Re: Maintenance Question

["Stephen Shaw" <moorcot@xxxxxxx>]

I found that I can quite readily change a reed in Special 20s and in my Echo 
double-reeded harps using just what's in the Lee Oskar tool kit, a small 
punch and a small hammer.  I'd be ashamed for any self-respecting repair man 
to see the untidy bodge I make of the job, but it gives a new lease of  life 
to what would have prematurely become scrap metal.  As I'm in confessing 
mode, here goes with further atrocities.  If I've used up my supply of 
cannibalised correct-length reeds, I simply take one that is slightly too 
long and snip the end off with scissors.  Needs a bit of tuning afterwards 
to say the least!  Sometimes I accidentally make the rivet hole a bit too 
big when I punch out the old reed.  The new reed then swivels around 
uselessly in the hole when inserted.  No problem!  A tiny blob of 
quick-setting Araldite will anchor the fixed end of the reed behind the 
rivet to the reedplate.  I make sure that the reed is true to its slot just 
before the glue sets rock-hard.  I've found that the reeds in Lee Oskars are 
fixed in much more tenaciously and don't lend themselves to this crude 
approach.  But as they rarely go south anyway it's not a worry.

I can tell you - the new reed sounds the same as the others; the repair 
lasts pretty well, considering that the replacement reed is not new;  and 
that, if nothing else, I still have an in-tune harp which is usually good 
enough to play out and about, and more than good enough to practise with.

I was going to say that that is my 2 cents'-worth,  but as you can see I 
don't spend that kind of money in one go.

Thank goodness I've got that off my chest.  It's a kind of coming-out.

Steve Shaw

Want more than the blues?  Try Irish!
http://mysite.freeserve.com/trad_irish_harmonica



>From: wmharps@xxxxxxxxx
>Reply-To: wmharps@xxxxxxxxx
>To: harp-l@xxxxxxxxxx
>Subject: Re: Maintenance Question
>Date: Fri, 20 Jun 2003 12:18:50 CDT
>
>Jim asks:
> > Just curious, in regards to how many on the list
> > do serious repair work on their own harps. I'm
> > not talking about installing a replacement reed
> > set. I'm talking about replacing an individual
> > reed if it goes bad.
> >
> >>
>I do a lot of this kind of stuff, and I took the advice of the esteemed Pat
>Missin and do this work without specific reed knockout and setting tools.  
>I
>went to Home Depot and bought a couple of very small pin punches, and I 
>took
>one of them to my bench grinder and made it small enough to knock the rivet 
>out
>of a reedplate.  I support the reedplate with an old metal Meisterklasse 
>comb.
>When I'm putting in a new reed I support the plate on a miniature jewelers
>anvil, and tap it with a tack hammer.  My total investment in tools is 
>about
>$20.
>-tim
>

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