New models, new mounts & ferrules

[John Henderson]

I'd like to hear more about the new plain-turned blackwood pipes, and about the new aluminum mounts and ferrules by David Marshall.

[Dunbar Bagpipes]

John;

I was really hoping someone would ask me about this, thanks!!!

We are extremely excited about our new products, and from what I am hearing from our customers, so are they.

Our new Blackwood bagpipe (model DB1) is not really new. The sound is the exact same as our other pipes (bores are exactly the same), the only difference is the styling. We felt there was too much of a price gap between our P2/P3 model and our cheapest Blackwoods. The DB1 with chalice style tops, wood button mounts and plain turning (no beading or combing) requires much less labour to manufacture. Labour costs is the biggest factor in the price of a set of bagpipes, and with our other models requiring threading not only the mounts, ferrules, bushings and rings but also the mating parts of the pipes themselves, plus the beading and combing, they are much more labour intensive. All of the individual parts of our DB1 model are made from 1 piece, so this reduces the labour required, hense reducing the price. We believe this will allow a lot more people to get into a set of Dunbar blackwoods.

We have just started working with David Marshall's ferrules, mounts, etc., and I must say, these are great!!!! The biggest plus is the fact that everything is threaded, so you will never have to worry about your ferrules, etc. "falling" off. Thus far, we have worked with plain stainless steel, aluminum alloy & brass as well as CNC engraved aluminum (expecting CNC engraved stainless shortly), and all of this stuff looks great. We have decided to use the stainless as our standard (the other metals are available as well), but now that I have seen the engraved aluminum, I am rethinking this. It is extremely difficult to see the difference from silver.

Unfortunately, none of these new items are on our web site yet, but we are in the process of re-doing our site, and all of the new models will be on there.

Regards

Rick

[Robert McIlhargie]

Rick,

I was very excited to hear that you'll be offering stainless steel and aluminum mounts as options on your pipes. What are the pros and cons and main differences of choosing stainless steel over aluminum or vice versa. Is the aluminum alloy as sturdy as the stainless steel is it significantly lighter? Does the stainless steel take a polish better? Why did you choose stainless steel as the default for Dunbar pipes?



Thanks for hosting this Q&A session.

[Chris Hampton]

Thanks for all the insights thus far! I was also curious to know if you have given any thought to an online catalog with some large and high quality photos of all of your products and options? Something like a .pdf download, for those of us who are getting ready to make a purchase. That way you don't have to worry about mailing out a bunch of printed catalogs.

Thanks!
Chris

[Dunbar Bagpipes]

Rob;

Yes, we obviously feel the stainless / aluminum is the way to go. I should also mention, these ferrules, etc. are available in brass as well.


Here is my take on the differences between the two:
Stainless:
- is much harder than aluminum, so it will stand up better against scratching, etc.
-I like the finish polish on the stainless a little better

Aluminum:
- is lighter in weight than the stainless. For a 1/2 set, this wouldn't make much difference, but if you are considering a full set (including projecting mounts), you would notice the difference
- because it is a softer material, David offers the option of hand engraving, rather than CNC machine engraving. The hand engraving looks just like the silver.

Stainless was chosen as our standard for its durability.


Rick

[Dunbar Bagpipes]

Chris;

I have definitely thought about this, although I hadn't thought of a PDF file. That may be a very good idea.

What I was thinking about adding to our new web site, is a photo gallery (similar to what Dave Marshall has on his web site), which would sort of be seperate from the web site itself. This way, people who don't necessarily want to see all the pictures, don't have to wait for them to download (speed things up). As you mentioned, a PDF might be a good way of acheiving this as well.

Thanks for the idea.


Rick

[brad]

Hi Rick!!

Proud P3 owner here!

The aesthetics of chalice tops are not as desirable to some people. Not that there's anything wrong with them, but they don't look like "normal" bagpipes.

Any thought of a button mount, flat combed or plain turned blackwood pipe that have the same outer dimensions as your other, more conventional pipes, but would still cost less than pipes with proj mounts?

Thanks

Brad

[Dunbar Bagpipes]

Brad;

The aesthetics of chalice tops are not as desirable to some people. Not that there's anything wrong with them, but they don't look like "normal" bagpipes.

This would be your opinion, but there are a lot of people out there who like the look of the P1 / DB1 style. Actually, this was actually Jack's favourite style.

Any thought of a button mount, flat combed or plain turned blackwood pipe that have the same outer dimensions as your other, more conventional pipes, but would still cost less than pipes with proj mounts?

Definitely no thoughts of adding any more models. You will see, once our new web site is up, that we will have about 8 different models with a total of 35 different option packages (over 100 if you include the option for either stainless, aluminum or brass). This can get very confusing from both a production standpoint as well as ordering, so no, no new models.
We can offer "custom" work, and from what it sounds like, you would basically want to combine different models together, which is not a problem.


Rick