violins88

I want to gift Roger a knife or two, in thanks for his generosity in sharing information. Can you please ask him what knives, if any, he could use? That can be your opener for conversation. I presume he a normal septuagenarian. Kindly, helpful, ready to share.

Christine, Have you spoken with Roger Hargrave about emulsions?

In 2012, I played with emulsions. My results: Emulsions

I like this approach.

The September 2026 Strad magazine article, by Tamás Guminár, essentially says that the wood “tubes” are 10 to 50 microns wide, and that it is desirable to have kaolin particles placed inside the openings. I am only offering here a small piece of info for anyone who wants to experiment. Where do you find particles less than 3 microns? I bought kaolin from purenature.co.nz. Since the settling rate of 3 micron kaolin is 0.5 mm/minute, it turns out that if you mix the powder with water in a 2 liter bottle, shake it up and let it settle for 6 hours, the particles that have not settled at the bottom are less than 3 microns. This should be helpful to someone trying to duplicate what is described in the article. In my sample, after 6 hours, visually, you can see that there are still a good amount of particles remaining.

Hobby violin making has the objective of making a good violin, but the caveat is that another objective as well — having fun doing it. in North Carolina, I had classes in my double garage. In a small town, I did not accept payment for this. It was too much fun. The students who completed their violins, 8 if I remember correctly, were VERY satisfied. For the past two years, I have been teaching here in Wellington, Aotearoa New Zealand. Students pay for rental of the space. I receive no compensation except joy and satisfaction. I will be available for sharing at the VSA convention only on Thursday, November 19. John Schmidt

Thanks, john

I will be making knives of CTS-XHP steel. Making knives in October. https://violinknives.com John

Jeffrey, I totally understand if you remove this post due to advertising policy. At the same time, i suspect many people would want to be aware of https://violinknives.com Thanks for your service over all these years. I suspect, like me, you have gray hair. Actually, mine is white.

Mark, I am reading this 6 years after you wrote it.. I moved to Wellington, NZ to work at the Wellington Quakers. I am now finished with that work and will be making knives in Fayetteville, NC in October. The steel has been ordered. I have a website but won’t post that here. I will be at the VSA Cleveland meeting Nov 19 only.

Thanks, Don. When I drop a soundpost, I don’t hear anything. Oh, the ravages of age!

Colleen, it would be great to get Peter Wusterlund in a lab with sensitive microphones and actually verify what he says he hears. I really, really doubt his hearing can detect what he says. It’s really not technically difficult to verify. Please, Peter, come forward and do a test. That would be very helpful to us. There is another fellow, with many pages on his violin maker website, who claims to be able to scratch a soundpost and use that info to make useful changes. Please, submit your claim to an actual measured test. I think the frequencies involved are above human hearing. But don’t trust me. Submit to a test. How about arranging this to be done at the Cleveland VSA meeting in November? I plan to attend. Who has a good microphone? Someone in Cleveland, I bet. Can we fundraise to pay for Wusterlund to attend? Sorry, actually Wusterlund’s attendance is unnecessary. Someone just needs to measure accurately the sound of a scratched plate with the before and after changes Wusterlund indicates. That can be done by anyone with the right equipment. Anywhere. My brain is tired tonight, but any mechanical engineer can work out the fundamental frequency of vibration of the violin sound post. I am pretty sure it is above human hearing frequencies. (See Langsather videos.) But wait… what about subharmonics. Isn’t it possible that we can hear half of 30 kHz. Yes, I think so. Some people, not me. But still, wouldn’t a test be nice? Thanks

I teach hobby violin making, trying to follow Davide Sora’s method as closely as possible. Currently have 8 students. 4 of them are at the scraper stage. I have the spring steel, 0.4 mm thick, as recommended by Darnton years ago. My most promising approach seems to be to hold the scraper against a 90 degree block, to keep it vertical against the 2000 grit diamond plate. Then use carbide burnisher. I am practicing. Sometimes successful. Use lube from behind the ear.

I use 0.4 mm thick steel, 1095 from MSC. (0.015 in thick) Cut the shape with snips. Smooth the profile on a belt sander, 80 grit. This is a dangerous operation. Don’t do it. Hire me to do it for you. Now, on a Tormek or similar, using the side of the wheel, grind an angle on the edge. 70 to 80 degrees. Keep going until you feel the burr. Grind the hook away using a 1000 grit, then 2000 grit diamond stone. Next, polish the edge on 1000 then 2000 grit. I hold near the 80 degree angle. Next use a tungsten carbide burnisher, trying to emulate Davide Sora. This works for me. Maybe a video someday.