[ptung]

There have been some pretty entertaining (not for the strong players who left this forum afterward, of which I know one or two) discussions of Tino Schucht's thumbhooks on this forum over time.

He's got a new product called a "Sound EXpander" that has a lot of promise for similarly wacky discussion: http://schuchtsaxtechnology.com/Deutsch/Sound_EXpander_D/sound_expander_d.html

They do work, by which I mean that if you have good tone production, if the saxophone is a form of speaking voice for you, you'll notice the change not only in how your horn sounds to you in the room, as you play, but that that change shifts and modulates according to how you place the "EXpander."

For most people, it will be a desirable, not-that-subtle change: greater volume, a woody kind of extra resonance, sort of a higher resolution color.

Is that change audible to listeners in the room? My guess is that it is, but less so than for the player and probably in a different way.

But the product is legit, from the player's perspective and it's too obvious to be due to placebo effect. It does change the sound from the player's perspective in a way most will find at least novel and interesting if not a permanent improvement, and anything that goes that will change how the player thinks and plays (for better or worse, but unavoidably).

---

I *am* a dealer for Tino's necks, hooks, and now the EXpander. I'm not posting about this item because I'm a dealer. None of his products are really money-makers for me -- I carry them because I like them and want to offer them to clients, because they open avenues to greater happiness for the latter.

I carry Tino's products because I got curious about his necks, bought a couple used, really liked them and wanted to be able to both have lots for myself and to offer them to customers, especially as add-on items.

It's pretty hilarious to me that the EXpander does what it does, especially in terms of how that's likely to play out in a discussion here. They work. Why/how, or in precisely what physical way is open to question. I don't know the answer to that. I only know that I'm going to carry them, and use one on my Taiwan tenor. If it does as much for the SBA, it'll go on that, too.

I think most items on the market of this type are BS or even do the opposite of what they claim to do. None of Tino's products are BS, IMO, at least not that I've encountered to date (necks, hooks, EXpander).

 

[Instrument Attic]

Looks similar to Meridian / Satterlee's Center Brace Resonance Weights. Same general idea?

 

[milandro]

Well, it is not quite so new ( maybe this looks more polished now) but we've spoken many times about it already since many years ago (2008)

https://forum.saxontheweb.net/showthread.php?84766-Schucht-sax-modification-devices

Tobias (remember the P-Ligging?) was one of the people who spoke about this first

His necks are great (I have one for my Selmer AN1) but also guite expensive

There are 3 tuningparts to pimp your horn.

When I first read about it, I was also very sceptical, but I orderd them to test them.
I've testet it on my sax, showed it to some friends and my teacher, and everybody could here a difference.

I have to, it is not such a big difference like chaninging a mouthpiece but often it is very clear.

The change depends also on the sax. Sometimes the difference is clear, sometimes just a little change and sometimes nothing is hearable.
Also the Effect can make it better, just a difference and also make it worse.
When we put the Soundexpander on the Yani 9931 of my teacher suddenly the depth aren't working,

Ok, there are 3 different gimmiks.

First the Thumphook: Often, it makes the biggest difference. The deep tones come more easy and they are not sounding any more like a signal horn of a ship.
At my SIII the tone get darker, and just a litte better but for 50€ it was to much

the Soundexpander: It gives my Selmer, and Selmer and the Rampone of my friend, mor center. An other effect is, that fast scaales come more clearly and are not swimming.
I liked it very much, so I bought it.

At the Klappenschutzblech I didn't hear a thing.

Another nice tool is the Klangbogen:
http://www.klangbogen.de/
It gives the sound more volume. You can see the frequenz mountains, they got spread up.

I think the resonanz stones of the Cannonball work wuite the same.

But at my Cannonball the difference was not so big as on my Selmer SIII, so I play my Raven without this stuff

I got a selmer SIII for finishing school, at this time I didn't know anything about saxes and wanted something better than my Yamaha. Therefore Selmer the newest model in a cool colour. Didn't play anything ele to test, just ordered it.
Then because I wasn't happy with the sound I went from an S80 to an OL STM, then Meyer M7M, B24, Yanagisawa Metall, at last my Jody DV 8.
I tried a lot of different reeds an lots of them were those expensive plastic reeds. For my last 5 Reeds I payed more 140$ (and this was a spezial price).
I also experimantated with necks. So first bought a Jupter funky neck, bit it wasn't that good, so I bought a neck from Tino Schucht which was over 1400$ worth.
I also bought pimping devices like the sound expander and the klangbogen.
And of course there were lots of ligs like, the Heftrig Lig, Ligaphone, two FLs (of course with different preasure plates), Brancher Ligs (Metal and Leather), Rovner, my own developed Lig.
And I never was satisfied with the sound.
So then I switched by coincidence to a Cannonball Raven. Because the Soundexpander didn't match the colour so I bought one again in silver finish an a new thumprest for over 160$.
And now I've got two other new Ligs here (saxas and snake) to test and I think I'll gonna buy them both. This would be Lig 6 and 7 which fit for my Jody.

