Dimensions for pipes - research opportunity

[Troy Jesse]

Hi All,

I am trying to compile a list of bores, dimensions, etc., primarily for educational purposes. A colleague of mine is working on a 'Physics of Sound' class, and he has asked me to do some lectures on bagpipes. In addition, we have a machine shop here on campus where students could produce bores based on our dimensions, and experiments could be done by our physics class...

Anyway, I have a decent list, but need information on more - Glen, MacDougall, McCallum, Lawrie....

I have info for Kron Heritage and Standard, Gillanders, Grainger/Campbell, Henderson (and the ones based on them), Robertson, Kilgour, Booth, Center....

I would be happy to share what I have, although it is not complete with regards to tuning chambers and bushes in many cases...

thanks

[Randy J. Homer]

Ringo Bowen has been at this and made some measurements available through an Excel spreadsheet downloadable here. (http://www.thebagpipeplace.com/museum/page269.html)

Hope that helps!

[Michael New]

The bore dimensions spreadsheet on Ringo's page can't be downloaded - seems the link is not available.

Michael

[Troy Jesse]

I noticed that, too...

I had requested a copy, but no answer yet.....

He is a busy person.....

[classicbagpipes]

Dimensions and specs are iffy at best a least in older pipes.
I tried to do the same thing many years ago when I was getting many fine sets of pipes from my Scottish source. I was finding that the bores were all over the place.
IE there were slight differences to just about all of them. From one set of pipes, be they Lawrie, Henderson, MacDougall, whatever, I was finding that the bores were different for all of the drones. Again not drastically but some slight changes in size from one drone to the next.
These were all older sets of pipes so would have to chalk it up to changes in the wood. Shrinkage would be the term here. But also the less precise boring and tooling that they had available to make these pipes.
In conclusion, I felt I could come to no conclusion and just stopped trying to take measurements.

[Troy Jesse]

OK, well, it will give the students something to do....

[bob864]

I'd like to see this experiment:

Use some thin wall tubing to create a drone. Reed it up and produce measurements and recordings of the sound. Now add some material to the outside of the wall and repeat the measurements.

Now repeat with a different bore material.

The purpose of the experiment is to discover how much difference the interior surface of the bore contributes, and likewise the mass of the wall.

Bob

[maitland]

A property of woods I have heard discussed by knowledgeable persons is their variable absorbent quality with regard to various frequencies, especially the higher ones above 1000Hz; the idea being that some woods soak up more or less of different frequencies, and these remaining would interact with the lower, more dominant, frequencies and produce a distinctive tone. Has anyone thought about or tested this phenomenon? It seems, in the view of one of the KP's, that testing a bore and not taking into consideration a) the type of wood, and b) measurement of the higher frequencies (reference was nade to a Paper which measured only up to around 800Hz) might not give a definitive result.

[Glenurquhart]

I have provided measurements of my ca. 1830 MacDougall/Perth set to several pipers in the past. If you have a use for them, you may send a private message.

[Troy Jesse]

I think I have those, thank you.....