On 01.04.2009 Andrew Stiller wrote:
The plastic combs I have been using all along are not at all fragile. I have
never known one to break on me--and I have specimens going back as far as 1966!
Noise is primarily caused by using a binding strip that is too narrow--a common
mistake. Put on a comb that is a little wider than you think you need, and
almost all the noise goes away.
What eventually wears out in a comb-bound volume is not the comb, but the
paper; and even so my 1966-67 issues of _Source_ show only minor wear to the
covers.
You must have a better make of combs than what I get from the local copy
shop. I just re-sorted all my music (wow, it took me a long time, but it
was necessary after two changes of residence and my music collection
mostly consisting of huge piles - although I still knew what was
where...) and I found that a lot of stuff which I had comb-bound in the
80s and 90s was completely broken, or mostly broken. It seems that these
combs simply give up after a while, and the larger combs I used all the
time have the disadvantage of being pressed flat when you stack music in
piles. Furthermore I found that in my new sorting system, which uses
Leitz archive boxes the comb bound music takes up far more space than it
should. Otherwise this system is highly recommended, if anyone is
interested.
Anyway, when we were recording with WDR a few years back the choir had
comb bound scores, and they ended up having to take the combs out as the
page turns were too noisy. That tought me, and I haven't touched combs
since.
I find the wire binding machine from NPC very pricey for the few scores
I would use it on. It is certainly not in the budget right now.
Johannes
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