[Koen88]

Hi everybody,

I`m an engineering student in holland and this month i got an assignment to print something with a 3d printer (prints plastic). It can create a solid shape in allmost any form and is hard an durable (you can throw a printed item on the ground and it wont break)

now i`ve gotten the idea to print an ALTO mpc but this gives allmost limetless options..
forms and shapes you cant possible do with a machine or by hand are possible with 3d printing. The only limitation is my skill in 3d drawing:mrgreen:

what unconvential ideas do you have or would you like to see, and what effect do you think this has on the accoustic properties.

some (crazy?) ideas i allready had are:

• dimples in the chamber which are larger than the shaft so youll get somehwat of a large chamber I was thinking of 3 dimples with a 5mm diameter
• a hollow tube inside the shaft which could be conical or straight or square etc..
• a comletely waved chamber or even a waved baffle

these are just a few things i could think of, but i havent got the slightest idea what these do with your sound or ease of playing etc..

hope to hear a lot of creative ideas!

Kind Regards,

Koen

 

[ricanna]

That sounds interesting. Talking of dimples, I imagine covering the entire interior of the mpc with small 2mm diameter dimples like the surface of a golf ball. I wonder if it would behave like a large chamber because of its volume, or a smaller chamber (dimples on golf balls actually reduce surface resistance), or otherwise...?

But how about the accuracy of such 3D printing? If it cannot guarantee accurate facing and rails, the "printout" will need some finishing and that could introduce enough error that throws the entire test results away.

 

[Dr G]

Do you have a way to image a mouthpiece and export a cloud array of points? If so, you could start with a real mouthpiece of known character and modify it to learn what effect it has.

 

[Koen88]

@Dr G--

I have the possibility to do a 3d measurement.. that allmost follow the procedure you are prescribing only you are drawing in 3d as you are measuring..

good idea! I`ll ask the guy who manages the workshop today!

 

[Koen88]

That sounds interesting. Talking of dimples, I imagine covering the entire interior of the mpc with small 2mm diameter dimples like the surface of a golf ball. I wonder if it would behave like a large chamber because of its volume, or a smaller chamber (dimples on golf balls actually reduce surface resistance), or otherwise...?

But how about the accuracy of such 3D printing? If it cannot guarantee accurate facing and rails, the "printout" will need some finishing and that could introduce enough error that throws the entire test results away.

interesting thought, I believe the dimples do reduce resistance but also enlarges the surface area..

the accuracy is .25 mm that means that "sharp" edges will have a fillet with a radius of 0.0049213 inches, and the overall texture will be quite rough on the feel
it`s comparable to the picture below.

I`ll als the workshop manager what finishing options they have dont know for shure if whe have that possibility.

on the other hand I could draw the mpc a bit bigger for some hand or machine surfacing..

 

[ricanna]

0.25mm is quite large an error for a mpc facing...but at least you can draw a perfect radial facing curve for start.

On the other hand...can we make a mpc with different beak shape.. eg. more "lip -friendly" / polygonal / cylindrical..? diagonal mpc? ....just some thoughts.

 

[mfry]

It can certainly be done, and the only limit is your imagination and drawing ability. I used 3d printing to prototype most stages of my new tenor mouthpiece. At .25mm resolution you can probably get a playable facing printed. I tried a couple of different machines, SLS (laser sintering) with plastic was marginally better than FDM (fused deposition). IIRC the Z increment on both was .1mm which I didn't expect to produce a playable facing but it did. I haven't found any plastic in these systems suitable for production (i.e., strong enough, pretty enough, and cheap enough), but for prototyping I found it useful for a while.

This is a perfect application for this technology IMO. Sax mouthpieces are awkward shapes to machine (especially large chambered ones) and so are great candidates for using this kind of manufacturing. You can make shapes that are difficult or even impossible to machine.

I'm having trouble visualizing what chamber shape you mean by 3 5mm dimples, but if you can draw it and have access to the printer, might as well try it. Good luck with your experiments.

 

[Koen88]

It can certainly be done, and the only limit is your imagination and drawing ability. I used 3d printing to prototype most stages of my new tenor mouthpiece. At .25mm resolution you can probably get a playable facing printed. I tried a couple of different machines, SLS (laser sintering) with plastic was marginally better than FDM (fused deposition). IIRC the Z increment on both was .1mm which I didn't expect to produce a playable facing but it did. I haven't found any plastic in these systems suitable for production (i.e., strong enough, pretty enough, and cheap enough), but for prototyping I found it useful for a while.

