Tuesday, January 5, 2016

Low A Oboe

I had this fun little guy in a few weeks ago. The owner said that, among other issues, the Low A mechanism wasn't properly regulated. How he realized that, I don't know, but it certainly wasn't from all the demanding Low A passages out there. Maybe he plays a lot of full range scales.


It was fun to work on, and the owner couldn't have been more pleasant. The Low A mechanism is pretty straightforward; it's activated by a right thumb touchpiece and is designed to also close the Low B and Bb keys, so you can go straight from C to A just by depressing the thumb. The only complication is that there are two regulation screws between the Low B and Low Bb keys. One is to adjust the regulation when playing low Bb, the other (visible in the center of the following photo) is to ensure that the Low B closes when playing Low A, which is tricky because of the flexibility of the very long mechanisms. It took a couple minutes to figure out, but now I'll be ready when the next one comes across my bench in 2038.


I hate that bench. Damn, we need a better consultation space.

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