SML Five Star Soprano Clarinet
This right here is the winner. Without equivocation I can say that this is the best professional clarinet I have ever overhauled or played. The enormity of the tone, the immediacy of the response, the free blowing feel are all leagues beyond anything else I have experienced. Many of you know that I a partial to SML's, so you would not be remiss to think I am biased, however, I have no investment in inflating the reputation of SML, I am simply stating my emotional response to playing this horn after the Full Mechanical Overhaul. Sometimes after an overhaul you have to do quite a bit of fine detailing to get everything out of the instrument that you believe is there. It's a normal and important part of the process. But there are other times when the playtest is over in seconds. Just like when you find a mouthpiece you know is perfect; it takes seconds. I actually cussed after blowing this horn for under minute. The intonation is spot on throughout. The throat tones are full, especially the notorious Bb. The tone is so beautiful. Man, SML did it again. I mean, I didn't even have to make any adjustments to the left hand spatulas, they are perfect. That has never happened. I love you SML.
See a the whole slide show here.

100 Year Old Buescher Tru Tone Soprano
This is the oldest horn I have yet to restore, a 1917 Buescher Soprano,  and it put to rest many of the claims I have heard about vintage saxophones from the teens of the 20th Century. Most of those claims are that these "Pre-Snap" Bueschers just don't play right, or that horns from before 1920 have terrible intonation and are not worth any investment. The funny thing about such claims is that when I first started out as a repairman, I was told to dissuade people from investing in any horns that were made before 1925; The claim being that it wasn't until about that time, or even later in most cases, that saxophones were truly being made well. The inherent intonation issues were so prevalent and so difficult to overcome that overhauling horns from that era was fool hardy. However, after restoring several pre-1925 horns from several manufacturers which all played remarkably well, I had to change my mind about these claims....see the rest here.

Owning a great playing bari has literally been a 10 year journey for me. From the Martin being stolen/recovered to its horrible, dishonorable overhaul, and its eventual trade for the battered 12M. I am so happy with this horn now. Please understand that every little thing you did to make it better is noticed and appreciated. Hooray!"
See the full slideshow here.

Were Your Tone Holes Chamfered? What Is it? Why do You Do It?
These photos show tone holes on a Conn 12M. In the left column the tone holes a have not been chamfered, while on the right they have been.
This horn was overhauled several years ago, but lots of necessary mechanical work was neglected, so it is now in my saxophone repair shop in Seattle. The tone holes were filed during the previous overhaul. Some of them are even level, but none of them were chamfered. Any facing of a tone hole will leave an edge; a burr. The burr must be removed. The burrs can actually tear a pad, although it is rare, but they often grab the pad interfering with its stroke, and if you think you have seen really stick pads, just think how bad it is when there are sharp edges on either side of the tone hole rim. It's terrible.

Tell tale signs of proper chamfering will be on the outside rim of the tone hole, as seen in the top row here.
It does fade, so, if your horn was overhauled some time ago, the mark may be gone.

                                                               Up Coming Overhauls
A 1941 Conn 30M Connquerer. A 1917 Buescher Tru Tone Soprano keyed only to high Eb made before Buescher designed the Snaps. And a 1949 Buescher Big B Aristocrat Tenor.

                                     Structural Breaks Should Always Be Silver Soldered.
Call me picky, but I resoldered this D palm key touch piece because it had been soft soldered. Silver solder is far stronger than soft solder because the alloys are heated to above 800 degrees, and at this liquidus temperature, the molten filler metal interacts with a thin layer of the base metal, cooling to form an exceptionally strong, sealed joint due to grain structure interaction. The silver brazed joint becomes a sandwich of different layers, each metallurgically linked to each other.
And it looks way better when it is done cleanly.
This is part of a Full Mechanical Overhaul on a '73 Mark VI. I could have left this key the way it was. It did function after all. But that is why I say, "call me picky."

Positioning Adjustable F#/G# Regulation Arm For Mechanical Advantage.
Compare the two photos here. On the left is the standard back to front positioning of the F#/G# adjustment arm on Selmer style systems. The arm is almost always as far forward as it can be in the slot on the F# key. On the right I have set it back for mechanical advantage.
In the picture on the left the G# adjustment screw has to hold down the G# key as close to the G# fulcrum as it can be. Meaning, in the back of the G# key cup. That gives the F# key, and its adjustment arm, the least mechanical advantage available.

