redwood dronereeds ?

[uilleannfinlander]

sometime ago there was thread about these dronereeds...
Summa summarum , nice to hear more about .. playability, tone, volume etc

[Ted]

Fergmaun was the only one who responded before about these reeds that had bought a set. You might try to PM him about them.

[Kevin L. Rietmann]

Redwood as in Sequoia sempervirens? Was he using that for the body? I'd assume so as the big tree isn't the pithiest stuff around, far as I know. So turning out dowels with bores and lays and tying a tongue on to that?

[Ted]

Redwood reeds are not made from California redwood but Padauk, a red African or Asian timber. I think the tongues are tupperware (synthetic).

[Ted]

The timber is spelled padouk. The tongues are glass fiber. Their adverts. say they (for GHB) sound like cane. Horsepucky! Only cane sounds like cane. A very expensive substitute with an inferior sound IMHO.

[Ted]

$125 plus shipping! I sell cane reeds that DO sound like cane for about 1/3 of that.

[Fergmaun]

I have a set of these redwood reeds.

Easy to set up with steady pressure with a woody sound

But you can not beat the sound from full cane drone reeds when they work.

My Andreas Rogge D set came with Black plastic body with white plastic tongue,

I then tried Pipe Dreams Ezeedrone plastic body with clear plastic tongue

Then I heard about Martin Preshaw Boxwood or Cherry body with cane tongue (I got Cherry body) tenor/baritone.

I have all cane reeds by A Rogge, A Moller from ebay and hobgoblin music shop

I got a set of drone reeds from Xavier Boderiou
RedWood drone reed body of the reed in padouk (african red wood) with clear plastic tongue the set I got

At present using bass cane reed by Jim Wenham, baritone cane reed ebay or hobgoblin and tenor redwood.

Cheers

Ferg

[Kevin L. Rietmann]

$40 for a single unwavering note? That's crazy talk. I think I've spent $125 total over 18 years on razor blades, string, beeswax, pitch, sandpaper, gas to go on elder collecting excursions...

So is padouk supposed to be more water resistant than your average timber? I'd think if that was what you're going after lignum vitae would be your best bet, or one of the vera species. I made a nice stock cup out of one of those. They still use lig for boat bearings, it can't be beat. But it is about the densest crap that grows, and the veras are scarcely much lighter, so maybe that was too harsh for the tone.

I seem to remember padouk as your typical schtuff you'd use for an exotic looking end table.

[Calum]

There is no particular magic about cane. I have a set of GHB drone reeds that are, in my not so humble opinion, better than cane.

Not that I'm defending this particular make, having never heard them in any kind of bagpipe - though I do have time for the maker's opinions.

[Ted]

Just got an email from a piper who got a set of the Redwood reeds. He said the tenor sounds pretty good, but he did not like the sound of the baritone and bass reeds. He is using the tenor reed but replaced the other two with cane. Synthetics in bellows pipes do not sound as good as cane reeds. Most of the cane drone reed sets I make for uilleann, border and smallpipes players are to replace the EZEE drone or other composites that were supplied by the maker. I have yet to hear anyone say that they liked the composites better than cane. Mostly I hear nothing but praise (often quite glowing praise) about the sound of the cane reeds. Some wood bodied reeds with wood or cane tongues are not so objectionable and have a fairly nice purr. I would say "there is no particular magic about" composites, especially in bellows pipes drones. The maker of Redwood reeds say they are close to cane, but the one piper who I know who bought them doesn't think so. I am more interested in the opinions of the users rather than the makers. They want to sell their product so would not say they make a product that doesn't sound so good.