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Hand Reamer


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trumpet56
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PostPosted: Tue Jun 04, 2013 10:04 pm    Post subject: Hand Reamer Reply with quote

I went out today and purchased a hand reamer and accesories to make throat adjustments to my mouthpieces. First of all I belong to the Beer and Black and Decker ( a potent combination and one that has not always ended well) school of mouthpiece throat cutomisation. I would appreciate any words of advise and caution regarding this new venture.
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etc-etc
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PostPosted: Tue Jun 04, 2013 11:16 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

You would need the tool that has a semi-circular cross-section, and is held in jaws (opposite to mouthpiece) of a lathe. You would need a lathe, too, a lot of spare brass rods to train your machining skills, as well as plenty of experience.
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Don Herman rev2
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PostPosted: Fri Jul 05, 2013 5:53 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Keep a spare mpc on hand...

A sizing rod can be useful for judging how large you have made the throat (tapered rod marked with drill sizes; see how far down it goes in the mpc from the cup to judge the bore).

I believe it was Jim Donaldson (Schilke Loyalist) who suggested enlarging one, playing a while, then the other, repeat. When you go one step too large you have the "right" size as your back-up.
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AJCarter
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PostPosted: Fri Jul 05, 2013 6:23 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Don Herman rev2 wrote:
Keep a spare mpc on hand...

A sizing rod can be useful for judging how large you have made the throat (tapered rod marked with drill sizes; see how far down it goes in the mpc from the cup to judge the bore).

I believe it was Jim Donaldson (Schilke Loyalist) who suggested enlarging one, playing a while, then the other, repeat. When you go one step too large you have the "right" size as your back-up.


All great advice right there!

Another member and I experimented with this years ago. We did it differently though: he put the drills in the vice of his work bench and we then carefully hand spun the mouthpieces. More recently with some expert advice from my favorite mouthpiece maker, I've found putting the drill chuck end first through the shank of the mouthpiece works great.

- take drill bit
- send chuck end through shank, so the chuck end comes through the throat.
- secure the drill bit (used a power drill)
- gently turn and remove mouthpiece from drill bit.

I'm no expert, but I've done it more than a few times and used mouthpieces today that I've drilled myself. But Don is absolutely right: if you like your piece, have another one on hand and use that as your guinea pig. practice and ruin ones you dont really want or that you dont care about (an old 7C perhaps)
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lipshurt
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PostPosted: Fri Jul 05, 2013 9:05 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

If you are using straight readers, yo would need about 4 of them to do sizes in the typical range. Hold them with a tap wrench or drill chuck by hand. Come in from the shank end. Very hard to mess this job up even the very first time with zero experience with any tools ever. It's easy. Whether or not you like the mouthpiece after is a question mark. Don't go very big stop at 25 or 24 and play it for a good long time that way.

If you are using a tapered reamer do it the same way. You should still have the set of straight reamers or numbered drill bits to check to see how big you are. Straight readers and straight throats work better in a mouthpiece. Tapered reamer/tapered throats go sharp the upper register.

Each straight reamer is about 7 bucks last I checked.
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royjohn
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PostPosted: Fri Jul 05, 2013 9:15 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

All good suggestions, but I don't see why just using a drill bit wouldn't work. I would use a micrometer and measure the drill to be sure what diameter I was getting. If you go slow, as suggested, you won't get an oversize hole.

All that said, a throat that is too long leads to problems in sound, so you should be aware that going too large may require professional work to redo the backbore so that the throat is not too long. IDK enough about it to tell you how large is too large, but maybe one of the mpc makers will chime in about that.
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lipshurt
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PostPosted: Fri Jul 05, 2013 9:59 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Ever look at a monette prana? The throat is about 5/8 of an inch long. If you go from a standard bach 26 throat, which is about 1/8 inch long and ream it to a 22 (big) the throat will be about 7/16 inch long. There will be a sharper edge in the bottom of the cup where it no longer blends as nicely into the throat. That may or may not need attention, and more likely to be benign. Some players will have a negative reaction to that problem. You won't know if you are like that unless yo try it. It's pretty easy to smooth that off in a lathe or bench motor/chuck. The way it blends into the backbore will not be a problem. It will be the same as it was before reaming.