This is why door handles are positioned opposite the hinge side of the door. Imagine closing a door, but the handle is on the same side as the hinge.
When possible, as on Full Mechanical Overhauls or extensive Play Condition repairs on horns with this Selmer style system, I always reset the position of this arm so the adjustment screw is as far to the front of the G# key cup as possible. In other words, as far back in the slot on the F# key as possible.
If the adjustment screw is too close to the fulcrum, the G# key will sometimes flex when the left hand table is stroked. It will do this in spite of an otherwise perfect set up. This will create unusual and intermittent playability issues. At the least it will manifest itself as a hissing. At worst the horn will fail from C# - Bb.
The problem however is that this will happen even when the pad seats look perfect, and the G# key will show no light coming through during the mechanical test to check F#-G# regulation. It is this flexing that causes the leak. And moving the adjustment arm to the back of the F# key solves that problem. A common, and incorrect, solution is to over-regulate the F#-G# adjustment so the G# key is forced close out of necessity to close the F# key. No, no, no.

Attention To Detail
Here's what Brian of Getasax said after receiving this horn that was overhauled by me in my Seattle Saxophone Repair Shop:
   "Hi Carlo, I got the Selmer Super Sax Alto that you overhauled today. Well, I already suspected as much, but based on this horn, I think your pad work is among the best to be found anywhere today. (And in my job, I get to see a lot of different people's pad work.) Extremely even, flat, snappy, just the right amount of spring tension, even across the horn, adjustment materials make sense and are nice and clean. And it looks like you did a real neck fit too, which is super-important but often-overlooked. I am going to start referring people to you who are looking for top quality overhauls. This is the real deal! I hope I can send you some horns for overhaul soon, before too many people find out about you and you end up with a long wait list."
Thanks Brian. I'm super glad you're happy with the work!    See the whole gallery here.

A Night Poem
Late November 7th I was in the shop and wanted accompaniment to my improvising, so I put on some old French poetry. Sometimes there's more to improvise along with a backdrop.
This sounds much better on a little tinny speaker. Bass heavy speakers make it sound all muddy.

                                                                       Ye Olde Shoppe
Here is what the shop sometimes sounds like late at night. Not working on horns. Just playing the piano.
This bit is rather nice, but a long, disjointed melody over it would be even nicer. Maybe tenor, but it'd have to be all up in the high register.

            Dear Hobbyists, Please Stop Misinforming People and Wasting Their Time
This 1948 10M came into my saxophone repair shop in Seattle and the owner is experiencing intonation issues and intermittent playability problems.
Although the horn was "overhauled", it was overhauled by someone that made absolutely no attempt to do the job properly. But they did buy the most expensive pads on the market to do the job. Why? Presumably because it made the horn easier to sell. But so what? Not a single key on the horn was refit. Not only are the keys loose, not one rod fits inside its post correctly; there is concentric play inside every post. The first two photos below show the F key in the lower stack and you can see just how much slop is between it and the F# key next to it. Every single key on the horn is like that. It's a mess, and it's a shame.
So why does this matter? Do loose keys cause intonation issues?

Not directly. But loose keys are at the root of the problem.
Loose keys wander all over the place. The concentric play on the rod causes key deflection, and they ruin properly seated pads by blurring an otherwise well-defined pad seat. And that causes both intonation and playability issues.
Know what else cause intonation issues? Improperly vented keys. The lower stack was significantly over-vented. That means the keys were too high. This can throw the octaves way off and playing in tune with an ensemble is virtually impossible.
Let's look at the pad work. You want to show off your super expensive pads, right? Well, Roo pads have very thick skins and require a deeper seat than tanned kid leather. These pads had seats that were too shallow, and shallow seats in Roo pads never hold. And, due to their extra firm felt, if the tone holes are not level, you will never get a proper seat in a Roo pad. And none of the tone holes are level. None of them.
Look at the first two pictures below. They show the front and back of the G# tone hole respectively. See the light? There are low spots in the front and back. And guess what? There was a significant leak in the front of the G# pad. The third picture shows the low D tone hole. See that depression? The pad was, not surprisingly, leaking significantly. You'd need very good luck to seat a pad on that tone hole.
And the last picture shows a loose spring. It's falling out of the post, and there were others like it. The only thing keeping it in place was the tension put on the spring by the cradle. It's like a loose wood screw held in place because the canted angle won't allow the screw to fall. And loose springs feel mushy, they don't provide a positive snappy action.

