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I'm working on a 2.2 and I am almost crazy with this flute.It play well through Ha Go but I'm having a lot of problem mainly with Hi meri which is hard to play. I spent my afternoon searching for tuning spots (I felt that Hi is sounding a little compressed comparing with other notes and I think that can be the problem), reading about mouthpiece angle, and comparing with another flutes I have from other makers or flutes I already finished... I really don't know in which point I lost... Any suggestion about what to try to make this specific note (Hi meri) sound easier?
I will keep searching but it's very good to try a little help from my friends...
Peace,
Henrique
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Hola Henrique, Any pics of your Utaguchi?
I just made Hi Go on a Gyokusui more responsive. Much of it was due to the top opening being too big and the utaguchi dip being too deep.
- Perry
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Hi Perry...
I will try to post some pictures soon...
I was also wondering if the ambient temperature is afecting the sensibility on the flute as well...I know that the temperature really work on flute playability... This morning a began to play on my main 1.8 jiari and it was hard to play some notes on it too... I bought this jiari on october of 2007 and it was Spring here... now three days before the winter arise, the temperature fell from 15° celsius to 5°... so it's the first winter with a good flute by my side and I'm feeling how much it's really affected...
I don't remember the exact temperature on the day I started the 2.2, but I think it was about 15°... this variation in temperature made me fall into mistakes?
This flute is to be a gift to a friend and I want to give him a flute that he can play with certain easily... he will make a travel around South America, and I would like to send a good representative shakuhachi with him... I have one month before he start to travel... I will start another flute this week and send the better of both with him...
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Hi Jeff,
Jeff wrote:
Yungflutes wrote:
Hola Henrique, Any pics of your Utaguchi?
Much of it was due to the top opening being too big and the utaguchi dip being too deep.
- PerryHi Perry,
I posted on this topic yesterday, but it didn't make it for some reason, so I'll try again. I was wondering about this quote. When you say the utaguchi dip was too deep, what do you mean? This is interesting to me and possibly helpful to know. Also, what did you do to make the dip less deep?
cheers
Jeff
Here are some photos of the Gyokusui 1.6. It is a fabulous player except that Hi Go sort of "disappears" whe playing a piece of music. If you were to play scales, you can hit it OK. So, through deductive methods, I found the problem on this particular shakuhachi being around the utaguchi.
It wasn't a terribly deep utaguchi, just a hair too deep.
We decided that caliber of instrument would do best with a new horn inlay to raise the edge.
Both internal sides of the utaguchi were also a bit funneled out. So I filled it with bamboo dust and CA glue
I refashioned the sides to be more straight up and out of the bore.
The first coat of urushi is cured this morning. The blue tape is at the top 1/4 spot for the pressure point in Kan. It doesn't always work but this time it was spot on! That's my coffee, not a cup of urushi. I take it black, no sugar.
I left a 1cm piece of paper in the bore at that spot and explored the top. After a bit of sluething, I found that two pieces made Hi Go Spring to life with much more accessibility. BTW, I am fortunate to be able to play a freshly urushied flute. This speeds up the process.
I ended up raising it only a hair more than 1mm. It will need a few more coats of urushi to bring it up to what the two pieces of paper did.
I've worked on Hi Go on many flutes. It takes working from a combination of angles to deduce what is happening. I also did a slight bit of undercutting. Undercutting changes the tone of the flute so it has to be done with care. Well, everything does. Rarely will the same things work on another flute with the same problem. That's the fun of it!
Hope this helps,
Perry
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Hi Jeff...
Let me to interfere a little since you made a question to Perry...
If you made the first cut on the utaguchi too smaller from what you want with no dip at first, you can gradually sand/cut it (independent of the angle you want the utaguchi, it works like this) until the dip start to appear... then you can test between every little increase on the deepness of the dip...
I hope this can also help you...but anyway let's wait for our friend Perry who can say it for sure...
About my flute I still doesn't have a cam to take the pics ( I will borrowed one tonight), but I made some works on flute and it is starting to sound better, and, another doubt come in the recent job made on the 2.2. I will ask when I can place the pics...
Peace
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Hey guys, looks like I wrote on Jeff's post by hitting the edit button instead of the quote button. One of the pitfalls of being a moderator!
Musgo de Pedra wrote:
I was also wondering if the ambient temperature is afecting the sensibility on the flute as well...I know that the temperature really work on flute playability... This morning a began to play on my main 1.8 jiari and it was hard to play some notes on it too... I bought this jiari on october of 2007 and it was Spring here... now three days before the winter arise, the temperature fell from 15° celsius to 5°... so it's the first winter with a good flute by my side and I'm feeling how much it's really affected...
I don't remember the exact temperature on the day I started the 2.2, but I think it was about 15°... this variation in temperature made me fall into mistakes?
Henrique,
I think we all know that a flute feels different when it is cold to when it is warm. So, I always play a flute for at least 20 minutes before I do any tuning. By that time, the flute will be where it should be so that the owner will also have the same experience with playing (after 20 minutes).
Extreme temperature differences will affect how it responds but I don't know if that will cause a flute to be dysfunctional. I have had the experience of leaving a flute on stage under theater lights for an hour before playing. The flute is very sharp then, but everything works.