I think this is kind of very idiotic, isn't it?

 

[JimD]

I expect that Tobias is probably out of debtor's jail by now. Those reeds were certainly a special price.

 

[ptung]

Looks similar to Meridian / Satterlee's Center Brace Resonance Weights. Same general idea?

Oh lawwwd...this is what happens when you don't use forums much for a decade or more. I mostly only use two areas of this site, too.

That mounts the same way as Tino's EXpander, and it's in the position I found to seem most influential (as opposed to up on the screw or some other position). I would have to guess (and this is a guess, because I don't understand what makes Tino's EXpander do what it does, or how that Meridian product is designed or why) that there is some relation (in design and effect). Unfamiliar with the Meridian product, have never seen one in person.

milandro - I don't remember "P-Ligging" unless it has some kind of relation to the ligature a while back with the four prongs coming off the reed plate and the arcing, long thingy on top. But it's clear to me from your and JimD's posts I missed on on something.

 

[milandro]

....milandro - I don't remember "P-Ligging" unless it has some kind of relation to the ligature a while back with the four prongs coming off the reed plate and the arcing, long thingy on top. But it's clear to me from your and JimD's posts I missed on on something.

found it for you, tobias was the author of the comments above ^ and the person whom discovered the P-Ligging, the world was never the same after that! He endorsed the Schucht stuff too ( read above) ^

https://forum.saxontheweb.net/showthread.php?92953-P-Ligging-a-little-help-to-pimp-your-sound

 

[ptung]

FWIW, I would have thought that whatever is happening with the EXpander is in part that sound is reflecting as it exits the horn differently (relative to the player's ears) than without the EXpander. But, in that case, if that was the design idea, you might expect the side that is toward the brace to be either concave or convex, to either focus and direct reflected sound or to diffuse it, and that side is flat. The Meridian product, if it does anything (all I know of it is in the posts above), might tend to reflect sound differently (because of the wider surface that "aims" more toward the player's head over more surface area) than the EXpander.

I have no idea what makes the EXpander do what it does. It's hilarious to me that it does anything at all, especially something cool.

 

[ptung]

I will have to look later, but it sounds like Tobias is/was a sounding board for some ridicule. Argumentatively, if he's being cited as a proof that Tino's products deserve ridicule, because one person was ridiculous in his manner of supporting them...not a strong rational basis for rejection.

My first reference point for discussions of things like whether his thumbhook has a sonic effect was a thread posted by a very strong player that received (for that person) unexpected ridicule from people that decidedly can't play, and were commenting without actually trying the hooks themselves.

 

[JimD]

Posts about sound enhancers usually come in for a lot of ridicule, ref one about the Klangbogen which ran and ran and got quite hysterical at times. You’ve got off lightly so far, maybe the Klangbogen thread wore everybody out.

 

[saxoclese]

My understanding of all of these "types" of "sound enhancers" is that what they all have in common is that they are attached somewhere to the outside of the body of the instrument to add weight or "mass".

These may affect the vibrations of the walls of body of the instrument when it is being played, and it is not unrealistic to conclude that an experienced player who is intimately familiar with his instrument may be able to feel or "sense" these subtle changes.

From the accumulated findings of years of acoustic research we know the following:
1) The wall vibrations themselves are far too weak to be heard while the instrument is being played.
2) On a standard reed instrument the vibrations of the wall material do not "couple with" the vibrations within the column of air inside that produces the sound---in other words, they have no effect.*

Changes to the outside of the instrument by adding mass may also change the "bio-acoustic feedback" received by the player creating the belief that the sound waves emitted into the room and heard by the listener have also changed. To prove or disprove that the added "device" actually affects the sound waves emitted from the instrument would simply require a well controlled, repeatable study in which neither the player nor the listeners know which trials are with the device attached and which are not.

To my knowledge no such study has ever been undertaken for any of the various devices described above.

