Sorry for splitting my message in 2. Almond oil was and is used during production of gut strings. Normally you get oiled strings unless you order otherwise. Oil slightly prevents from moisture, meaning that your string will live longer, however it won't stop your lute from going out of tune (at least not significantly). Historically almond oil was used to protect strings from rotting which was quite common in past. This is what Mace wrote (p.66): "As concerning the keeping of your strings, you must know, there ought to be a choice care taken; for they may be very good when you buy them, but spoiled in a quarter of an hours time, if they take any wet, or moist air. Therefore your best way is, to wrap them up close, either in an oiled paper, a bladder, or a piece of sear-cloath,[……] Which, when you have thus done, keep them in some close box, or cupboard; but not amongst linen, (for that gives moisture;) and let them be in a room where there is, or useth to be, a fire often. And when at any time you open them for your use, take heed they lye not too long open, nor in a dark window, or moist place; For moisture is the worst Enemy to your strings." >From this quote it can be safely deduced that gut strings were extremely >susceptible to moisture in spite of oil treatment . Notice that Mace says one >shouldn't keep a box with strings open too long or they get dump. This is >quite amazing…or the climate in England was very humid at that time, who >knows? Anyway, gut strings have some weak points which synthetics do not posses, but I don't see any reason for hiding them. It is a natural part of recreating something from the past. It's like driving an old car from 1920s. You can't compare it to a new Mercedes but it's fun to drive a vehicle from the past with all its disadvantages.
Kind regards Jaroslaw Wiadomość napisana przez Sam Chapman w dniu 6 paź 2012, o godz. 18:03: > Interesting. Weren't strings sometimes also treated with certain oils - > almond oil I think? I hadn't realised that this could potentially > protect against humidity changes. > > Sam > On 6 October 2012 15:05, alexander <[1][email protected]> wrote: > > It needs to be understood, i think, that there are clearly two > elements in the pitch (in)stability. The string material and design > is, of course one. But for the light and breathing, as it is, lute, > the movement of the whole structure, most likely influences the > tuning much, much more. So, in this case, chasing the string mole > while disregarding the body movement monster, is not going to solve > anything. Especially with the synthetics, - the differences observed > here are the result of a different stretch - flexibility of the > materials, rather then some radical reaction from the material to > the temperature - humidity change. (Of course the wound strings, > consisting of two conflicting materials are a problem of its' own). > Just one brief look at the size of a single string and comparing it > with the size of the whole instrument should make one to realize > something here, right? > I do not have an information on the early lutes in this regard, but > early - baroque - bowed instruments as well as some later violins, > especially those built and used in bad climes, had the inner wood > surfaces treated with the mixture of hide glue and linseed oil. > (There were actually some arguing this might have improved the > instrument sound - to some tastes, that is, just off the top of my > head - look up Frederick Castle's "Violin tone peculiarities"). Some > other varnishes on the inner wood surface were observed as well. I > have seen them on museum instruments. And some varnishes penetrated > the wood deeply enough to create more wood stability. Think Cremona > here. > Protecting the inner wood surface of the lute would do much more to > stabilize its' tuning in the case of rapid weather changes. But this > will never happen, i would hazard to guess. Chasing a perfect string > - there is the solution, of course. > alexander r. > On Sat, 06 Oct 2012 12:17:41 +1000 > Mark Probert <[2][email protected]> wrote: >> >> My $0.02, living in Sydney Australia, is that nylgut mitigates > some >> of he effect of fairly extreme weather changes. We can have a > thunder >> storm roll in and have the temperature drop by 10+C in the space > of as >> many minutes. Gut just gives up in those circumstances. >> >> Part B of this is the effect of the weather on the wood of the >> instrument. One of my lutes is more stable than the other in the >> pegbox department. When we are in a changing time, I am forced > not to >> play this instrument for days at a time (I really don't enjoy the > tune, >> tune, tune aspect). >> >> Then, isn't there the old adage of lute players spending half > their >> time tuning and the other half playing out of tune? This is not a > new >> problem, though I do believe that synthetics help. >> >> Kind regards >> >> -- >> mark. >> >> >> >> To get on or off this list see list information at >> [3]http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html > > -- > Sam Chapman > Oetlingerstrasse 65 > 4057 Basel > (0041) 79 530 39 91 > > -- > > References > > 1. mailto:[email protected] > 2. mailto:[email protected] > 3. http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html > >