Happy blowing my friend, Perry
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Thank you man...
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Thanks Perry and Henrique,
The pictures along with advice is invaluable.
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Hey guys,
I'm sure you know this already but I'll just mention it for the sake of this discussion. Many flutes have difficult notes. It could be a problem or not. It depends upon how accessible it is when playing the music it was designed for. I've done a lot of tweaks such as this one for many players. I prefer to have them in the shop so that we can do a "fitting" to ensure that we are on the same page. I never tell people there is a problem with a note unless there really is a problem. For example, if a note squeaks or disappears when passing through it on a scale, there may be a real problem. What many players seek is balance, each note should flow into one another and feel like it's the same flute. If a note is just difficult, I usually say it can be easier.
As of today, after the second coat of urushi, Hi Go is easier. I'll keep you updated when the flute is finished.
Best, Perry
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I was so impressed at the flute building expertise of Jeff Cairns... (Great photos and info Perry)
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Thanks Lance, but though I dabble in making shakuhachi, I don't consider myself anything near an expert when compared to the likes of Perry and many others on this forum. I appreciate your kind words though.
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Hi
Here are some pictures of the flute I was talking about...
Here I got a question...when I started the flute I opened the nodes until I assumed that Ro was sounding good... so I left the node below the way it was but working on Hi Go I tried to sand it a little to see if the meris here would begin to sound easier...and they did...before sand it, the node in the exact direction from the fourth hole to the bottom was about 3,5 mm...now it has about 2 mm. Does this node affected the air stream enough to make Hi Go became difficult? It's the first time that something like this happens on the flutes I made... I used to had a lot of different problems, so this is a new and good learning...
Oh Edosan... my hand was trembling with the emotion of post some pics and it slipped to the wrong button in the moment I clicked... I'm sorry... : {p
Peace
Last edited by Musgo da Pedra (2008-06-20 09:21:05)
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Musgo da Pedra wrote:
Hi
Here I got a question...when I started the flute I opened the nodes until I assumed that Ro was sounding good... so I left the node below the way it was but working on Hi Go I tried to sand it a little to see if the meris here would begin to sound easier...and they did...before sand it, the node in the exact direction from the fourth hole to the bottom was about 3,5 mm...now it has about 2 mm. Does this node affected the air stream enough to make Hi Go became difficult? It's the first time that something like this happens on the flutes I made... I used to had a lot of different problems, so this is a new and good learning...
Hole Henrique. Nice looking flute. The utaguchi angles look pretty good. The top from the side view seems a little horizontal for my taste but most likely not the culprit to the problem you are having. My guess is that it is due to a resonance spot (pressure point) being too big, hole misplaced hole or something else.
Try dropping a tuning bead back to one of the areas you removed nodal material from. And then try other areas such as near the top of the utaguchi and all around the thumb hole.
Good luck, Perry
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Musgo da Pedra wrote:
Hi
Here I got a question...when I started the flute I opened the nodes until I assumed that Ro was sounding good... so I left the node below the way it was but working on Hi Go I tried to sand it a little to see if the meris here would begin to sound easier...and they did...before sand it, the node in the exact direction from the fourth hole to the bottom was about 3,5 mm...now it has about 2 mm. Does this node affected the air stream enough to make Hi Go became difficult? It's the first time that something like this happens on the flutes I made... I used to had a lot of different problems, so this is a new and good learning...
Hole Henrique. Nice looking flute. The utaguchi angles look pretty good. The top from the side view seems a bit horizontal, but most likely not the culprit to the problem you are having. My guess is that it is due to a resonance spot (pressure point) being too big, a misplaced hole... or something else.
Try dropping a tuning bead back to one of the areas you removed nodal material from. And then try other areas such as near the top of the utaguchi and all around the thumb hole.
Good luck, Perry
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Thank you Perry...
I think the flute is showing the way it want's to go...little by little it's getting better... I am going very slow with it and I will certainly test your tips...
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Henrique, make sure that the utaguchi face is absolutely flat. By the side view picture of the blowing end of your shakuhachi, it appears that there is some curve to it. I have had trouble in the past with this part and found that a slightly curved face will cause unwanted situations. I can't be specific about the kind of problems, but sound was 'less easy' to make when the face had a curve to it.
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Hi Jeff!
Man, you have eagle eyes!!!
I noticed that small curvature, but I wasn't thinking in it as a problem...I will try to flat it...
Make a really flat utaguchi is one of my main difficulties. I don't use a flat rasp but a sandpaper that I glued on a piece of wood (I think it's doesn't a problem) ... Maybe I should start to use a support that provides that the flute don't do any movement during the sanding...I use to put in a table and make a tenon with my hands, attaching the flute and the table...I can't say that it doesn't make any movement...
Maybe I also need to put more attention on this step...
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Hi Henrique,
As I said, I'm not entirely sure that the flatness of the utaguchi face has effect on sound, but my own experiments suggest that it does. I don't know the physics of it though. Comments from more knowledgeable makers on this would be very welcome.
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When I started the flattening work on the utaguchi, I realized that the utaguchi was not too sharp...It was a little square on the top... When I finished and sharpened the utaguchi, the meri notes become very much easier... I am almost considering the flute finished...
Thank you Jeff and Perry for all the support...
A big hug and peace...
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