"Neighbor Friendly Chimes"
No More Tube Banging!
ABOUT THE ARTIST:
My name is Mark Gould. I am a retired computer geek! When my mother passed away, no one wanted the 6 wind chimes that she had. They were in pretty bad shape, sun damage to the strings (monofilament fishing line), corrosion on the untreated aluminum tubes, small heavy plastic strikers, and algae coating everything. I knew she loved those chimes and I could not bear to junk them. So, I “Googled” how to repair wind chimes and my adventure/frustration began.
As everyone is finding, there is just as much misinformation or wrong information as “good” information when you do an internet search. What I found was that mom’s chimes were classic “drug store chimes” and had not been tuned, not hung for maximum resonance, were thin walled aluminum tubing and not weather resistant. I learned how to tune the tubes (selecting the notes is a whole other journey) and hang them for the best sound quality. Coming up with new top plates caused me to have to relearn Trigonometry (my brain is still bleeding). The material the striker is made from, where it strikes the tube, and how far it moves before hitting the tube, make a big difference in the sound of the chime. Now, I had chimes that were sounding as good as possible, but they sounded terrible when the tubes banged together during strong winds.
So another internet search on “tube banging”. This time, I only found a lot of frustrated chime lovers who had no cure for the problem. I even tried some of the suggested techniques and found that the author had obviously NOT tried them themselves (did someone mention misinformation?). After much trial and error, I came up with my Windcage as a solution. I then discovered there was no cost effective “safe” way to manufacture them in my home work shop (I am a long time woodworker). I could make one, but it took hours to do it right and only a split second to trash the template or the Windcage blank I was working on.
I am now the proud possessor of an 80 watt laser system which does allow me to cut the cages safely (another ugly, long learning curve).
My biggest regret is that mom cannot hear the beautiful music my chime design produces. I have been told that they are musical instruments now and not just wind chimes.
Sincerely,
