Vintage Saxophone Mouthpiece Rescue #26

I know, you haven't seen all of my prior mouthpiece rescues.  It takes more time to write a blog about refacing a mouthpiece than it does to reface a mouthpiece.  Rescuing old saxophone mouthpieces is what I enjoy doing, not writing blogs about them.  I mainly write blogs to show how it is done, not to chronicle all the ones that I've done.  Usually it is only the "lost cause" mouthpieces that show up in a blog.  If it just needs a touch-up, that doesn't make for good reading, IMHO.

What does a truly "lost cause" mouthpiece look like?  How about this one.

Yes, that is the horrible discoloration that vintage ebonite shows after years of neglect and exposure to sunlight (and who knows what else).  And look at those teeth marks.  The only animal I know of that can make those striated teeth marks is the Lamprey eel.
  

I don't know if an eel just got loose in the saxophone case or if it actually could play a tenor saxophone.  Fortunately, that's not my problem.  I only need to get rid of the teeth marks.

The larger problem is going to be getting rid of the discoloration on this vintage "Pitt American" mouthpiece.  You might wonder why I would even want to try.  What is a Pitt American, anyway?  I did some research.  "Pitt American" was a brand name used by a music store in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.   Pretty clever of Rudolf and Jacob Volkwein, the brothers that started Volkwein Brothers Music Store in 1905.  

The business is still operating (mostly wholesale), but no longer uses Pitt American as its in-house stencils for musical instruments and accessories.  The Pitt brand name was used on both foreign and domestic instruments, most commonly metal clarinets (and some saxophones that were King stencils manufactured by H.N. White).  The brothers did not "make" musical instruments or accessories.  

Here is a vintage Pitt American tenor saxophone that is likely similar to the source of my mouthpiece.

As is common with stencil horns, the engraving has a large "badge" area that can be left blank so that when Joe's Music Store (or Volkwein Bros.) asks for 10 saxophones engraved "Joe's Special" (or "Pitt American") the H.N. White Company could rapidly fill the order.

So are Pitt American saxophone mouthpieces made of that special recipe vintage ebonite?  Yes.  Do they have that late 30's to late 50's jazz vibe?  Yes.  Do they have a cult-like following of collector/players willing to pay over $800 without even play testing?  No (not yet).  Mine showed up free in a box of junk that I bought for other reasons, but I might have paid up to $15 for it had it sold on Ebay.  Here's why.  (Later I'll tell you why not.)

Yes, those are cobwebs inside of the mouthpiece and the table is also discolored.

The inside of the chamber is also all scratched up by using some kind of a cleaning brush with an exposed metal tip.  Just the irresponsible behavior that you would expect from a Lamprey.

But the worst part is what I'm going to talk about for a bit.  All of these problems will be cleaned up just by putting on a new facing and doing some chamber work to make this play better than a vintage Otto Link Slant Signature.  

What I want to point out is an effect of the discoloration that isn't often talked about.  Most posts about a dull brown or greenish-brown discoloration are worried about how the mouthpiece looks.  Some posts about vintage ebonite mouthpieces talk about the sulfur smell and how to eliminate it.  But discoloration has a far worse effect on the mouthpiece than just the look and smell.

In order to discolor, usually accelerated by ultraviolet light,* but also by contact with other chemicals, ebonite releases some the sulfur on its surface (hence the smell).  The reduced sulfur content of the material that is left behind (mainly natural rubber, linseed oil, and a colorant, usually lamp black), results in the brownish or greenish discoloration.  But the surface integrity has actually changed.  The surface becomes hygroscopic (it holds some water) and it will be unavoidably altered by removing the discolored material.  In theory, it would be possible to stain the compromised ebonite to make it black again.  There are commercial products and home remedies (like black shoe polish) that can do this.  The surface is still compromised, but if cosmetics and odor is the only interest, it might not matter.

Here is what I mean by altering the surface when removing discoloration.  The side of my lost cause mouthpiece showed a marked delineation between the brown oxidized area and the apparently sound black ebonite.  This is what that delineation looked like when the brown was removed.  It is most obvious below the ligature line at the top left of the bright reflection. (Someday I will learn how to add arrows to my pictures).

The line between what was brown and black is partially obscured by the reflection.  To the right of the reflection the brown to black surfaces are on the same level.  But to the left is a now an obvious alteration of the height of the two surfaces.  Removing the brown oxidation resulted in a "drop off" that is easy to feel.  Imagine what will happen to the surface levels when I clean up the table and rails.

Cleaning the table and rails will result in similar bumps halfway down the rails.  Removing the brown from the table will probably change the tip opening by a measurable amount.

I realize that this mouthpiece is an extreme example of a discolored mouthpiece.  It sat someplace for years in order to turn this brown.  On most discolored pieces, it is not the table that suffers the most from discoloration.  It is usually a stencil print of the ligature that is most obvious.  But that just made me wonder what is really going on.  

Could it be that an ebonite mouthpiece that is played regularly simply has the surface discoloration routinely removed from constant handling?   Playing a mouthpiece regularly still exposes it to light and oxygen.  Does the table and lay change over time but go unnoticed because what would be the softer brown surface naturally resulting from oxidation is consistently rubbed off by handling the piece?  