Let's see what we have here: Sloppy unfit key work. Sloppy wobbling rods. Loose Springs. Out-of-level tone holes. Poorly seated pads. Improper venting. A horn that responds poorly, intonates unevenly, and has intermittent playability issues.
Why do I say hobbyist repair techs are misinforming people and wasting their time?
Because the unsuspecting people that buy horns like this think they have a horn that was "overhauled", and they rightly assume the horn shouldn't have too many issues. They also assume that any issues it does have won't require extensive repair. Doing repairs like this lowers the bar on what passes for a proper overhaul and gives professional repair techs everywhere a bad reputation. And it leads many people to believe overhauls can be done cheaply, but it just wastes their money. And educating people why their horn is in need of such extensive repair without injuring their pride or bad mouthing another "repair tech" is a diplomatic art at which I have become very articulate.
There is no shortage of excuses for why corners are cut on jobs like this, and they include: insufficient compensation, lack of proper tooling, lack of education, lack of skill, lack of time. But none of that matters. This recently overhauled horn needs an overhaul and that is an inexcusable waste of time.
A new, full set of pads indicates this person intended to "overhaul" this horn, not just tune it up or whatever. Fine, do it to your own horn. Do not sell the horn and misinform people everywhere. If you do sell it, clearly stating what was not done would help saxophone enthusiasts everywhere.
Thank you.

Key Work Geometry
As usual, the best work is in the small details. Here is the left hand table on a Super Action 80 II I just overhauled in my saxophone repair shop here in Seattle. As you can see, the Bb mechanism in the first photo is level with the table. Repair techs worth their salt everywhere are always going on about "leveling the left hand table." And they're right. The table must be level to facilitate navigating the the three lowest notes on your horn. But in this Selmer design the Bb needs to be tilted.
When it's not, its stroke bottoms out at an angle too great in relation to the B and C# spatulas. This makes navigating the table impossible without awkward extensions of the little finger. If you pick the Bb spatula up, as it is in the image on the right, you decrease the final angle: Follow the stroke in your mind; Remember, we're not changing the height of the Bb key cup, so the pad cup strokes the same distance, but will now bottom out at a smaller angle in relation to the B and C# spatulas. Reducing that angle reduces the work of the little finger which facilitates a quicker, snappier, and far more comfortable action.
​ As with all fine saxophone repair and adjustments, there is a balance; If you go too far with this adjustment, it makes getting from C# to Bb very cumbersome.

                                                    Trying Something New: Graphite
     I often embed G# pads with Teflon powder. I posted about it a couple weeks ago. I stated in that post that the jury was still out on that practice. Here is an alternative. Graphite.
     This is the G# pad to a Super Action 80 Series II that's in my saxophone repair shop in Seattle for a Full Mechanical Overhaul. The second photo compares a treated pad on the left with a plain one on the right. We all know Roo pads stick. Every repair tech worth their salt has seen an unresponsive G# key with a Roo pad in it sticking to the tone hole. So let's see how this works out.

                                    Customer Review of The SML Gold Medal II Stencil
      I got this phone call from the owner of the SML Gold Medal II Stencil. He loves it! Hearing feedback like this is what makes the attention to detail all worth it.  You can see the whole gallery here.

                                     

Hinge Tube Extensions? Isn't All That Work Unnecessary?
The short answer is No. Here you see a 1941 Conn 10M owned by a client from Los Angeles. The Octave key is sitting between its posts. Look at the gap. It's not small by any means. It's huge. The key is wobbling like crazy on the hinge rod and will wander between the posts. This will give the octave pad multiple seats and ultimately end up in the key dragging against the guide. True, the key will err to one side over the other, but is that how you like you key work? More or less in one position when its not in some other?
     "Sounds good to me. I prefer there to be over lapping seats in my pads. And come to think of it, I like all that clicking and clacking too, so keep those keys loose", said No One, Ever.

      The gap here is so large it can not be corrected with normal key fitting, nor is it wise to simply bend the posts in towards each other. Doing so might give the appearance of a good fit, but the posts will be angled inwards causing the key to drag. When the whole Octave assembly doesn't feel heavy, sluggish, and unresponsive, it'll fail intermittently. And considering the distance needed to be covered, angling them will probably put dents under the posts as well.
    That is why hinge tube extensions are necessary. They are not overkill. Making this bushing, soldering it onto the hinge tube, and fitting the key so the faces of both the hinge tube and the posts are square, allows the key to stroke positively. Now there is absolutely no concentric play on the hinge rod, end play between the posts, or slop within the hinge rod and its post.
     It is a repair that will last for years, and that is how I do things in my saxophone repair shop here in Seattle. It takes longer and costs more, but unlike the above mentioned alternatives, it eliminates frequent visits to the shop. And frequent visits to the shop are what is really unnecessary.

