It's kind of funny the things that excite a repair technician. In my shop I was struggling with files that I didn't really care for. So about 6 months ago I bought all new files. This made my repair-shop life a lot easier. Manufacturing keys and such is a breeze with good files. I'll never go back to inferior files in my shop. I've gone ahead and added the most popular files in my drawers to the website.

With some great new hand files and killer tone hole drill-file set, work has been a day in the park lately.

I use the coarse file for cutting and removing metal. The fine file is perfect for taking out the large file marks or removing small amounts of metal. The fine hand file on the site is so nice parts go directly from the file to the buffer.

life is good.

If you have a favorite shape that you like to use in your own repairs, please drop me a line and I'll try and get them in stock.

Here is a link to our files:

http://www.musicmedic.com/catalog/categ ... at_22.html


All the best!

-Curt

Changing the angle or location of spring cradles on woodwinds.


We do a lot of modifications in our shop and have developed some tools and techniques to make this work faster with better, more predictable, results. One modification that can be completely invisible to the player yet can make many vintage instruments feel a lot better, is relocating or modifying spring cradles.


When to move a spring cradle.

There are a number of vintage Conn's and many sopranos of all makes that can benefit from longer springs. The distance from the post to the spring cradle is sometimes not enough to get the needed feel. Springs that are too thick or short will have an uneven pressure. The key will get harder and harder to close as is it pressed.

This is also true when a player asks for very tight action on a small instrument such as a soprano and especially a vintage soprano.

Sometimes a longer spring or a longer spring cradle (one that extends further from the key) is the answer to key bounce.

Of course, when we make a key from scratch, deciding where to put the spring cradle is always a question.

In most of these instances, the quickest and most long term solution can be moving the cradle. Sometimes there is very little room on the key and the new location of the spring cradle is obvious; as far as possible. Other times, for example the low C key on many saxophones, there are many places that the spring cradle could go and the length of the cradle is a variable.

The temporary spring cradle:

To solve this problem, we made a small movable spring cradle with various lengths. It's not a pretty part but it works very well. If any of you have a need to move a spring cradle, you can make this tool quickly.

If we have a need to make more of these, they will be made from steel rather than brass. The bushing serves 2 purposes. First, it keeps the key from being marred when the cradle is moved around. Also, it allows us to use this little tool on keys of various diameters.




All the best!

-Curt

A better way to sand.

At the last national NAPBIRT (National Association of Professional Band Instrument Repair Technicians) convention in Tuscon, Matt Scott from MusicMedic.com gave a clinic and MusicMedic.com exhibited tools and supplies. Although these activities were great, the best part of the convention for us was attending other technician's clinics. One never knows where the next good idea will come from at these clinics.

While we were attending a particularly great clinic given by Dale Barton we picked up this tip. Months later we gave it a try and it's a great little time saver I thought I should share with you.

It's this simple: Put packing tape on the back of the sandpaper you use in the repair shop. There are two reasons to do this. First, the tape makes the sandpaper much stronger so it won't tear when you are ragging or sanding under key feet. Second, the tape is much less abrasive than the back of the sandpaper, and doesn't scratch the body of an instrument when you are sanding key corks. This tip has saved us a good deal of frustration, not to mention sandpaper.
Give it a try!

-Curt

Headquarters Post 2 the layout.

As we enter the design phase of our project, I'd like to share a few pictures so you can have the before and after experience. This is quite a project and the end result will be impressive, especially if you see what we are starting with.

For pictures I'm going to show you an aerial view first, then the street level pics will make some sense.

So, below is an aerial view of the building. Notice that we're right on the tracks? Should we need it, I can request that a train stop right outside the back loading dock. As the building is only 9 blocks from a major port, this may be useful.

I left the building next door in the shot for perspective. There is a tractor trailer parked there. It amazes me how small the tractor trailer is compared to the building!

So, here's the tour.




Section A: The Shop.
This is all MusicMedic.com's new shop. At nearly 20'000 sq feet, it will surely provide ample room for us. There will be more room in section D should we want to expanded further. This part of the building is the one we are most excited about. I am in the process of designing the offices and and shop portions of the building now. The offices and shop will be partitioned off from the rest of section A, leaving room for manufacturing and a warehouse space.

Section B. The Parking Deck.
Notice in the picture that there is very little room for parking? This was a huge consideration when we bought this building. There is a lot of building but only a few on-site and street side parking spots. To solve this we are going to take section B and turn it into a parking deck. It's about 8500 sq. feet and will hold plenty of cars. Right now Section B is just like the rest of the place. It's a huge open concrete room with concrete pillars. We have a great architect working on the plans to make this part of the building a parking deck. It's going to take a lot of work including building a ramp, fire exits, some major ventilation and the addition of a few large, fireproof bay doors. When it's done, it will be a real convenient space for everyone to park indoors.

Section C: Home sweet Home
I'm going to take this portion of the property and live in it! Section C is the original building, it was built first and differently than the rest. This building is free standing, it shares no walls with any other buildings on the property. Like the other parts of the building, it's got a concrete floor, is an open room with pillars and is one story. Unlike the rest however, the walls are block, the roof is wood and the pillars are made from wood, not concrete. There are windows along one long side which provide plenty of natural light. We will add glass block windows along the other side for more light. The rafters inside Section C are very cool and totally exposed. It has the feel of an old mill right now. I've seen some very nice homes in our area where this exposed wood look was integrated with a steel frame. The steel beams were covered with wood to make it look like the wood held up the place. Our home will have the real thing and will most likely have an urban loft feel to it.

Section D: The future:
I've had many conversations with various music related entrepreneurs who are considering section D. Eventually we may want to expand into this section but I think we have plenty of room in the rest of the building for now. We will have over 7000 sq ft of indestructible lease space with outside and indoor parking and a loading dock outside. There is also a large Bay door that opens into the parking deck. I am always open to hearing your ideas if you need warehouse space for your products.

OK back to my repairs... more on the Headquarters later.

-Curt

If you are reading this blog, there is a good chance that you, through your patronage, moral support and friendship have helped MusicMedic.com grow and thrive. For this, all of us at MusicMedic.com are thankful.

For the last 2 years, we have been looking for a new location for our business. We needed a space big enough that we could grow, allowing our shop and supply business to expand at a more natural rate. Our current location is too small, and we need more room! Also, we are currently in Southport North Carolina which is a beautiful town on the Cape Fear River, but all of us at MusicMedic.com teach and play gigs in Wilmington North Carolina. I'm happy to say that we now have a very cool new building in Wilmington. It will be a lot of work to get it up to date and make the improvements that we are hoping to make, but when it's done it will ROCK!

About the building.
This building is 40,000 square feet (that's nearly an acre of building). There are 4 loading docks, a courtyard, offices, and a warehouse. The building is completely concrete; floors, walls and ceiling, and has withstood any and all storms to date without damage. Architects and builders that we have had in the building say it is the sturdiest building they have ever been in. When complete the new MusicMedic.com building will have limited access indoor parking. This means customers and employees will come to MusicMedic.com, punch in their code, or ring the desk, then a large door will open at the top of a ramp. They will drive into the building and park their cars in the indoor parking facility. From there they can walk into MusicMedic.com!

We have a lot of plans for this new building, and I hope to share some these ideas here on this Instrument repair blog. We are lovingly calling the new building "Headquarters" so every blog about the building will have Headquarters in the title. This will make it easy for you to find new updates on the building.

Next time I stop at the building I will snap a few shots of it so you can see it for yourself!