The reason you can't or shouldn't use drill bits is that drill bits make a rough surface in the wall of the throat. Even in a lathe spinning at 750 a drill makes a fairly rough hole compared to a straight reamer. If you did it by hand or wit ha power drill, it would be really rough. A reamer by hand makes the same smooth hole as it does with the lathe. You can hear that rough wall too by the way. More than you would think.
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royjohn
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PostPosted: Fri Jul 05, 2013 10:13 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Hey Doug,

Thanks for the info. Hadn't thought about the roughness of drilling. If it were me, I'd probably go ahead and use the drill and then polish the throat with tripoli on a string, in preference to spending bucks on a reamer, but I'm Mr. DIY.
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Brian Moon
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PostPosted: Fri Jul 05, 2013 10:13 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Practice on Hercos first
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lipshurt
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PostPosted: Fri Jul 05, 2013 11:10 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Hmmmm
Not many people have numbered size drill bits, so buying reamers is about the same cost as bits.
Twist bits make a rough enough hole that tripoli on a string would not even remove the gouges unless you really hit it for a while, and then you have no way of controlling the roundness of the hole. It would be way better to twirl a rolled up piece of 300 grit Emory paper for about 3 seconds inside the hole.

But still another main reason for using reamers as opposed to drill bits is simply that reamers are about an inch longer overall than a bit, and drill bits are basically too short to go in from the shank end. You end up gripping the bit by just the last 1/8 inch or so with a chuck. And some chucks get kind of iffy when using just the very tips of the jaws.
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dbacon
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PostPosted: Mon Jul 08, 2013 5:14 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

DB

Last edited by dbacon on Thu Jun 23, 2022 1:41 pm; edited 1 time in total
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lipshurt
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PostPosted: Mon Jul 08, 2013 5:18 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

The point here is that the guy does NOT know what size he wants.

Man, just buy three reamers for 5 bucks each, and take the 10 seconds it takes to go one size bigger. Try it for a whle. Then maybe take another ten seconds one day to go one size bigger, etc.

You will probably settle on a 25 or 24

This is very close to tying your own shoes as opposed to hiring that out
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TrentAustin
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PostPosted: Mon Jul 08, 2013 5:20 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Great stuff as always Doug!
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dbacon
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PostPosted: Mon Jul 08, 2013 5:53 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

DB

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trombahonker
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PostPosted: Mon Jul 08, 2013 8:28 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

...I don't even know her.
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Capt.Kirk
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PostPosted: Fri Jul 19, 2013 4:42 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Straight Reamers are the way to go. I would never use a drill bit. I did that once just to see how bad it would be and it was bad. It did not affect my ability to play the MP but the German in me cringed at night in bed just thinking about the surface finish inside that MP. After being haunted in my sleep for 2-3 nights I had to invest an entire day cleaning up the inside before I could sleep.

I have done it with and with out a lathe. The lathe just takes the human element out of it kind of making it close to idiot proof. A lathe is not a must though. I would say this though if you can not draw a straight line free hand or drill a perpendicular hole with a hand drill this is not a good time to learn! If you have decent mastery of simple power tools like drills, circular saw's, die grinders etc.....This is not going to be hard to do a nice job on. I have done throats and back bores by hand with booth hand tools and power tools and a with a lathe. Ultimately if you want you can use this just as a chance to see what you like before custom ordering a professionally finished product. Especially if you are wanting to go much larger then industry norms.

This is what I have read do not know how true it is. That Vincent Bach intended for each player to finish the manufacture of his MP by reaming it to the desired size. He did not intend for them to remain as they left his shop. Today people think just the opposite that the MP is meant to be the way it leaves the shop. There has been a total paradigm shift from people being expected to finish the product to their specifications versus people today thinking that the piece is as it was intended to be used when it left the factory. Today only an expert (no mention of what makes them an expert mind you) can hope to modify the throat of a MP with out destroying it. I am surprised man is still allowed to make a sandwich at home and does not need to be an expert sandwich maker to pack a lunch!

This will likely come as a huge surprise too some but trumpet mouthpieces have been around longer then precision lathes have been with man.