                                                  The Little Stuff Makes A Big Difference
       This 1941 Conn 10M is in my woodwind repair shop in Seattle. The previous repair tech crunched the tabs on both the side Bb and C keys. Why? To eliminate lost motion between the the lever and the key. Lost motion is when a lever or key designed to open or close another key does not do so instantaneously: The keys should act as one.
     When there is lost motion they feel clumsy, clunky, and reduce the players confidence in their horn. If the adjustment materials are too thick, or create unnecessary friction, the key will bind. If the adjustment materials are too hard, the key work will make annoying clicking sounds. If the materials are the correct thickness, act as good bearing surfaces, and are soft enough to absorb sound, the key work will act as one, feel slick and responsive, and be silent.
       Here is a short chronology: Lost motion is usually the first indication that your adjustment materials have compressed and worn down over time. Your horn will often play adequately even if there is lost motion. It will just feel clunky, but when the discrepancies increase, playability issues will surface, and that's when you end up in the repair shop.

     So, how to get rid of it? You could do what was done in these photos. Just crunch those tabs to make up for the worn out adjustment material and send the musician on their way. This could result in:
-Obviously unparallel key tabs which are ugly as hell and look like someone didn't care enough to do the job right.
-Compressed height adjustment material under your Bb key. Which is unsightly and will increase the key stroke, producing a sharper Bb. It will also make the key bind before it bottoms out on the body tube.
 -Plier marks on your Bb key.
     Look at the two pictures above. The angled tab on the Bb key even wore down the lever. It has a taper on its south side. Compare it with the picture below: That is a 1947 10M. See the corners on that lever? That is how it should look.

      Setting the adjustment materials so they eliminate all lost motion and silence all the key work is time consuming. When I worked in a corporate repair shop, taking the time to do it the way I have done here is exactly the kind of thing that would have resulted in a Repair Department Meeting in which we would all be pressed to get work done faster. This is why repair techs do what was done in the first photo. They are either pressed to do so, or they have been trained to do so and don't know any better.
    Of course, sometimes, the client has made their inability to pay for a proper repair clear and has been told explicitly by the repair tech that corners will be cut. But that topic requires a lengthy article all to itself.

                                                    1941 Conn 10M. Factory Relacquer?
When I see Res-O-Pads such as these, they say, "Original pads" to me. As in, these were the only pads put in this horn. But the bell has that relacquered look to it. Not so much in the engraving, but particularly in what looks like hammer marks near the bell-to-bow ferrule.
So, if it is a relacquer, at what point in this horns life, starting in 1941, did someone decide, or get persuaded, to have it relacquered at the factory? Ten years, in 1951? Eighteen, in 1959 right before they busted the union? I would love to go back in time and hear the sales person at the music store, or the repair tech in their shop, discuss the advantages of having this done.

                                        G# Pad Embedded with Polytetrafluoroethylene Powder
Doing saxophone repair in my Seattle shop for several years, I've been trying this out for sometime now and have not yet seen any horns come back. So, while the verdict is still out on the effectiveness of this, I like the theory enough to continue doing it. That the horns have not yet come back is, perhaps, confirmation that it's providing relief from sticking G# and C# pads.
Polytetrafluoroethylene is just the chemists name for Teflon. Rubbing the powder into the grain before ironing and seating the pad gives the result you see in the photo.

                                                               What's In A PlayTest?
There is a lot more to playtests than these three examples alone. But I feature these three elements because they are heard so rarely. Too often I hear clips intended to impress upon me the ease of playability of a given horn, and I hear lots of ripping bebop lines and blues rock altissimo phrases. These do not put the horn under the kind of scrutiny essential to demonstrating the ease of playability. They do a great job of showcasing the players ability to burn changes and riff. If music is to be featured in a playtest, Bach's Cello Suites would be a better common denominator. They are a demanding workout that all players use, and will readily reveal playability issues. This playtest here is purely clinical. It does not tell you what kind of music I like to play because that is irrelevant. For those of you that do not appreciate this clinical approach, I will be posting another playtest like this one on Tenor, a '22 New Wonder I, in it I will play some of the Cello Suites. For now we can start with this clinical scrutiny.

  Here is a compression test on a '47 10M. The horn should sound like a drum. It is an indication of the compression your horn has. It is not a critical leak test of high scrutiny. It is simply a bonus you get after doing all the critical mechanical tests. Certainly all repair techs, and saxophonists do this, but I have to credit my friend Matt Stohrer with the original posting of this test. Thanks Matt.