Newbie, making a hammered dulcimer

[Skip]

My floating sound board bottom is 1/4 " marine plywood so I suspect 5/8" is a bit thick. You haven't mentioned if you're making a floating soundboard or box style HD.

[Verduin]

Floating soundboard.

[Verduin]

Going back to tuning pins/hitch pins...

If I make my own loops, and use one tuning pin on one side and one hitch pin on the opposite side (or, 2 tuning & 2 hitch pins per course in a two-string course), I just slip the loop over the hitch pin and hope it doesn't unravel when I start tightening it during tuning?

(Or, I could just use all tuning pins and avoid the hassle of making loops LOL)

[mrchips]

If you go with ONE wire per course the middle of that wire is wrapped around hitch pins on one side and the TWO ends go to tuning pins on the other side, no loop ends needed. for this method you need to wrap the middle around the hitch pins NO LESS than 4 times. The idea is to secure the middle in such a way that when you are tuning up one section it shouldn't affect the tuning on the other section.

If you go with 2 separate wires per course then you have 2 choices. One is loop ends with a hitch pin on one end and a tuning pin on the other end or 2 tuning pins. All tuning pins will make a HD a pound or so heavier than hitch and tuning pins. It also does away with having to deal with loop ends. Loop ends are easy to do. Here is one method http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=USAUZ7nVQ_g that will give you the idea. I do it with a cup hook and a battery powered drill but the basic method is the same.

I use all tuning pins and 2 separate wires per course because of the options it gives in tuning up a HD. When tuning up a HD the best way to go is to tune both bridges together. If you tune one then the other tuning up the other will throw the first one off a small amount so you gotta touch the first one up again. Doing both together eliminates nearly all that. Some people will tune by doing all of one note then the next and so on. That gets both bridges together. Most Hds Ive seen will have the tuning pins for one bridge on one side and the tuning pins for the other bridge on the other side. That meas you are going back and forth between the pins. With all tuning pins you can just stay on one side or the other and still get all the wires. My prefered way of tuning is to start at the top and go down getting all the wires alternating between the bridges. If the wires on the short side dont want to equalize on he treb for some reason without a hassle I simply get on the pin on the other side of the bridge.

When I first put on the wire I wind up about equal amounts on both tuning pins. I start tuning from the center outwards both twords the top and bottom. The idea is to work the stresses out to the sides in a balanced fashion. The first 3 or 4 times I tune one up I do the same but from then on its by my usual method of top down resulting in alternating between the bridges. Over time strings stretch and if the pin on one side starts getting significantly deeper into the pin block, simply back it off a turn or 2 and take up the slack with the other tuning pin.

Keep in mind that you need right at 3 inches of wire past a tuning pin to get 4 full wraps and a bit extra for a bend to hold the wire in place while you twist the wire up on a pin. For 2 pins that's 6 inches more than the distance between the pins. for one pin and a hitch pin its just 3 inches. If you use wound strings you MUST NOT have the 2 pins any further apart than say 4 inches less than the total length of a standard wound string or you will have to have custom length ones made and that gets seriously expensive. I use all solid wire and that makes it super easy to get wire anywhere you can find a piano repair shop or by the quarter pound from most any piano parts supplier.

[Andarg]

If you go with ONE wire per course the middle of that wire is wrapped around hitch pins on one side and the TWO ends go to tuning pins on the other side, no loop ends needed. for this method you need to wrap the middle around the hitch pins NO LESS than 4 times. The idea is to secure the middle in such a way that when you are tuning up one section it shouldn't affect the tuning on the other section.

If you go with 2 separate wires per course then you have 2 choices. One is loop ends with a hitch pin on one end and a tuning pin on the other end or 2 tuning pins. All tuning pins will make a HD a pound or so heavier than hitch and tuning pins. It also does away with having to deal with loop ends. Loop ends are easy to do. Here is one method http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=USAUZ7nVQ_g that will give you the idea. I do it with a cup hook and a battery powered drill but the basic method is the same.