This is a perfect application for this technology IMO. Sax mouthpieces are awkward shapes to machine (especially large chambered ones) and so are great candidates for using this kind of manufacturing. You can make shapes that are difficult or even impossible to machine.

I'm having trouble visualizing what chamber shape you mean by 3 5mm dimples, but if you can draw it and have access to the printer, might as well try it. Good luck with your experiments.

thank you for your comment mrfy. With dimples i mean; in stead of making the round chamber part, as in your picture, the chamber is only bigger than the bore on 3 places which you could indeed see as 3 larger golfball dimples.. sorry I dont speak/type english fluently enough to explain better, so i drew an example. these are oval dimples they were fastest and easiest to draw..

 

[Sakshama]

The whole subject is very interesting and keep us posted with the results.

 

[Koen88]

The whole subject is very interesting and keep us posted with the results.

I will! havent you got any unconvential / unmachineable ideas lurking around in the back of your mind? (that you are willing to share offcourse)

 

[Jazz House]

This sounds like a lot of fun. Let's hope it produces some amazing new gear.

 

[MojoBari]

It is fairly common to take inspiration from aerodynamic designs for mouthpieces. But acoustic science is different from aerodynamics. Putting dimples in a mouthpiece makes as much sense as putting a high baffle on a golf ball. But some baffle designs were inspired by the shape of airplane wings. They can work quite well in spite of the different physics at work.

 

[Koen88]

It is fairly common to take inspiration from aerodynamic designs for mouthpieces. But acoustic science is different from aerodynamics. Putting dimples in a mouthpiece makes as much sense as putting a high baffle on a golf ball. But some baffle designs were inspired by the shape of airplane wings. They can work quite well in spite of the different physics at work.

I`ll see if i can find some aerodynamics books, I only had fundamental aerodynamics and fluid dynamics but it`s a start

 

[avan]

We have use here at our museum, some new 3D scanner to use on small archaoelogical artifact. ypu dont need to put point on the surface like the old technology. We use bigger Leica scanner for the in situ remain for 5 years now. This technology use cloud array of point. they even compatible with SketchUp.

 

[Dr G]

More details, please, regarding your scanner(s), Avan. My NextEngine isn't doing the job I need - specifically, scanning reflective surfaces to high resolution.

 

[avan]

We are experimenting with the small hand scanner. We also have some difficulty with high reflective surface with the small scan. The resul I see are good (good enough for a mouthpiece) but some intricated detail where lost. it's like in digital photography. it's hard to keep detail in the white or highlight zone. This is the company we are working with : http://www.graphsynergie.com/, talk to Richard Lapointe for more technical stuff he is THE guy to talk about scanning and cloud, and it is very friendly: [email protected] The result with the big scan are impressive. We can see and mesure the tickness of a crack deep in a stone wall, so it help for the restauration and the survey of the site.

 

[MojoBari]

I`ll see if i can find some aerodynamics books, I only had fundamental aerodynamics and fluid dynamics but it`s a start

If you are looking for acoustic books, start with Benade's "Fundamentals of Musical Acoustics". But there is not a lot there on sax mouthpieces that will help you. There is very little in the technical papers too that can be applied to good use. The state of the art is "trial and error" IMO. You should not wander too far away from a proper chamber volume for intonation. But even that is more flexible than some would lead you to believe.

 

[jicaino]

one of the greatest potentials of this technology is that any mpc could be scanned and then enlargened for solving the problem of 10 to 15% reduction of casting. A good florida replica with OEM link ligatures compatibility and chamber size, a slant cast in delrin, possibilities are virtually infinite!

 

[Koen88]

one of the greatest potentials of this technology is that any mpc could be scanned and then enlargened for solving the problem of 10 to 15% reduction of casting. A good florida replica with OEM link ligatures compatibility and chamber size, a slant cast in delrin, possibilities are virtually infinite!

thats true, only I dont have those scanning technologies at hand, only thing that comes close is on this site http://sax.mpostma.nl/NL/ He is a Dutch refacer and mouthpiece maker.
he has a few pics like this on his site and some X/ray pics

 

[jicaino]

^^ that's what I'm talking about!