I would think that this happens to every old ebonite mouthpiece.  For absolute proof, I would need to travel back in time and take extremely accurate original curvature measurements from a 1930 ebonite mouthpiece (i.e., vintage measurements on the vintage mouthpiece).  Then travel back to the present, using the same measuring apparatus, I would need to measure that same mouthpiece again today.  Obviously, that is not going to happen.  So, given the apparent effects of time on the mouthpiece shown above, and the fact that erosion occurs naturally on most every surface, I'll just extrapolate that a claimed "original facing" on an old ebonite mouthpiece is not the same facing that was on it originally.  We might refer to the facing as "original," but it ain't.

All of the above was just a diversion.  Now I'm going to clean up this old mouthpiece and make it sing again.  Washing out the cobwebs didn't seem to make any difference.  The tip opening on this piece is approximately .065.  Besides being a small tip opening by today's standards, it has another common problem.  The Lamprey that played it apparently didn't use a mouthpiece cap.  The piece has been bumped right on the tip end.  That causes a tiny deformation in the tip rail.  

Under magnification, it is easy to see the problem on the right hand side.  The reed can't seal properly which dulls the  sound.  Old mouthpieces of this vintage are often accused of being dull, but microscopic wear and tear can be most of the cause.  A flat table and a new lay should change all that.

I wasn't at my work bench, so I didn't have my lighted desk magnifier.  Still, it is fairly obvious that there is a problem.  I then tried to "polish" the dent out by simply burnishing the lay on a glass table top.  This process can sometimes clean up little imperfections, but not this one.

It simply made the imperfection more obvious.  Some of the tip is now polished, but a surprising large area around the dent was not because the imperfection is a high point.  That gives you some idea of what a flat reed would do when trying to seal the tip opening.  I may have found the primary reason why this vintage mouthpiece sounds dull.  So, do I spend $300 for a modern mouthpiece or do I fix this one? 

Maybe I'll just take a swipe across some 1,000 grit sandpaper and get rid of the high spot.

Above you can just barely see the remains of the deformed tip.  I didn't do any measurements or anything.  Just ran the facing down some fine sandpaper.  The change in playing, for those of you who still use cane reeds, was like finding a really good reed.  It seemed like a completely different mouthpiece.  Still, I'm going to continue with modifying the facing.

I should note that this is a very common blank from JJ Babbitt that was sold to lots of saxophone makers, music stores, wholesalers, and refinishing businesses.  There is no way of telling how long Babbitt produced this model.  Maybe as early as the 1930's and as late as the 1960's.  They appear regularly on Ebay, sometimes with very exotic claims as to pedigree and material with correspondingly ridiculous valuations.  Remember, it is just a chunk of hard rubber already formed into a tenor saxophone mouthpiece.  Bid accordingly. 

Cleaning it up is going to be the easy part and will largely occur as I put on the new table and facing (the rest of the mouthpiece being merely cosmetic).  The new facing numbers can be considered right from the start.  I usually enjoy playing something around .090 to .095, so that's what I'll shoot for.  I just read that a 7** tip opening (called a "seven double star") is the new groovy cool thing to claim, so I'll call whatever my tip opening ends up a Seven Double Star.  It does sound kind of cool.  And that alone will make it more valuable.  "What are you playing?"  "A Seven Double Star."  "Wow, I wish I had one!"  Well, now you can.

Here are the lay numbers.  These numbers are not some secret formula.  It is a smooth curve that gets me to a tip opening of approximately .090 inch.  I'm usually happy with that tip opening.

Feeler gauge            Brand number (.5mm)
.0015                                46.0

.005                                  40.5

.010                                  34.3
.016                                  30.0
.024                                  24.6
,035                                  19.0
.050                                  12.2

.063                                    9.0
.078                                    4.0

This facing is a little longer than most .090 tip openings, but I have found that's the way I like it.  Also, the numbers near the tip might have been tweaked a little.  When I play test I sometimes make little adjustments.

What does the finished piece look like?

It looks like a brand new mouthpiece.  But it is still a Pitt American.

It's just that opening it up gave me a little area to make a tiny (by modern standards) baffle.  Now it has that feeling of making the saxophone vibrate without the harsh screeching of a high baffle mouthpiece.

Remember when I said that the mouthpiece was free, but I might not have paid $15 for it on Ebay?  It was because of this picture.  Half way down the left hand rail there is a scratch across the rail and down the side and curving towards the shank.  But it isn't really a scratch.  It was a crack.  I mended it by putting super glue on the end of a needle and touching it to the crack from inside the chamber.  The glue instantly wicks out through the crack and leaves a "blush" around the crack on the exterior.  Don't touch it or it will make a mess.  Let it dry for a day and then when polishing the mended crack will disappear.

Here it is under magnification.  The new facing completely removed the line from the rail.

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*  Ultraviolet light basically means all daylight.  A regular mouthpiece cap stops exposure over most of the mouthpiece, but better is a mouthpiece bag of some sort.  If you leave your mouthpiece out on a desk top, even if the sun never hits it directly, it will discolor over time, leaving a photo imprint of the ligature if that is left on the mouthpiece.  Guess how I know that?  Better to store it in a bag.  Think of it as a necessary precaution, like drying out the inside after every use.  What, you don't dry out your mouthpiece after every use???