I use all tuning pins and 2 separate wires per course because of the options it gives in tuning up a HD. When tuning up a HD the best way to go is to tune both bridges together. If you tune one then the other tuning up the other will throw the first one off a small amount so you gotta touch the first one up again. Doing both together eliminates nearly all that. Some people will tune by doing all of one note then the next and so on. That gets both bridges together. Most Hds Ive seen will have the tuning pins for one bridge on one side and the tuning pins for the other bridge on the other side. That meas you are going back and forth between the pins. With all tuning pins you can just stay on one side or the other and still get all the wires. My prefered way of tuning is to start at the top and go down getting all the wires alternating between the bridges. If the wires on the short side dont want to equalize on he treb for some reason without a hassle I simply get on the pin on the other side of the bridge.

When I first put on the wire I wind up about equal amounts on both tuning pins. I start tuning from the center outwards both twords the top and bottom. The idea is to work the stresses out to the sides in a balanced fashion. The first 3 or 4 times I tune one up I do the same but from then on its by my usual method of top down resulting in alternating between the bridges. Over time strings stretch and if the pin on one side starts getting significantly deeper into the pin block, simply back it off a turn or 2 and take up the slack with the other tuning pin.

Keep in mind that you need right at 3 inches of wire past a tuning pin to get 4 full wraps and a bit extra for a bend to hold the wire in place while you twist the wire up on a pin. For 2 pins that's 6 inches more than the distance between the pins. for one pin and a hitch pin its just 3 inches. If you use wound strings you MUST NOT have the 2 pins any further apart than say 4 inches less than the total length of a standard wound string or you will have to have custom length ones made and that gets seriously expensive. I use all solid wire and that makes it super easy to get wire anywhere you can find a piano repair shop or by the quarter pound from most any piano parts supplier.

Hello,
That she is the diameter or the size of the used cordres to do a hammered dulcimer ?

[Skip]

Andarg;

"That she is" = ???

[Andarg]

Andarg;

"That she is" = ???

Sorry my English is not very good.
Does how much the thickness of the ropes measure of a tympanon?

[Andarg]

I did mine totally from scratch, no plans or whatever. I cheated by building mine totally within Auto desk Inventor then ran stress analysis on it. Then and only then did I start cutting wood. All I had to do was cut parts to the prints from inventor. No bad parts to toss out either.

I also use a hard brass rod on the treb bridge for that nice ring but to cut the sustain way down I use a wood dowel at the side rails. You want something hard enough the strings wont chew up fast but still soft enough to soak up the sustain. A poplar dowel works great on mine. You DO NOT want to use a steel rod for the bridge rod as it creates a real PIA case of "sticky" across the bridge. Brass is sorta self lubricating against a steel string and that makes a brass rod work as good as a delrin rod and it wont cut through as fast either.

Can one to replace the stem of steel or of brass on the bridge, by bone?

[Skip]

Andarg;

"That she is" = ???

Sorry my English is not very good.
Does how much the thickness of the ropes measure of a tympanon?

Fil musique? = .010 inches to ~ .035 inches

Ok about English, I have no French at all.

http://www.eudict.com/index.php?word=+w ... ang=engfre

[mrchips]

You could use anything for a bridge rod or cap but in my opinion the hassle in making a rod out of bone would be borderline insanity on a one piece bridge. Now if you went with whats known as chessmen style bridges then a bone cap would be doable. This type of bridge is a separate short bridge for each course.

[Verduin]

MR chips,

When ye say that you space the strings in a course at .198 (the diameter of a tuning pin)...is that US or metric? I only see inches divvied up into 16ths on a US ruler... I'm guessing roughly two-tenths of a centimeter, or 198 millimeters?



(I hates math LOL)

Mark

[KenH]

A tuning pin is a hair less than 1/4" in diameter (.25"). So to get metric it's .198 inches x 25.4 millimeters per inch = 5.0292 mm spacing