Re: [Harp-L] Soaking a plastic comb harp?

[JohnnieHarp <johnnieharp@xxxxxxxxx>]

> Now I've seen everything.


Ahhh Grasshopper, I am glad that you are learning...

I must agree with you're implied question:

Why on earth would anyone “soak” a wooden combed harmonica?

Extended exposure to liquids does horrible things to an unsealed, wood
combed; sharp tynes protrude;  then tend to assume distorted positions
side-to-side so that the holes are of varying sizes; the wood is soft
and potentially fragile. The harp becomes impossible to play with
precision or comfort.

However, this is only the first part of the story. Once the harp was
thoroughly soaked and the comb fully swollen, we'd take a razor sharp
blade and trim the protruding tynes back flush to the front of the
harp. To play, we'd have to re-soak our harps before and during a gig,
to return the now shrunken tynes, back to being flush with the front
of the harmonica.

Some players preferred the soaking and triming approach as It was
better to have the comb flush with the reed plates while playing
rather than before playing. Again a personal choice, often dependent
on the amount of saliva generated and the playing time per harp per
gig.

To improve playability rather than soaking, some would “dunk” their
harps briefly to “moisturize” their harps, mimizing comb swelling.
This made them more responsive immediately, especially the low note
reeds. This is the same reason why someone would dunk and “moisturize”
any harp, plastic, metal, glass combed, etc.

It may be that rather than minimizing air leakage around the reed
plate, we are minimizing air flow leakage between the reed and the
reed slot, especially in the case of the longer, lower note reeds
where the total area of the gap is larger. Liquid embossing if you
will ...