[Harp-L] Chromatic maintenance problem - have i done something silly?

["Bill" <bill.eborn@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

I hope someone can help me with this

I bought a 14 hole Hering a couple of months ago and amaterish harp tech that i am, after falling head over heels in love and playing it non-stop for a week, the slide got a bit sticky, so I took the mouthpiece apart to clean it up a bit. I was used to doing this, as it was continual problem on the Suzuki I had previously.  The first thing that happened was that i stripped out the threads in the wooden comb.  I managed to overcome this by carefully putting some Araldite (epoxy resin) inside the screw hole and allowing it to dry, so that I could get the screws to bite again.  

When I put it back together again I found that, blowing on hole 5 on the 14 holer (for the G/Ab) I can't get a single note, it sounds as if the air is leaking.  Initially I thought it might be a problem with my reassembling of the four part slide mechanism but i took it apart again today and tried blowing into the hole without the slide mechanism and found i had the same problem still.  Would i be right in diagnosing a cracked comb and if so what can i do?  

Thanks in anticipation

Bill