Brendan Power & Alternative Harmonicas Forum

Here's another idea for true "on the fly" instant tuning swaps whilst playing, which Dominick is really after. It involves adding an extra reed to the appropriate comb chamber (hole 3 in his case, to swap between Richter and Paddy-Richter - G and A on a C harp), then add a muting mechanism - basical...

Here's a practical idea for quickly changing between harmonica tunings in the same harp, which I've been using for a long time. However, I don't know if it qualifies as "on the fly". If that means within the same song whilst playing, then not! But if it means to switch tunings between songs, it coul...

My twin diatonic Switch-Harp is currently the only option that would give you alternate tunings in a relatively small size harmonica: https://www.brendan-power.com/harmonicas-twin-diatonic.php#twin-harps-diatonic-switchharp However it's still bulkier than a standard diatonic. I have something in the...

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 br...

Just saw this thread... I don't do resin 3d printing, but I'll try to answer your questions: - Is the material food safe? From a quick search, apparently not. However this wouldn't be a problem if the reedplates were behind a mouthpiece, so your lips are not in direct contact with them. - does the m...

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 ...

I've continued experimenting with different designs for this project. There are so many theoretical ways to follow to achieve what I'm after, but none is easy! It's been a two year journey so far, and the stack of crazy-looking prototypes that have resulted surprises even me when I go back and look ...

Welcome to the forum Dominick! It's nice to have a trained engineer with obvious curiosity about harmonica design and the skills/tools to make stuff accurately contributing here 😊 The general consensus about diatonic comb design is that it's better to have small chambers in the top octave (for good ...

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 practic...

Since it roughly halves the comb size, could you use this to fit two chromatics on top of one another in about the same thickness as a typical chromatic? I don't think so - because you'd need four reedplate sliders, including two in the middle of the sandwich. It would still end up fairly thick. I ...