[Harp-L] Re: tuner recommendations

["Dr. Michael J. Marino, DC" <m.marino@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

I use Software tuners. Two of them to be exact. They are in order of
usage Dirk's Accordion tuner with the note set up for chromatic in
both ET and J7T (Equal Temperament, Just 7 Tritones) and also TuneIt
both are very good products and with a good quality Pezio' microphone
I can calibrate it down to tenths of a cents tolerance. I have
calibrated tuning forks that i use as checks. Dirk's will set you back
a bit, but it should be less than the $200 US you want to spend. The
nice part with that one is once you set up your table the program has
the ability to auto sense or do manual choice. These are a big help
with some reeds that you can pick up the secondary harmonic as much as
the root you are going for. 

Speaking of which and slightly off topic, has anyone come up with a
consistent way of eliminating some of the unwanted secondary
frequencies that you can get off of a reed or ways of ensuring that
the prime is the strongest? I use Shofu bits for tuning and have found
a few different techniques that allow to clean up a note and good
clean spike, but none to remove strong secondary frequencies. If
anyone wishes to know what I do for the cleaning up of the note, it is
simple though you need to practice a bit to get the touch right. If
anyone is interested get a hold of me and will gladly pass the
information on.

Michael