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Cryogenic treatment?

I think that if we were able to change the atoms within a given metal then we would be able to turn lead into gold, yeah of course the guy's from another planet, but makes for entertaining reading though doesn't it?

Yes, it is entiertaining. However, I do worry that some gullible people will be sucked into this and be fleeced. In the same way that some people a suckered into paying a load of cash for a brass ring to put on the neck of their sax, or $300 for a $50 cheapo Chinese mouthpiece.

Again, these comments are just my own personal views and represent the opinion of this cynical writer only.

Jon
 
Yes, it is entiertaining. However, I do worry that some gullible people will be sucked into this and be fleeced. In the same way that some people a suckered into paying a load of cash for a brass ring to put on the neck of their sax, or $300 for a $50 cheapo Chinese mouthpiece.

Again, these comments are just my own personal views and represent the opinion of this cynical writer only.

Jon

And this one.
 
paying a load of cash for a brass ring to put on the neck of their sax,
Had to think about that one for a minute, but i know what you mean now.....the dreaded "neck enhancer" what a load of old cobblers, and regarding the mouthpieces on the other thread, well thats just daylight robbery!
 
Oh well, there are many cobblers sellers around the world..........this is the infamous Schucht design

this sst sound expander

http://www.schuchtsaxtechnology.com/Produkte/Sound_EXpander/sound_expander.html
sex0002223.jpg


be prepared, the English site is coming soon..........

Surprisingly there's no dealer for this wonderful technology in the US, not even in the south. Whatever is the world coming to?
 
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yes, hand he had a " klappenschutzblech "that is no longer on sale! Terrible! This was endorsed by Tobias on SOTW.........
 
yes, hand he had a " klappenschutzblech "that is no longer on sale! Terrible! This was endorsed by Tobias on SOTW.........

I guess it was made from a nickel plated baked beans can, complete with corrugations...
 
Sadly there are snake-oil merchants everywhere and everywhen... L'elisir d'amore anyone?
 
<snip>
The same argument can be extended further down the sax. Go to the spreadsheet at https://public.sheet.zoho.com/public/dave.mclau/ring-frequency, click on "Click to Edit" and try inserting the diameter of the sax at the first open tone-hole for any given note. I'm sure you'll find the critical frequency is far higher than that of the note itself.

In my view, the material of the sax body cannot affect the tone.
<snip>

Hmm. Interesting, and actually, though I used to agree with you, a thought has occurred, and I ran your spreadsheet, and now maybe I don't...

Put in the next tone-hole, say 30mm diameter - this has a ring frequency of 36871Hz, still inaudible, BUT the mixing of this with the frequency from the 25mm hole will give a resultant at 44245-36871=7374Hz - THAT's audible.

NOW change the material to copper (speed of sound 3901m/s instead of 3475) and the resultant changes to 8278Hz - that will sound different.

However, until someone (probably in Japan) builds twenty dimensionally identical saxes (probably to an accuracy of a few microns), ten each out of any two materials of their choice, and proves by rigorous laboratory testing that they do emit different sounds when played identically, then proves by similar experiments that they can consistently reproduce this effect with normal production methods, and publishes a peer-reviewed scientific paper with the results...

...then I'll believe the material itself makes an audible difference.

I'd be very happy to be told this experiment has been done, or any along similar lines, but I rather suspect it hasn't, and all assertions as to the merits of brass, copper, bronze, phosphor bronze, nickel silver, acrylic etc. etc. etc. are hype, speculation, or wishful thinking on the part of the owners.

Cryogenics? Just possible, on similar grounds. But I don't think so, somehow...

Cheers

Jonathan
 
Hmm. Interesting, and actually, though I used to agree with you, a thought has occurred, and I ran your spreadsheet, and now maybe I don't...

Put in the next tone-hole, say 30mm diameter - this has a ring frequency of 36871Hz, still inaudible, BUT the mixing of this with the frequency from the 25mm hole will give a resultant at 44245-36871=7374Hz - THAT's audible.

That's interesting, but I'm not sure I know what you mean. If you're talking about "mixing" like heterodyning, that surely requires some mechanism to multiply the two signals? I can't see what that mechanism is. If the signals are just added, the result will just be a tone of the average frequency modulated at half the difference in frequency. Although the modulation is in the audible frequency range, can you hear it if the carrier is ultrasonic?

Of course, we've just been talking about longitudinal waves in cylindrical shells, when a sax is a conical shell with lots of tone holes to complicate matters; and bending waves are dispersive, which complicates matters further. BUT (and it is a big but), it's only those longitudinal waves that can lead to a monopole source of airborne sound. Bending waves will produce multipole sources that will not propagate very far (IMHO and OCICBW).
 
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That's interesting, but I'm not sure I know what you mean. If you're talking about "mixing" like heterodyning, that surely requires some mechanism to multiply the two signals? I can't see what that mechanism is. If the signals are just added, the result will just be a tone of the average frequency modulated at half the difference in frequency. Although the modulation is in the audible frequency range, can you hear it if the carrier is ultrasonic?

Of course, we've just been talking about longitudinal waves in cylindrical shells, when a sax is a conical shell with lots of tone holes to complicate matters; and bending waves are dispersive, which complicates matters further. BUT (and it is a big but), it's only those longitudinal waves that can lead to a monopole source of airborne sound. Bending waves will produce multipole sources that will not propagate very far (IMHO and OCICBW).
Hi David

You're probably right, if the world were ideal then additive mixing probably would give an inaudible signal, but the world does tend to be non-linear so there would probably be some level of audible result. Maybe it depends on the non-linearities in the hearer's own ear, hence the "golden-eared" types who insist on Litz wire speaker cables (or unlacquered saxophones >:)). I'm not sure it matters how the ultrasonics are produced, just that there are plenty of them at fairly close frequencies.