In fact I have seen people with all the right gear but no idea what they are doing really mess up all kinds of simple tasks.

I would practice if you do not work with your hands often on cheap MP's you have gotten off ebay or with trumpets you have bought over the years. Every trumpet I have bought off ebay has come with 1-3 MP's in various states from decent to horrific. The horrific ones usually have the tell-tale marks of a pair of Vise-Grips on the rims and or shank. These are the first ones I use to practice any new idea's on.

In fact the precision lathe that Mr. Olds used to make valves is not as nice or precise as the $400 mini-lathe you can by at Harbor Freight tool store. So do not get caught up in the cost and complexity of the tools.

Also keep in mind how inconsistent Bach MP's have been over the years. If the number one selling brand in America could not make 3 3C MP's one after another and have them be exact copies of each other what does that say about the MP in general????
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percivalthehappyboy
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PostPosted: Fri Jul 19, 2013 4:53 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Capt.Kirk wrote:

I have done it with and with out a lathe. The lathe just takes the human element out of it kind of making it close to idiot proof.


Assuming the human is good at centering the piece in the chuck...
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fijimorgan
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PostPosted: Sun Jul 08, 2018 4:43 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

So would this kind of reamer work? https://m.harborfreight.com/t-handle-reamer-66936.html
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JoeLoeffler
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PostPosted: Sun Jul 08, 2018 1:10 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

No. That will not work. It will not reach where you want it to and the taper is too fast.

Drill bits will not give you the level of control you really need. (Particularly if you only have a fractional set from the hardware store.)

Many will say that straight machine reamers are the only way to fly. This is not the case for somebody looking to make their own bucket of failed experiments... You are looking for a tapered reamer usually called a broach. Usually 5-sided. I believe the Stubs #20 is the right size range. Starts somewhere smaller than a #28 drill through somewhere just under 1/4”. Look at jewelry tool houses. (McMaster-Carr might carry them also) You will need a way to hold it. Buy an appropriate tap handle from the same place. (Scott Laskey had one that looked like a giant screwdriver handle, but I just used a basic t-handle one.) You should also buy a way to measure the hole sizes that you will be reaming. The cheapest way is to buy some number-sized drill blanks. Probably starting at 28 (or whatever the smallest size you are interested in) up to whatever you care to open up to. (Number size drills (or drill blanks for that matter) are graduated in something like .003” increments and get smaller as the number increases. Above “size 1”, the letter drills start and go up in the same increments. ) Ream the throat a little from the cup and a little from the backbore (I think it is something like 30% cup/70% backbore. It has been so long since I have bothered with this - it’s just not worth it...) It is remarkably easy to control how much material you are removing. Dont go nuts. Ream with gentle pressure. Blow the chips out with compressed air. Measure. Play it. Note what happens. Lather, rinse, repeat. Be aware that changing the throat will make changes to how the mouthpiece works. Some are good, some are not. Be prepared to open too much and make paperweights.
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iiipopes
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PostPosted: Tue Jul 10, 2018 8:54 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Before you go enlarging the throat, look at it carefully. First determine if there is any excess plating in the throat that may be constricting the bore. I have had to clear the excess plating a time or two, and the mouthpiece opened up.

Another item: don't just go for the #28, #27, #26, #25, #24, etc. "stock" sizes. For example, Curry opens his stock throats just a little bit and calls them "loose #27." From the Curry website: "Trumpet Standard Bore .1455" (3.7mm) This may be classified as a “loose #27 drill.” It allows a #27 reamer to pass easily through the throat after plating...."

After reading this, I had a tech friend help me do the same - just a couple of thou. And I had the disposable spare if I went too far. I found my "sweet spot" to be Curry's standard, or just a hair larger. The shank of a #27 bit is loose and wobbly, but the shank of a #26 will not pass through.

The whole point of this post:
Get a tech to help you
Get a spare mouthpiece so you have a backup if you go too far
Don't insist on the exact number drill
Be careful about how you contour the throat, i.e. don't just drill it straight through, because the length and contour of the throat affects everything: tone, blow, intonation and slotting.
And GO SLOWLY!
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