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Dirty-South Blues Harp forum: wail on! >
Modifying your harp?
Modifying your harp?
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harmonicaMudd
1 post
Jul 27, 2011
8:39 PM
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So i know about modifying harps, and i know the techniques from overblow.com, but i dont understand as to why each step (like embossing) is used, and how do i know when i have done enough, or not enough.
Thanks for any and all help.
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nacoran
4391 posts
Jul 27, 2011
9:21 PM
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Wow, that's a big topic.
Embossing makes a harp more responsive. That means you can play louder with less force. It also means you can blow out your reeds easier. By reducing the gap around your reeds in the slot you reduce the space air can get through without actually doing what it's supposed to be doing, swinging the reed. If you make the gap to narrow the reed will catch.
Gapping is important because for notes other than what the harp was designed to play it's not just the one reed responding. It involves one reed choking off when it would normally play and the other reed not vibrating at the frequency it normally would. This can make adjusting reeds counter-intuitive, since sometimes you have to tinker with the opposing reed to get the reed you want to respond to respond. If you gap a reed too high it will probably still play the notes it's 'supposed to play' but overblows will be harder. If you gap a reed to low it may choke when you play hard, which is exactly what you want it to do when you are trying to make the other reed to crazy stuff but not at all what you want when you are trying to make that reed sound.
Tuning is just what it sounds like, except there are really two kinds of tuning. The first one adjusts the basic note in a hole, say changing an A into an Ab. You might do that to change the tuning scheme from major to minor or various other tunings. The other is temperament adjustment. That's tuning notes just a few cents flat or sharp, not full notes. Generally speaking, Equal Tuning is more for playing melodies, Just Tuning more for smooth chords, with Compromise Tuning somewhere in between. You retune a harp by scraping metal off either the base or the tip of the reed. Some people use blu-tack as a less potentially destructive solution.
(Here is a great link on temperament. It's more about pianos, but the battle over how to tune things has been going on for centuries.)
The Wolf at our Heels (Slate)
I've heard people argue for straight reeds, for curved reeds, for chamfering (whatever that is), for tip scooping, for using micro-pore tape on the reed plate (which I've heard as a technique similar to embossing and also as a suggestion to warm the sound.) I've heard experts disagree on whether these things help, or even hurt. I'm not an expert, but I've read lot's of threads.
Then of course, there is opening up the back of your harmonica. All that means is you bend the back of the cover (or sometimes cut it off) so that the back of the harp is, well, more open. It makes the harp sound brighter and louder. So why don't they just do that at the factory? Some people like their harps to sound warmer and it's a whole lot easier to make a hole than to fix one. :)
I've tried embossing. I did it to a couple cheap $5 harps to practice on. I got some of the reeds to be more responsive. I got some of the reeds jammed. I broke a couple reeds. Hey, that's what I got the cheap harps for. If the reed is more responsive maybe you've done enough. If it's jammed you've done too much. Hold it up to the light after each pass and see how much closer it is (a light table is even better.) You'll probably destroy a few before you get it down, so I'd recommend cheap harps or harps with serious damage first.
I regularly gap my harps. Sometimes I open up the backs, although I'd say more of my harps are closed back, but that's a preference thing. I've straightened reeds I bent too far, and realigned reeds that were sitting in the gap crooked.
I haven't tried tuning yet, but it's on my to do list.
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Nate
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Last Edited by on Jul 27, 2011 9:24 PM
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