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Does plating affect the sound; no longer an issue...

40K views 189 replies 46 participants last post by  kymarto 
#1 ·
Per the Woodwind and Brasswind (presumably lifted from Yamaha literature). While the saxophone isn't addressed, the effect of plating on clarinet keys and posts didn't just nibble at the edges of a discernable difference, didn't merely add warmth to the tone, but actually made "a dramatic difference".

Boy have I (many of us) been wrong on this one.

Case closed, no further room for discussion. On to precious stone key touches...

Yamaha YCL-CSG Series Professional Bb Clarinet
What is HAMILTON PLATING?
Hamilton plating is an alloy of gold and nickel. It's extremely resistant to wear and discoloration, and delivers a powerful tone with excellent projection. On the CSGH instruments, the Hamilton Plating is actually not only on the keys, but on the posts as well. In artist testing, it was shown to be a dramatic difference between instruments that had just Hamilton plated keys and Hamilton plated keys and posts.
lest you think I'm making it up:
http://www.wwbw.com/Yamaha-YCL-CSG-Series-Professional-Bb-Clarinet-471270-i1414054.wwbw
 
#136 ·
A bit OT re: sax, but I did a calculation of the cost of building an 18K gold flute vs a silver flute, taking into account the cost of the base metal and figuring that construction costs were roughly the same. It appears that makers pocket about $6000 in pure profit from the gold flute--maybe that's where the "rich sound" angle comes in :mrgreen:
 
#137 ·
well you folks that worship the science god. ive read some of these wehre the commenter says they base their belief in the science on their experience in playing many horns. also stated is that a great deal of variability exists horn to horn. so with obviously no measurable difference in the things that matter to the manufacturer, how do you explain this. clearly the science is lacking in my opinion. knowing this inaccuracy, i fail to see how your so certain the science explains it.
 
#141 ·
Yes, there are variations between apparently identical instruments - and there always will be until such time as the Star Trek replicator is invented.
What this means is that every single instrument will have its own unique tone.
OK, so the differences will be small for the most part - but in some cases they can be quite dramatic. Anyone who's spent some time testing batches of horns will have noticed this - how every so often they come across a horn that seems a bit lifeless and another that simply sings...even though they're apparently identical and in full working order.

It's within this ambiguity that the opportunities for marketing lie.
If I were given a dozen brass tenors and a dozen bronze tenors, there's a good chance that within this group I would find a bronze tenor with a warm, dark tone - and a brass one with a bright tone. This would fit in with the claim that bronze gives a darker tone - and I could use that for marketing.
But, I would also very likely find a brass tenor that was even warmer than the bronze, and a bronze one that was brighter than a brass one - but as that's not my selling angle I would ignore it.
Because part of my work involves setting up batches of horns for dealers I get to do this test on a regular basis - and to date I haven't found any consistent and repeatable differences.

So much for marketing, what about the science?
Well, you have to look at what it is you're examining and then try to find a system that can produce measurable results as simply as possible - and it doesn't get much simpler than an organ pipe. No moving parts, a plain tube - something you can reproduce with a greater degree of accuracy than a complex instrument body.
And that's exactly what's been done.
The results gleaned from such a test can be applied upwards through the range of all woodwind instruments as they all use the exact same physical system to produce a sound, and merely adding complexity will not change the laws of physics.

In the end though it boils down to what you want to believe.
That McGurk effect video posted earlier can be used to sum it up quite eloquently.
The science has been explained, the effect has been demonstrated - it's up to the individual to decide whether they want to hear what they want to hear...or what's actually there.

Regards,
 
#138 ·
unless one believes in the fact that every horn has a magic of his own, a mojo, the only explanation of the different sound of every saxophone is that the way a saxophone is made cannot be exactly replicated without producing variations in in each or some the several parts of it that are involved at different levels and in different manners in sound production.

One must have no idea of how a saxophone is made to think that you could bend it exactly in the same shape around a mandrel or pull or solder the toneholes all with tolerances of microns, of course tolerances are more ample than that and if a saxophone would be made in a much more precise way all it would achieve would be a higher uniformity but it would cost much more to produce and assemble all its parts let alone maintain it within those tolerances.

