When to use a wire rush?

Lorenzo · Post by **Lorenzo** » Mon Oct 16, 2006 8:25 am

Tony wrote:Is it a bore thing or a reed thing...
Meaning: Can Froment D chanters be re-reeded to play well without the rush?

That's just the thing. I bet you can make a reed that plays sharp in any chanter and tune it down with a rush. I don't really know though, But conversely, I did have a long narrow reed that played perfect at Bb, up and down, in the Froment B chanter. Explain that.

Tony · Post by **Tony** » Mon Oct 16, 2006 10:31 am

I had a similar experience with my Angus Bb chanter. Brad sent 5 working reeds with the chanter. I could get it to play nicely in B and anywhere in between. Sorry I had to sell that chanter. It had good tone... just a bit too long for me to play comfortably.

I think many of the Bb chanters are designed to play somewhere between B and Bb, so the right reed could possibly play either pitch.

reedman · Post by **reedman** » Mon Oct 16, 2006 1:44 pm

when you reed a concert chanter to its correct pitch,the three D's should all play roughly in tune at 440hz or the chanters given pitch,

I use a meter when I'm reeding a chanter up to help me get the correct pitch for the chanter, using a good meter will help you get the chanters true pitch,

on some concert chanters I can be up to 442hz before the three D's are all playing around the same pitch with its new reed, its no good trying to get a chanter to play at 440hz when its true pitch playing is at 442hz-443hz you can alter the reed as much as you like, it just ain't gonna happen.

all the best.

leremarkable · Post by **leremarkable** » Mon Oct 16, 2006 2:55 pm

I played an Alain Froment D chanter for twelve years with a reed that Alain made, without a steel rush.
My C set does have a very thin gauge rush, with touches of blutac in places, and I dust the blutac with talc to prevent it from sticking to the inside of the bore.
I have made many reeds for Froment D chanters which have not needed rushes at all, but as anyone who goes around to different climes knows, different areas or individual notes even on a chanter can go out of tune in relation to other areas or notes, and a quick adjustment to the blutac can be a quick reversible way to settle it.
The bottom D, the G and the A are notes that often require adjustment, depending on prevailing conditions.
Starting from the point of your chanter being in tune with the drones is the best possible way to get your set sounding like a set of pipes. At least then you can start to get your regulators right.

Lorenzo · Post by **Lorenzo** » Tue Oct 17, 2006 9:26 am

Good post, leremarkable.

My first reed was a short one, but a great reed (too good for me at that time). It played about ¼ step above standard in my wide bore D chanter, so not knowing much about rushing at that time I thinned the blades to flatten it. It came right down to standard pitch and still played great, almost too easy. I was lucky because of my dry climate. Anywhere else the reed probably would have sunk on certain notes, being so thin.

BZH29 · Post by **BZH29** » Tue Oct 17, 2006 11:23 am

I was with Alain the whole afternoon and I tell him the answer from leremarkable ; he said me : " he is right "

molduche · Post by **molduche** » Fri Oct 27, 2006 2:23 am

Just discovered this debate about rush or no rush , and I was surprised to discover that a majority of pipers seem to consider that a chanter equipped with a rush is suspect , and therefore that the maker is just unable to make a good chanter , and tries to cure this with a piece of wire .
Why not say the same about regulators then , nobody seems upset by the fact that they all have a tuning rush and that they cannot function properly without one ?
Why don't people understand that it is the same with a chanter , it is nothing more than a regulator with open holes instead of keys , and cannot work without one ?
Of course , you can occasionally get a reed which does not need a rush , very seldom , but you will be lucky if you get both octaves right , with both F# tuned with the drones , as well as As and back D , and even if you get that , the volume of the chanter is very often too loud compared with drones and regs . A rush is the solution to all these problems , and old makers of the past knew it well .
I have two sets , a concert pitch made by Dave Williams and a A.Froment chanter , and a C# set made by Alain as well ( a copy of S.Ennis's Coyne ) , and both chanters are equipped with a long rush , and they are perfectly in tune on both octaves , and moreover they have ...the..sound !
If I try to remove the rushes , everything is out of tune .
So why not accept the fact that a uilleann-pipe chanter is designed to function with a rush , like regulators ( once again remember that makers of the past always used them ) , rather than criticize the maker and suggest that he should make a better bore !
Anyway , I have always noticed that D chanters without a rush , even if they are in tune , sound more like a saxophone than a chanter , but it all depends on your conception of the u.pipes ! " A hive of honey sound ! "

billh · Post by **billh** » Fri Oct 27, 2006 5:17 am

I have never seen an unaltered (historic) flat chanter which required a rush.

