Re: [Harp-L] customizing Lee Oskars

[Michael King <king.michaelt@xxxxxxxxx>]

I was not addressing gapping or tuning reeds, but of lowering the height of
the reed in relationship to the plate where it is riveted. My apologies if I
wasn't clear. I've no troubles gapping or tuning, but dropping that height
to get more of the reed properly positioned over the slot is where the
brittleness is in evidence.

On Sun, Aug 30, 2009 at 9:44 PM, fjm <bad_hat@xxxxxxxx> wrote:

> Michael King said;
>
>  One HUGE problem with the LOs is the reeds are brittle.
>>
>
> Wow! not my experience at all.  I once foolishly used discarded reedplates
> from a couple of lower pitched Lee Oskar harmonicas to create a low A
> harmonica.  I had never retuned that low before.  I repitched 20 reeds, many
> of them using solder in large amounts.  Remember I was using  used plates.
>  I broke one reed out of the 20.  I really manipulated the reeds to an
> extreme.  Getting something that low to play reasonably took a lot of
> adjustment.  The reed that broke was on its way out before I touched it.  I
> think it may have been a 4 blow.  Anyhow that was over a decade ago.  The
> harmonica still plays quite well and I haven't had any reed failures.  My
> initial manipulations of the reeds were inept and the harmonica survived it.
>
> On another occasion I had traveled out of town to a Lee Oskar workshop.  If
> I recall correctly we were asked to bring along a D harmonica. Being cheap I
> brough an older much played harmonica.  We retuned  the harmonicas to the
> tuning Ben Bouman showcased on a youtube video recently.  3 of the reeds
> drop significantly in pitch.  I did this without solder plus my initial
> attempt went awry when I accidentally tuned the reed next to the reed I was
> trying to lower.  I kept scraping then sounding it and the pitch wasn't
> changing at all.  By the time I realised my mistake I'd dropped the wrong
> reed almost a whole tone.  I retuned it back to where it was supposed to be.
>  That harmonica is well over a decade old.  It too was severly abused by my
> efforts.  It started out used and I regapped the retuned reeds after having
> dropped some of them well over a whole tone in pitch.  It still plays fine
> today.  So I guess your mileage may vary applies here.  fjm
>
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