Saxophones have improved greatly in since their creation but the technology has pretty much stayed the same , that's why they are relatively cheap (for such a complex instrument) and they can be maintained by people with much experience but by means of relatively uncomplicated technology all at a cost that is very affordable.

The other day I have replaced a bumper of my new car, the bumper was made of moulded plastic had no particular electronics and was spayed in metal paint it took few hours to complete the operation and the repair consisted in taking the part off and screwing back the new part in. It costed 942€ which, at the moment would pay for 2 complete overhauls of a professional horn at the majority of the Dutch shops. And this was hardly a complex item to repair or one made in small series!



 
#139 ·
very nice videos but you didnt explain what features you can account for in your calculations are causing the variations. granted, they arent microns but i bet your theoretical calculations wont show significant differences for plus/minus .010 in. maybe not even .030.
 
#143 ·
Bore variations of as little as 1/100 of a millimeter can make a perceptible difference in a woodwind. I would say conservatively that .1mm variations (not local, but over some length) would almost certainly result in easily perceptible differences. This is especially true in the upper part of the bore and the neck.

It has been very educational to have been making shakuhachi flutes, in which the bore is hand-formed. It becomes very easy to see how dramatic very small bore changes sometimes can be (and other times not seem to matter at all).
 
#140 ·
in my opinion in the films it is clear to be seen that all processes are conducted within ample (if one would compare this to a precision instrument) tolerances. so anything really has variations of some significance and bearing on the sound, from the bending of the neck to the forming of the body to the pulling of the toneholes or the position of the keys. Each one of these variation or all of that has a bearing on the sound and I am not necessarily talking of the intonation which is pretty much something that has to do with the project of the horn but rather with the small alterations in , for example section of the bore of the body or neck or tonehole radius that have a bearing on the " colour" of the sound.

So, even assuming that all horns would be made to close perfectly and exactly the same way (and you know they are not because tech can spend much time in re-setting a new saxophone) there would be parts of the horn that are minutely different (but still significantly different) in many different areas and no two saxophones are exactly the same hence not playing exactly the same.

No doubt that a saxophone could be made to much higher tolerance (such as the (not musical!) instruments used in the astronautical industry ) but its cost would be prohibitive and you could hardly use it the way we do, put it on a standard for days on in a case in a hot car and expect it to play the next time we use it.

The saxophone and many other things that we use are made with a relatively precise technology but have a considerable amount of slack which allows us to produce them relatively cheaply and use them in a range of ways and environments and do so successfully BECAUSE of its relative simple technology and consequent " imperfections".
 
#146 ·
well ive just heard and looked at the calcs and youre saying that the calculation shows it to be insignificant. true. no one seems to be doing that for these other things you seem to think do matter. i think youll find the same thing for those. I think you do have pretty close tolerances inside a saxophone. so to me, your argument that it is those other things that make the difference is flawed logic.

i dont think you have enough information with calculation evidence to make those claims.

so, the whole science argument is bogus in my opinion. You dont have enough verified information. based on that standing wave calc alone, it would make no difference. i think there are too many assumptions and unknowns in reality for the equation to be wholly believed.
 
#147 ·
I take it that your premise is that the scientific understanding of sound production in a woodwind instrument is, in its current state, an approximation at best with many aspects poorly modeled.

I can buy that.

The conclusion you come to- that because the details are yet to be fully modeled there's no validity to acoustic science- seems to be more than a bit of a reach though.

That one can shove all sorts of blobs and impediments in the bore of a tenor sax and yet have it play indistinguishably to an audience or for the player is more a testament to human sensing and its easily influenced perception of sights, sounds, ETC. than a slam on the science. While the science can not accurately model the tiny details it is perfectly capable of working out "the big picture"- and things below the threshold of that "big picture" are by and large completely below the ability of human perception to ID. Plating/ lacquer on a sax almost certainly falls into that category. And plating only on the posts of a clarinet- not the keywork, just the posts- surely does.

I'd still try any horn before I bought it though- model be damned; they play different horn to horn. Just why? Were you able to accurately measure the horns inside from top to bottom in accurate detail down to say .01 MM including all the surface anomalies (hellishly difficult to do accurately and probably never has been done to even one sax) the science could almost certainly tell you what the salient differences were. That is to say- it'd be able to predict that they'd play differently.

