Making Mellow Tone Artificial Drone Reeds

Copyright 2006 David C. Daye

Overview

Some artificial reeds, while marvelously dependable, can be a bit rough or buzzy in the tone. This is caused by noise of the hard artificial tongue slapping against the hard artificial body of the tube.

One fast, easy way to temper this noise is to simply glue a layer of paper onto the bed where the tongue mounts. This creates a softer surface for the tongue to vibrate against.

Another option is to make replacement bodies from natural cane or bored dowel rod with interior bores matching the size recommended for each drone. If the drones' reed seats are small, suitable only for thin-walled tube reed bodies, the bottom end of the wood or cane body can be cut off and then very carefully bored out for mounting onto the tubing that will fit into the drone's reed seat.

Considerable control over the softness and brightness of the drone set can be achieved by adjusting any one, two or all 3 of the reeds.

Papering a Metal or Plastic Tube Body

1. If the reed is already playing, mark the end of the binding on the tongue and then carefully untie it and set it aside.
2. Cut a piece of paper a little bigger than the tongue bed.
3. Select a thick type superglue or other household glue which will not rapidly permeate the paper as conventional thin superglue will do.
4. Get a nail or paper clip to use for spreading the glue.
5. Use a bright light (and magnifying glasses if needed to see very clearly) when working quickly.
6. Put 1-2 drops of thick superglue or the household glue onto the bed, then quickly spread a thin layer all around the bed.
7. Set the paper onto the glued bed and press it down onto a very smooth surface such as formica, mirror, window etc.
8. Let dry 5 min. for superglue or an hour or so for household glue.
9. Inspect the paper. If it has not glued tight at every point around the bed, or if excess glue has saturated the paper leaving dark hard spots at the surface, strip it away, file the original surface perfectly flat, and try again.
10. Now carefully cut the airway into the paper using a razor blade. NOTE: do not try to rip pieces out of the airway. Always find a way to slice or cut them, or else they may tear away surrounding surface so that the reed can't seal airtight as needed.
11. Replace the tongue and bind it back into position.

Test the reed. NOTE: because the reed now has natural material under the tongue, you should avoid mouth blowing the reed and the drones from now on. Since the paper is only a passive surface, it shouldn't make the performance of the reed change with the weather, but it could gradually degrade from the influence of mouth blowing leading eventually to excessive dullness or leaking causing instability.

Making a Cane Tube Body

Select a cane tube with an internal bore within 1/64" of the inside diameter of the artificial tube normally used. Narrower tubes will need to be slightly longer, and wider tubes slightly shorter, to give the same pitch. Narrower reeds tend to sound brighter, wider reeds deeper and more mellow in tone.

Sand a flat, cut the windway and tie on the tongue in the same way as in making reeds with metal or plastic tube bodies.

If the cane body is too wide to fit in reed seat, you can trim it a little shorter and insert a metal tube extender that will fit into the pipe. The metal tube must be the diameter required by the drone design. Daye Budget Concert Drone sizes: Bass and baritone, 9/32" I.D., tenor drone 3/16" I.D.

Click here for diagram of steps to put metal tube mounting onto cane drone reed body.

If you own a set of my Budget Drones and have more questions, feel free to inquire at this address.