Re: [Harp-L] Treating reeds for stress



You won't be annealing brass at the temperatures you've listed. 70-30 brass anneals at 800-1400 F and it quickly sweats out the zinc in the allo towards the upper end of that number. Machineries Handbook didn't have any specs for brass alloys and annealing but an ASTM spec was readily available. Most of the harmonica reeds I've seen recently appear to be yellow not red brass so the 70-30 spec should be in the ballpark. There is a listing for the stress relief temperature and it is 500 F for an hour. I regularly anneal copper and that starts to get soft once you get it over 700F. The rate of cooling has nothing to do with annealing of copper alloys. I'm with Vern, I think annealing brass reeds isn't going to make them a better or longer lived spring. maybe stress relieving them would but my guess is polishing the surface would yield better results.

Sure reeds in harmonicas do break but for me the rate at which they currently are failing doesn't merit any intervention. It is years not months days or weeks. The most significant change you can make to enhance harmonica reed life is playing technique.

fjm



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