Chiff and Fipple Forums

Paddy had the body of the set restored by Martin. I heard it was redone after. Paddy kept the chanter from the set and Michael copied it. It is a 14 3/8" chanter and Michael's copy plays well at A440.

So sorry to hear this. Brian is a friend and I hope he recovers. Sending good thoughts and prayers.

I have seen Leo R. D sets reeded so they blend well in sessions. Same for K&Q and other Rowsome copies. The large bore concert pitch chanters need not be too loud. It all depends on how they are reeded. I once heard a Wooff narrow bore D set that was reeded very loud, as well as a couple of othe...

I have a sample of the Arvorin coming. I contacted the maker in China. He can cast 65mm or whatever dia. rod which would work for bass drone pucks and bass reg bar mounts. He will custom make that size but needs a minimum order to do so. There have been a couple of versions of this material and he i...

Alex at Hermit Hill Folk Instruments makes a Delrin C for $75; tuneable is $100.

Thermowax is a brand name of cobbler's wax once made in England. The company who made it closed shop and sold their business to Caswell, who no longer makes the product. The GHB maker C E Kron, paid for the rights to make it, as it was the last commercial wax of its type available. He occasionally s...

When modifying cobblers' wax, you can melt it in a sort of double boiler or use a mini crock pot, which are a good temperature to melt everything but not burn it. I pour the melted mixture into a bucket of 96 to 100 degree water and allow it to cool to that water temperature. Pull off a ball smaller...

I make and sell "cobblers' wax", available at piperssupply.com. I also supply it to the NPU store. It is a mixture of rosin, pitch, beeswax and some jojoba oil or lanolin. Real pine pitch can no longer be bought. Most shoemakers don't like to use bitumen (mineral pitch or asphalt, e.g. roo...

Both are free-blowing whistles. The Viper does have a bit more back-pressure and I could barely keep up with the air demand. The older model takes even more air and hardly has any back-pressure at all. I found it almost unplayable for me. The Viper is a definite improvement in play-ability IMO.

I know of one duo where the piper had an 18" chanter that liked to be 20 cents sharp of B flat and was playing with a friend who had a B flat concertina tuned at modern pitch. He was not happy with his attempts to drop the pitch of the chanter. I joked that it might be better to have the 'tina ...

At the length and bores of the big flat sets, the pitch can be made flatter or sharper than the pitch advertised. Forty years ago an 18 inch chanter was sometimes referred to as a B flat stick. In reality most 18 inchers played somewhat sharp of B flat and the pitch more referred to them being flat ...

Switch to all cane reeds. Tone will be better and you will like the sound with the chanter.

I removed them from the regs, polished them and cleaned them with alcohol, then painted the coating on with a small natural bristle artists' brush in two coats. It is self-leveling so no brush marks are left. They look exactly the same before and after the process. Pictures would show no difference....

See the thread in the uilleann pipe forum titled "Like shiny pipes?". I will try it on some whistles next. Highly recommended.

I corrected the name of the source of the ProtectaClear coating mentioned above.