Most concert pitch chanters are not designed to require a rush. That is not to say that a design which does assume a rush is inferior; certainly it offers some advantages over the equally common electrical tape over toneholes, etc. Personally I don't prefer it - among other things it does alter the tone, as molduche infers.

I do believe however that any significant amounts of stuff on a rush tend to alter the acoustics of the instrument dramatically. This speaks to me of serious problems somewhere - possibly compensating for a design that is inherently too sharp, or in the case of some old chanters, compensating for prior alterations and damage (aka vandalism). If a chanter is to be rushed, the rush should ideally be part of the original chanter design (as is Alain's), relatively smooth, and not have lumps of stuff all over it.

Same goes for regulators really, but it seems that we like, or at least tolerate, a muffled tone on the regs and because regs don't have to play two octaves (in fact you want to avoid that...), the extreme disturbance of the bore doesn't ruin the octave relationships and harmonic alignment. In the case of chanters you have much less latitude.

Bill

gandalfouille · Post by **gandalfouille** » Sat Oct 28, 2006 6:06 am

talking about acoustic... A rush with blue tack (in a small) quantity doesn't alter so much the acoustic of the instrument. The whole bore has a dynamic which is much stronger than this small alterations. If you measure the standing waves of your pipes you would be very surprise. It's just that people don't like to think that they have wire in their pipes.
You know that if you move a tone hole up or done of 1mm you will have less effets on the tuning than temperature and humidity can have. Think about that and you will find a rush very usefull.

Nick

PS: Molduche, you have so a lot of good pipes!! you lucky boy!

billh · Post by **billh** » Sat Oct 28, 2006 6:50 am

gandalfouille wrote:talking about acoustic... A rush with blue tack (in a small) quantity doesn't alter so much the acoustic of the instrument. The whole bore has a dynamic which is much stronger than this small alterations. If you measure the standing waves of your pipes you would be very surprise. ..

Sorry, I just can't agree. The bore is *defined* by the cross sectional area along the axis, and a rush is effectively a bore change. That's the whole principle of how a rush works...

regards

Bill

Cayden · Post by **Cayden** » Sat Oct 28, 2006 7:01 am

Unrushed chanters sounding like a saxophone and permanently rushed chanters. I wonder if that has any relationship with the fact some people refer to the sound of a particular maker's pipes as 'Music from the Sock' i.e. sounding like there's a woolly sock around the chanter muffling the tone.

Joseph E. Smith · Post by **Joseph E. Smith** » Sat Oct 28, 2006 7:05 am

Peter Laban wrote:Unrushed chanters sounding like a saxophone and permanently rushed chanters. I wonder if that has any relationship with the fact some people refer to the sound of a particular maker's pipes as 'Music from the Sock' i.e. sounding like there's a woolly sock around the chanter muffling the tone.

That'd be my guess.

Tony · Post by **Tony** » Sat Oct 28, 2006 9:36 am

Peter Laban wrote:Unrushed chanters sounding like a saxophone....

OK, so a wide bore D chanter with a good strong reed is a screamer! Rush the bore and you tame it's tone.

Agree?

Isn't this a good thing?

Cayden · Post by **Cayden** » Sat Oct 28, 2006 10:29 am

Tony wrote:
Peter Laban wrote:Unrushed chanters sounding like a saxophone....
OK, so a wide bore D chanter with a good strong reed is a screamer! Rush the bore and you tame it's tone.

Agree?

Isn't this a good thing?

That was not a point I put forward, someone else did. My point was a different one.

But while you're at it: what's the point of making an instrument you don't like the sound of so you have to stuff things up the bore to muffle it down?