Converting an EastTop T10-40 to an "XB-40" style harmonica

[dominico]

I did not want to muddy up Brendan's X-Reed thread, so I started a separate thread about it:

Out of my diatonics I really wish I could bend from the 5 all the way down to the 4, and bend from the 4 all the way down to the flat 3.
A lot of guitar solos I try to track have those bends, I've considered changing my diatonic tuning to accomodate, but maybe X reeds are a better answer.

Yes, bending the 5 and 4 of the scale a wholetone are essential if you want to emulate guitar players...

Have you tried the Hohner XB-40? It will give you those wider bends. The intermediate semitone bends are trickier to control (similar to hole 2 on a Richter harp), but it can be done with practice.

It's sadly discontinued now, but can be found on eBay etc. It was only made in Richter tuning but can be retuned to other scales.

I've seen the XB-40 but I didn't get a chance to play with one. What I did do is pick up a couple EastTop T10-40s to see if I could convert them to something like an XB-40.

The comb on the T10-40 is pretty cool, each reed has its own chamber so its very airtight and allows bending.

My thought is to replace the slider with a gasket, so each mouthpiece hole allows access to 4 chambers, and then add valves to create two "x reeds" per hole.

On a somewhat different project idea: the reed breath pattern for the T10-40 looks like this:
---------------------------------------------------------------
B | D || B | D || B | D || B | D || B | D || B | D || B | D || B | D || B | D || B | D
B | D || B | D || B | D || B | D || B | D || B | D || B | D || B | D || B | D || B | D

Theoretically one could create a slider mechanism to allow any blow reed to interact with any draw reed in the same hole, OR in the previous hole.

1040 comb.JPG (46.92 KiB) Viewed 11936 times

4 reeds per hole.JPG (72.9 KiB) Viewed 11936 times

[Brendan]

The Easttop T10-40 is the latest in a slew of Chinese valveless chromatics modelled on an old Seydel design. That's where the individual comb channels and tuning/slider combination format came from. The Seydel precursor is discontinued, but the design concept lives on. The Easttop version is better than earlier models of this type made by Swan and other Chinese harmonica companies.

As you say Dominick, it's a useful chrom for tinkering Your idea to create an XB40 type of harp with it sounds interesting. When you say:

My thought is to replace the slider with a gasket, so each mouthpiece hole allows access to 4 chambers, and then add valves to create two "x reeds" per hole.

What type of valving did you have in mind? Conventional reedplate valves wouldn't be enough, I think. Even if you give the x-reeds zero offset, over-valves would probably be required to stop interference between x-reeds and active reeds.

On the other project idea you say:

Theoretically one could create a slider mechanism to allow any blow reed to interact with any draw reed in the same hole, OR in the previous hole.

This sounds intriguing. Do you mean a single slider, or twin sliders?

Looking forward to hearing how you get on with these projects

[dominico]

What type of valving did you have in mind? Conventional reedplate valves wouldn't be enough, I think. Even if you give the x-reeds zero offset, over-valves would probably be required to stop interference between x-reeds and active reeds.

I would probably need your advice for this. The only valve experience I have is half valving diatonics, either with your gasket valves or with PT Gazell's valves. I own three chromatic harmonicas: a Seydel nonslider and a few EastTops. None of them have valves, so I really don't have any hands on experience with chromatic valves. My friend is sending me a Suzuki sub-30, maybe I can look to that for some inspiration when it arrives.

This sounds intriguing. Do you mean a single slider, or twin sliders?

This is a good question. Multiple sliders I would worry would be tricky to keep it from being too leaky. While playing with the T10-40 it looks like you could allow the mouthpiece itself to slide over to grab the draw column to the left of it, maybe keep the current slider and mouthpiece together and just fashion a way to be able slide that entire assembly a smidge to the left to grab the lower set of draw reeds.
I will have to record a quick video and upload it somewhere to share what I'm thinking if I'm not doing a good job explaining it.

I suppose this is another opportunity for your reedplate sliders: the mouthpiece can move to grab a different set of draw reeds, and the reedplate slider switches which blow/draw reeds are active.

[triona]

Looks just as if Brendan's Slip Slider technique could be a good try for your idea?
And the Suzuki Sub-30 is featuring some kind of a similar technique as the XB-40, as far as I remember.


dear greetings
triona


edit: an error about the Suzuki Sub-30 deleted.
I had mixed it up with the Suzuki MR-300 Overdrive harp.

[Brendan]

Re. OverValves:

Conventional valves are mouthed on the reedplate opposite the reed they're intended to mute. OverValves are different: they're mounted on a plate directly on top of the x-reeds, on the same side as the reed. They stop interference between the x-reed and the active reed of the same breath.

Here's a video with photos showing OverValve Plates fitted on the custom SUB30 harps I used to make with Zombor Kovacs:

https://youtu.be/W8xja8V2bd0?si=wTLXOZxum3Kup7P7