CT scan during clarinet repair

I asked SolidVision s.r.o. for tomography of a wooden musical instrument, a clarinet, in order to determine the extent of damage to the wooden structure. Due to the uniqueness of this part, which we were unable to replace with another one even at the manufacturer, due to intonation and acoustic properties, we decided to repair this part as thoroughly as possible. To do this, it was necessary to reveal all existing and incipient cracks along the entire length of this part.

Thanks to CT scanning, the beginnings and ends of the cracks could be determined in the first place, and the depth of the cracks was no less important information. This was used in the subsequent milling.
I will try to summarize the advantages of this scan in the following points:

• Clearly visible depth of cracks
• Revealing the defects of the previous repair
• Revealing small cracks that could not be observed by ordinary inspection
• Understanding of tool construction and technology used by the manufacturer
• The method of drilling some holes
• Confirmation of the success of the tone hole replacement
• Showing the shape of the tone holes and their effect on intonation
• Internal drilling tool

These findings can be compared to an older instrument from the same model series and observe how the instrument changes over the years depending on the playing.

Author
Jan Provaznik
Atelier H&M
www.atelierhm.cz