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March 26, 2005
Winter Shakuhachi Repairs.
Winter is gone, well....almost. We just had a snow storm on the first day of spring! Maybe now the repairs department here at Yung Flutes will get a breather. I had tons of cracked shakuhachi come in this winter. Please store your flute in an AIR TIGHT containter. The best is a simple plastic bag with a rubber band to seal it. If you don' t have a long bag, just use a double layer of the plastic bags from your dry cleaning.
When I was a kid, I went to the dentist quite often. One day, Dr Fong held up a hand mirror to my mouth an said, "Take a look at how big your cavity is. I had to drill this big hole. I want you too see this so you'll brush your teeth from now on!"
Well, folks, some of you don't know what goes into an inlaied rattan binding. There's a lot of surgery involved.
This is a 2.7 Hoshi Bonchiku. Look at how deep I have to cut into the bamboo in order to do the lower wrapping. This flute needed two at the bottom.
After it sat over night, the stuborn root tried to open up so I extended the width of the lower binding.
There are four more inlays done on the top piece for insurance. The utaguchi is an variation on the Miean style. Interesting choice for a thundering modern shakuhachi.
I also moved the Chi hole for an easier reach. This is a great flute from a great maker. As you all know, each shakuhachi hand made in the traditional way is different, even from the same maker. When a great flutes comes into the shop, I measure the bore for future reference.
Other repairs this winter:
This one had a kusabi at the top - a Japanese woodworking nail. Japanese shakuhachi makers stopped using these because they continued to crack and the nails caused additional cracking.
The original crack was above the thumb hole which was near a node. It was tricky getting the placement correct.
This Kinshu had a custom painted surface so it posed other problems. The paint was chipping even with careful cutting with my super fine toothed Japanese saw. I decided the older look of the urushi coated inlayed bindings would look better than rattan because of the color.
Once again, unless you want deep channels carved into your flute, I recommend the simpler and just as effective topical monofilament binding. That's what Kinya does in Japan. You can read the entry on how to do your own monofilament bindings on this blog.
That's it from the shop. Please remember to store your flutes in an airtight container... and brush your teeth at least twice a day.
Your shak doc, Perry
Posted by Perry Yung at March 26, 2005 09:29 AM
Comments
Hi Perry,
Very interesting. I was wondering what those "chip-offs" were with old flutes.I always thought those shaks fell and the utaguchi accidently chipped off...
Anyway, don't let the shak bugs bite you, hehehe.
greetz, Ken Tanaka
Posted by: Ken Tanaka at March 30, 2005 07:31 AM