Better or worse? Hoo boy- a completely different issue...
 
#148 ·
i completely agree with that "play it before buying". also, go with what you observe rather than trusting an expert - more about how you'll feel about later than science - but still justified.

i don't totally discount the acoustic theory but thought some were selling it harder than is justified. there is a lot of just dont know.

i worked in thermal and fluid flows for a while. i saw many tests get different results than we first predicted. then the calculation would be updated with different assumptions and boundary conditions to make the calculation match the result. the things we changed seemed trivial but significantly changed the result. the same people would swear by the ability of the models to predict results but we really never got it right the first time. I agree the tools are where you start with a new design but you need to look at historical experience too and take it with a grain of salt. and dont tell people how usre you are of the methods without some qualification.
 
#149 ·
From what I've read, the relationship of material and a standing wave inside that material have been researched a fair bit and the common results are that for the materials and material thickness used in musical instruments, the material won't matter much.

Assuming that material can be taken out of the equation, there are still the effects of toneholes and inside dimensions especially the neck which don't seem to have been researched as much as the material.

Just because the effects of toneholes and inside dimensions might not have been researched to the nth degree does not mean that the material/standing wave research ends up in the same bag and the material/standing wave research is valid on it's own.

How much tone hole and octave hole placement variation is there on one particular model of sax?
This variation would have some effect.
The variation might be in mm for the same model of sax depending on how the saxes are manufactured.

A plastic Grafton sax still sounds like a sax.
A plastic Grafton sax has not got the same tonehole design and tonehole edges and inside dimensions as an another sax though.
 
#151 ·
No, I'm saying that the differences in sound between a Grafton plastic sax and say a Selmer Mark VI are mainly due to different design and manufacturing and not due much at all to the material.

There are differences in sound due to design and manufacturing for different saxophones made of brass and the same holds true for a plastic sax.

Both the plastic and brass saxes sound like a sax.

If someone had never heard or seen a plastic sax before and was then given a demo of it, then I would think it would be understandable that they might expect the plastic sax to sound like a plastic kazoo because of the plastic material, but it doesn't work like that.
 
#152 ·
And the Grafton is perhaps the most telling example of how little effect body material has on the sound of a sax.
Pete Thomas posted an interesting sound-clip some time ago, in which he switched between a brass alto and the Grafton during the course of the piece. It isn't at all obvious.

So you have to ask the obvious question: If such radically different body materials make such little difference to the tone, how much difference could a different finish possibly make?
The recently-introduced Vibratosax confirms this., and perhaps even goes one better by having a plastic crook (the Grafton had a brass one).

Regards,
 
#160 ·
so has anyone got the calcs for this?

let say that in the horn, the air column is vibrating at some frequency. the horn, of whatever material, is vibrating independently with the air column vibration being the forcing function. in this coupled system the actual sound you hear is the combination of the vibrating horn and the vibrating air (superposition theory). this wont quite be right because the horn vibrating offers feedback to the air which is perhaps small but who knows what your ear can detect. This probably looks like a spring mass system with the horn mass attached to a base with a spring and a damper (plating/finish affect damping?) and forcing function of air column vibration.

to explain another way - each impact of a hammer hitting a bell leaves it vibrating at some natural frequency. thats what we hear. if the hammer could vibrate at an audible level, we should hear a combination of the 2 sounds. Imagine the pressure wave as the hammer repeatedly striking the bell and the saxophone as the bell. ignoring the feedback to the pressure wave, what you hear is a combination of the two sounds. in a saxophone, the amount of the metal vibrating would differ for high notes and low notes so it may be more pronounced on the low notes.

has anyone done a finite element model to determine the natural frequencies of horn itself? the modes?
 
#161 ·
Yes, these tests have been done with accelerometers attached to the horn body. The body expands one micrometer in response to the pressure of the air column. This translates into a radiated sound 10000x weaker than that of the air column. This is completely imperceptible. As an analogy, think about lighting a match in a room lilluminated by a 1000 watt floodlight. Yes, if the room is completely dark the light from the match is significant, but when the room is strongly illuminated, can you see the difference when the match is burning? More accurately: can you tell the difference between 10000 candles burning and 10001?

