Bulb horn fun

[Rich P. Bingham]

One of the perks for buying an older restoration rather than doing your own ground-up restoration is the opportunity to tinker while maintaining it. For one or another reason, I couldn't get sound out of the bulb horn. Reasoning (incorrectly ?) that an air blast from the bulb would be lessened by having to compress a column of air in the flex-tube, I re-located the reed from the horn end to the bulb. I could get a sick goose honk by blowing on the connection, but it took both hands on the bulb to force a sound out of it.

I decided to fiddle with the reed. On examination, I found the edges of the reed were pretty rough, formed by shearing. I smoothed the edges with a fine file, and reasoning that a thinner "flap" would likely respond better to lighter air pressure, I filed the "flap" a bit.

A test "honk" proved successful, but I wondered if less air would be required to produce sound if the "flap" was shorter. Using a tiny elastic band, I "bridled" the flap, and found it not only did make sound with less effort, but moving the bridle "tunes" the horn. The less "flap" length free to vibrate, the higher the pitch. Your sick goose can sing from basso profundo to soprano depending where you place the bridle.

[Wayne Sheldon]

C'est Magnifique!

[Kaiser]

Now you know how it works you can start a business as a accordion tuner

[Rich P. Bingham]

Sorry Leo, it's a one-note samba !!
Everybody polka !!

[rbishop26]

Rich,
One day I was pretty much doing the same thing as you, trying to get an acceptable sound out of the horn with minimal pressure on the bulb. Unlike you, I was going in the wrong direction. Every test honk was sounding worse and worse.
About that time a friend of my son came to the front door. When my son answered the door, he said " does your dad keep geese in the garage?"

[Rich P. Bingham]

Bob, that's a great story !
Did you resolve your horn issues ? I'd like to know, as I'm flying blind here ! One thing I've found frustrating is the different threads used on bulb horn hardware. I'm afraid some sources we had a few years back are no longer available.

[rbishop26]

Rich,
At that point I had no idea what I was doing. It was my first T and I had no other parts to compare to. In fact, I think you have more knowledge about horns than I still do. At least now I have multiple T’s that I can compare working parts to non-working parts. I think I finally gave up and bought a new reed from Chaffin’s. Sorry. Good luck.