SteveC
1 post
Nov 23, 2014
12:00 AM
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I noticed that my Big River harp has 5 holes in the reed plate, but only 3 of them are tapped. Is this common with the MS system harps?
Thanks,
Steve
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arzajac
1512 posts
Nov 23, 2014
5:07 AM
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Actually, I've found some new Blue Midnight and Big River harps that come from the factory with the middle hole enlarged so that you can't tap it with an M1.6!
But the good news is that you don't really need any extra screws. I've made some very high performance harps using MS hardware held together with two screws. If the comb and plates are flat, you don't need extra screws.
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Custom overblow harps. Harmonica service and repair.
Last Edited by arzajac on Nov 23, 2014 5:09 AM
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WinslowYerxa
726 posts
Nov 23, 2014
9:22 AM
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The MS-Blues Harp uses only two tapped holes. Big River uses three.
When I was using MS parts for the MS Discrete Comb in the 1990s, only the MS-Meisterklasse used all 5 holes.
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Winslow
Harmonica For Dummies, Second Edition with tons of new stuff
Deepen your playing at the Harmonica Collective
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arzajac
1514 posts
Nov 23, 2014
12:28 PM
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Winslow: I found that about a year ago, Hohner started shipping Big River harps with just two screws. You could easily add the third screw.
New Big Rivers from just a few months ago - and Blue Midnight harps - now seem to have an un-usable middle hole.
You can enlarge the clearance hole on the blow plate and tap that hole with an M2 screw, but you would need a custom comb to offer clearance for the larger screw through the 5-6 hole tine. But you probably don't even need to do that if everything is flat - the two screws should work fine.
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Custom overblow harps. Harmonica service and repair.
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WinslowYerxa
727 posts
Nov 23, 2014
10:26 PM
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It's weird that they'd bother to drill a hole and then render it unusable.
If you really wanted a screw there, perhaps you could use a nut instead of threading the bottom reedplate.
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Winslow
Harmonica For Dummies, Second Edition with tons of new stuff
Deepen your playing at the Harmonica Collective
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barbequebob
2764 posts
Nov 24, 2014
11:07 AM
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Some years ago, I had a few Big Rivers where I used Cross Harp plates and the now no longer made Lavoie sealed maple comb and ordered extra screws and used all 5 screws and without overtightening the screws, I found the harps played better with a much tighter seal.
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Sincerely,
Barbeque Bob Maglinte
Boston, MA
http://www.barbequebob.com
CD available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/bbmaglinte
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ridge
564 posts
Nov 24, 2014
12:34 PM
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To Andrews point, I've recently tried my hand at flat sanding the MS Blues harp combs and sanding the draw plate. This makes an appreciable difference in these harps.
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Ridge's YouTube
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