Here's something to chew on in reference to "who knows what the ear can detect?": an experiment was done with trombone bells, using ten top pro trombonists as test subjects. Unlike woodwind tubes, bone bells can and do vibrate enough to be significant. However in blind tests, not one of those pros could tell the bells apart, even though there were differences of up to 2dB in the partials making up the radiated sound spectrum measured at the position of the player's ear. 2dB is well within the range of perception. Oh, and of course all those guys could "hear" a clear difference in those bells before the lights went out...

In answer to your last question: as explained in F&R, even in a very thin tube of circular cross section, the lowest resonant frequency lies well above any playing frequency. Of course you can tap it and it will ring somewhat like a bell, but this is a deformational mode that is not excited by the air column. For an analog of what an air column would do to a bell, try to imagine a 360 degree hammer that strikes the bell at the same time around the entire circumference. In a normal bell, the first frequency at which the bell would ring if hit like that would be well in the supersonic range.
 
#162 ·
I am happy to have found this thread active.
I am currently trying a lovely SML nickel plated: quite an uncommon finish on a Gold Medal. And no engraving.
It sounds very well, but there is something in the finish stopping me from buying it. I am generally not fussy about the look of horns. My yani silver plated soprano now looks like a piece of rust and my tenor is green.

Any comment about nickel plated horns?

When, years ago, I used to work in a music shop, the old man had a theory about Selmers (SA80II at the time): They selected the best ones for engraving and the even better for silver plating.

Does it make sense?
 
#165 ·
horns are plated before they are in playable state so how would anybody know which is better to be plated based on a sound they cannot , yet, hear?

So, it doesn't make sense and it is an " urban legend" based on something totally impossible and illogical.

Any comment about nickel plated horns?
nickel plating has to be one of the more durable finishing but is is not to everybody's taste.

Even Selmer offered this finish (rare) in the past and a nickel plated horn from the '30 can look as good as new nowadays. The only problem is that undenting such a horn might result in the nickel plate cracking and that won't be very nice.
 
#163 ·
No, it doesn't.

Have a think about it...lacquered horn are far more popular than plated ones.
On the whole, players who prefer silver-plated horns will take lacquered ones instead - but player who don't like plated horns simply won't buy them.
It makes no sense then to make the 'best in range' horns all silver-plated.

Regards,
 
#164 ·
Thanks Stephen,
the man said they did that to justify the difference in price.
but I am still curious to know if there is a form of selection before the finishing.

There was on buffet clarinet: apparently R13, Evette, Evette Master Model used to come out from the same factory and branded differently after a test playing.

i have no idea what kind of quality control can be in use nowadays.
 
#166 ·
I think if I was a manufacturer I'd probably prefer to to plate the horns that had cosmetic blemishes that might show under a lacquer finish.
These would be harmless, and in no way affect the playability of the horn - for example, a visible seam joint.

Regards,
 
#169 ·
I have been told........ (urban legends always start this way) that all Asian saxophones are made using spent American shells used in Vietnam. (not a political statement!) :bluewink: if anything is wrong with them must be because of the Agent Orange!:twisted:
 
#173 ·
They're two different horns. I find my friend's Mk VI tenor stuffy and hard to play. I find mine free blowing with a nice spread sound when pushed. They were set up by the same technician. The finish is nearly identical.
 
#176 ·
What Milandro say is true,

Even it is the same model but produce over different time period will be different. Hell, even produced in the same time period will be different because of the final assemble and adjusting personal. If you don't trust me , look at the cork for the 2 same mdoel horn which is under the same key. the angel and depth of the cut usually various from person to person.
 
#177 ·
A sheet of metal is cut and folded to a frustum (decapitated cone), and brazed down the length (by hand). The heat distorts the metal. it is not round in cross section. Each one is slightly different. They are put over a mandrel and beaten until they approximately fit the mandrel. They are all beaten slightly differently, so the metal is distorted differently, especially since the beating work-hardens the metal, and that will occur in different places on the metal for each cone. . So each come comes off that mandrel a slightly different shape. And much bigger differences occur in the bell, bow and neck. Shape does make differences to tone.

So two saxes coming off the same production line on the same day will be different, just as two eggs fried the same way in a restaurant will not be the same.

Nothing to do with the finish of the sax.

As others have suggested.
 
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