* In the latest research, a measurable effect was found in a few of the upper harmonics on a simplified reed instrument that was slightly oval shaped and with a wall thickness of .2 mm.

 

[lostcircuits]

Here is another variation. As far as I know, this is one of a kind.

 

[turf3]

My understanding of all of these "types" of "sound enhancers" is that what they all have in common is that they are attached somewhere to the outside of the body of the instrument to add weight or "mass".

These may affect the vibrations of the walls of body of the instrument when it is being played, and it is not unrealistic to conclude that an experienced player who is intimately familiar with his instrument may be able to feel or "sense" these subtle changes.

From the accumulated findings of years of acoustic research we know the following:
1) The wall vibrations themselves are far too weak to be heard while the instrument is being played.
2) On a standard reed instrument the vibrations of the wall material do not "couple with" the vibrations within the column of air inside that produces the sound---in other words, they have no effect.*

Changes to the outside of the instrument by adding mass may also change the "bio-acoustic feedback" received by the player creating the belief that the sound waves emitted into the room and heard by the listener have also changed. To prove or disprove that the added "device" actually affects the sound waves emitted from the instrument would simply require a well controlled, repeatable study in which neither the player nor the listeners know which trials are with the device attached and which are not.

To my knowledge no such study has ever been undertaken for any of the various devices described above.

* In the latest research, a measurable effect was found in a few of the upper harmonics on a simplified reed instrument that was slightly oval shaped and with a wall thickness of .2 mm.

How dare you introduce science and testing and data!

(Note, most saxophones are 0.8-1.0 mm wall.)

 

[raindog]

If these things work by adding mass, I wonder if the same result could be achieved through alternative means. How much mass would be added, and how much of that mass would target near the critical finger-sax-interface area, if one were to consume equivalent value in ice cream? With currency rates here, 1 Sound EXpander = ~40 liters decent quality full dairy vanilla ice cream, a considerable amount. Don't know about humans, but I remember reading Northern pike can convert smaller fish to body mass with efficiency of about 25:1.

 

[J-Moen]

Here is another variation. As far as I know, this is one of a kind.

Well that is certainly a contraption I had never seen. Weight added to the back of the mouthpiece? And the Power Ring is also the name of Jody Jazz's Ring Ligature, so that could be a fun Trademark fight. Very interesting to say the least. Is this owned by you?

 

[lostcircuits]

https://forum.saxontheweb.net/showthread.php?180164

Turns out there were apparently more of those made

 

[BrianMitchellBrody]

found it for you, tobias was the author of the comments above ^ and the person whom discovered the P-Ligging, the world was never the same after that! He endorsed the Schucht stuff too ( read above) ^

https://forum.saxontheweb.net/showthread.php?92953-P-Ligging-a-little-help-to-pimp-your-sound

I remember that thread. Extremely entertaining :/*

 

[lostcircuits]

Well that is certainly a contraption I had never seen. Weight added to the back of the mouthpiece? And the Power Ring is also the name of Jody Jazz's Ring Ligature, so that could be a fun Trademark fight. Very interesting to say the least. Is this owned by you?

Here is the Power Ring TM entry but it was abandoned by Ron (you have to use the trademark / provide evidence of sales to maintain it). Jody Jazz registered the Power Ring in 2017

And yes, I have it sitting right in front of me, a 110B Power Ring ™

http://tmsearch.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=4801:rq71ha.6.14

 

[Guto]

I reckon all these products only slightly impact how the player perceives his own sound, because part of what we hear is actually conducted through our jaw bones vibrations. I don't believe for a second these products have any impact to how the audience hears us. My personal opinion anyways.

 

[lostcircuits]

I reckon all these products only slightly impact how the player perceives his own sound, because part of what we hear is actually conducted through our jaw bones vibrations. I don't believe for a second these products have any impact to how the audience hears. My personal opinion anyways.

Guto, with all due respect, the effect of the Power Ring MPC is jaw-dropping - that's how heavy it is

 

[J-Moen]

Here is the Power Ring TM entry but it was abandoned by Ron (you have to use the trademark / provide evidence of sales to maintain it). Jody Jazz registered the Power Ring in 2017

And yes, I have it sitting right in front of me, a 110B Power Ring ™

http://tmsearch.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=4801:rq71ha.6.14

Ah, that makes sense. Well i know RPC Mouthpieces are normally well regarded, so I imagine that is one heck of a player. Whether the ring does much, you'd have it dismantled to know