All I'm really saying is that I can see some theoretical justification for apparently minute effects, including those resulting from differing material choice on otherwise identical instruments, giving audible differences. Consideration of a single element (a tonehole, in your example) would suggest no audible effect, but the sum of many might give rise to one.

There could be a PhD in this for someone...

Cheers

Jonathan
 
Sorry to reopen a thread....
Since I have been curious about the cryogenic thing, some time ago I asked some information to a few friends not involved in music.
1- -400F is about -240C. Liquid nitrogen is -210 and -273 is only theoric (atoms don't move anymore, too cold).
An industrial fridge maker told me that some research institutes might have such a fridge, and asked me if I was planning a live concert on Pluto.
-400F is BS.

But

In steel factories, below zero (C) temperatures are quite common to change the crystalline structure. And the time needed to go back to normal is another factor.

Heat a spring till red an let it cool down slowly: it is no longer a spring.

Who wants to try first with brass?
A -18C fridge could do, if you want to remove the keywork first.
 
Since the material makes bugger all contribution to the sound of the sax what would be the point?

Er, sorry. It's a joke isn't it?
 
I just hope someone will try...
 
" someone" tries it all the time when they are charmed by those who sell the dear treatment (of course the cryogenic treatment involves a complete disassembling and re-adjustment of the horn so any tests before and after are pointless to evaluate the impact of the treatment since the horn is bound to be better after a complete re-pad and general overhaul).
When it comes to cryogenic treatment on brass one shouldn't let what happens to iron or steel get in the way to cloud your judgement because Brass is not iron or steel.
Tempering doesn't work in the same way on brass as it does in steel and there are serious questions on the need and function of annealing and since saxophones are not brasswinds the bells do not contribute to shaping the sound in the same way.
 
You are right. A pure experimental environment is not possible (except in Japan).
Years ago a friend of a friend used some big tool (spectroscopium?) to check the crystalline structure of a slice coming from an old Conn. and its structure was definitely different from a new piece of brass.

Part of all the mess about vintage instrument can be due to the ageing of metal (brass is an alloy, and alloys are not always stable).
Whatever they say, I find a huge difference in sound between a vintage student horn from the twenties and a new brass yanagisawa.

The contribution of material in creating the sound is very subtle, and difficult to approach in a traditional scientific way. Unfortunately we are talking about air that must vibrate in a beautiful way.

In the last years I had the occasion of messing around with a lot of mouthpieces by the same holy maker.
At some point (couple of months ago) he pointed out that I preferred the same material as a colleague of mine I often play with.
We are talking about kinds of "ebonite" that can have different weight, density and other physical characteristics.

When i checked the other pieces by him I am using (cl, bcl, as, ss, ts) and that I bought in the past, they all brought the same material code. I swear I didn't know that and the different materials look the same (black).

I think materials do make a difference.
 
If you really want to try cryogenics Aldevis, sit naked in this bath tub, we wont look and we will fill it with liquid hydrogen. When you've convinced us that this treatment has improved you, I and other PPT users, will explain why the later PPT, of whatever size, is a better mouthpiece principally due to its colour change.>:)
 
If you really want to try cryogenics Aldevis, sit naked in this bath tub, we wont look and we will fill it with liquid hydrogen. When you've convinced us that this treatment has improved you, I and other PPT users, will explain why the later PPT, of whatever size, is a better mouthpiece principally due to its colour change.>:)

I booked that already: I will sit naked and will be covered in liquid nitrogen, suspended life, until in a better future they find the perfect reed and a trumpet section that plays in tune in the third octave.

And about the PPT: I have a Onyxite clarinet piece and I tried two identical alto pieces by the same holy maker: one in black and one in white. There is definitely a difference in sound.

I used Cryogenic (-10) to remove a mouthpiece from a neck once... it worked.
 
And about the PPT: I have a Onyxite clarinet piece and I tried two identical alto pieces by the same holy maker: one in black and one in white. There is definitely a difference in sound.

No you don't. You have two different mouthpieces. That's why there's a difference in sound. No two mouthpieces are ever 'identical'.
 
No you don't. You have two different mouthpieces. That's why there's a difference in sound. No two mouthpieces are ever 'identical'.
Same maker, same cast, same facing (measured) same room with the same reed.

We can start a debate about the concept of "identical", but I have quite consistent experience about pieces to be able to feel what the difference is due to.
 
You are right. A pure experimental environment is not possible (except in Japan).
Years ago a friend of a friend used some big tool (spectroscopium?) to check the crystalline structure of a slice coming from an old Conn. and its structure was definitely different from a new piece of brass.

Part of all the mess about vintage instrument can be due to the ageing of metal (brass is an alloy, and alloys are not always stable).
Whatever they say, I find a huge difference in sound between a vintage student horn from the twenties and a new brass yanagisawa.

The contribution of material in creating the sound is very subtle, and difficult to approach in a traditional scientific way. Unfortunately we are talking about air that must vibrate in a beautiful way.

The structure of most metals is largely chaotic, so you're going to find notable differences between any two samples.

Drawing a comparison between a vintage student horn and a modern Yani is a bit pointless really - even before you get to any supposed difference the material makes you'd have to take into account the design and the build quality...both of which would have a huge impact on the tone.

I don't believe there's anything subtle about the way in which materials play a role in sound production (or not, as the case may be). It really all boils down to physics.
The big problem is that the physics are quite complex, and even those with a casual interest in such things will soon run into mind-boggling equations.
That's not to say that there's no room for the craftsman - but that's more about the manipulation of the material rather than any 'mystical' properties.

Regards,
 

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