[LUTE] Re: tuners + Loaded
William I agree with what you say. I have just measured several Duracell batteries, and I see that those dated up to March 2007, with black bases, still fit the Turbo, but the new ones dated 2012, with a blue base, no longer do. However, this would not be a problem if the space as you suggest was larger than necessary, but with support coming from a spongy material. Also the clip on back plate, is a little flimsy, and I fear forcing it closed would dammage the side spigots. As this is an excellent tool, it is a pity that it falls down on this issue. Anthony Le 8 oct. 08 à 17:25, William Brohinsky a écrit : Anthony, Your comments on differences in 9v batteries are well noted: recently my daughter and I had the pleasure of playing pennywhistles and bodhran for Robin Mark, who tours the US doing his Christian/Irish music with 'pickup bands'. When he arrived for our practice (already 2 hours late because of traffic on the Massachusetts toll road) he spent all the time before he had to go teach a seminar messing with his guitar's built-in amplifier. It also uses a 9-volt battery, and he found that the American Duracell batteries were smaller than his European batteries, which had bent the contacts further from the holder box. Someone went out and found fatter batteries here (I didn't see the brand) which pressed their terminals 'properly' against the contacts. It makes me wonder if maybe TurboTuner folk wouldn't like a heads-up on the matter. Personally, I prefer the 9volt battery terminals which clamp right on the terminals and hang on a length of wire, with a holding strategy of a space with some foam, which is immune to the variability of battery manufacturer's physical specs. Ray On Wed, Oct 8, 2008 at 10:25 AM, Anthony Hind [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I must state that Turbo tuner, through Ralf Johnson has immediately replied that although US Duracell are slightly larger than Energizers, they do not present any problem for the T-122. He supposes that the European variant might be larger. In fact, I have tried several, and some do fit, even if rather tightly. It seems that tollerance in the production of these batteries is not close. I will just avoid Duracell, in the future. Nevertheless, I thought I should mention this problem to potential users. Anthony Le 8 oct. 08 à 16:14, Anthony Hind a écrit : Dear William and All I am also enjoying the T-122. In general, it is far easier to use, when you are thoroughly accustomed to it than the Korg OT-12. However, I have just encountered a problem concerning the battery holder. It seems that all 9v 6LR61 batteries are not equal. Duracell Plus are fatter (deeper) than Energizer, for example, and when I replaced the Energizer with a Duracell, I could not close the cover. I suppose the T-122 has been made with a particular battery in mind. This is unfortunate, as it slightly mars a good tuner. Another slight problem for me is that you do have to remember combinations of keys to reset the reference frequency, temperaments, etc; and in this it seems to use the dreaded mobile phone, as its model. I am definitely mobile-phone challenged, and thus have to keep the manual close to hand. However, most of you just won't have this problem. There is just one other gripe that I have: the tuner allows you to preset open strings for a number of instruments, but it is not possible to simultaneously memorize the open strings, the reference frequency, and the temperament, that you are most likely to use with that instrument. Both these last have to be set independently. You also have to scroll through all the precoded instruments until you get to the one you need. There is no short-cut available, using a number letter or whatever. David Tayler, I htink it was, suggested that the Korg should always be used, when ever possible, with the note out-put mode switched on, just to practice tuning by ear. This does not seem to be available on the T-122. I still tend to use the Korg when I am completely restringing my lutes, but this may be part of the learning process. However, for every day use, the T-122 is so much more accurate, and once you are used to the strobe, which initially is off putting, it is so much more intuitive. This is the first Turbo Tuner model (to my knowledge), so some of these minor problems (for this user) may disappear in the next version. It is still an excellent tuner that should surely be judged by how well the lute sounds after tuning. Although the difference in accuracy with the Korg is beyond most human hearing, when applied to a single string. It does seem to me that the effect can be accumulative. I suppose this has something to do with sympathetic resonances between strings. I seem to remember having read, in a message to this list, something to the effect, that absolute accuracy is not relevant to the lute, as one may want to compensate, by
[LUTE] Re: tuners + Loaded
I must state that Turbo tuner, through Ralf Johnson has immediately replied that although US Duracell are slightly larger than Energizers, they do not present any problem for the T-122. He supposes that the European variant might be larger. In fact, I have tried several, and some do fit, even if rather tightly. It seems that tollerance in the production of these batteries is not close. I will just avoid Duracell, in the future. Nevertheless, I thought I should mention this problem to potential users. Anthony Le 8 oct. 08 à 16:14, Anthony Hind a écrit : Dear William and All I am also enjoying the T-122. In general, it is far easier to use, when you are thoroughly accustomed to it than the Korg OT-12. However, I have just encountered a problem concerning the battery holder. It seems that all 9v 6LR61 batteries are not equal. Duracell Plus are fatter (deeper) than Energizer, for example, and when I replaced the Energizer with a Duracell, I could not close the cover. I suppose the T-122 has been made with a particular battery in mind. This is unfortunate, as it slightly mars a good tuner. Another slight problem for me is that you do have to remember combinations of keys to reset the reference frequency, temperaments, etc; and in this it seems to use the dreaded mobile phone, as its model. I am definitely mobile-phone challenged, and thus have to keep the manual close to hand. However, most of you just won't have this problem. There is just one other gripe that I have: the tuner allows you to preset open strings for a number of instruments, but it is not possible to simultaneously memorize the open strings, the reference frequency, and the temperament, that you are most likely to use with that instrument. Both these last have to be set independently. You also have to scroll through all the precoded instruments until you get to the one you need. There is no short-cut available, using a number letter or whatever. David Tayler, I htink it was, suggested that the Korg should always be used, when ever possible, with the note out-put mode switched on, just to practice tuning by ear. This does not seem to be available on the T-122. I still tend to use the Korg when I am completely restringing my lutes, but this may be part of the learning process. However, for every day use, the T-122 is so much more accurate, and once you are used to the strobe, which initially is off putting, it is so much more intuitive. This is the first Turbo Tuner model (to my knowledge), so some of these minor problems (for this user) may disappear in the next version. It is still an excellent tuner that should surely be judged by how well the lute sounds after tuning. Although the difference in accuracy with the Korg is beyond most human hearing, when applied to a single string. It does seem to me that the effect can be accumulative. I suppose this has something to do with sympathetic resonances between strings. I seem to remember having read, in a message to this list, something to the effect, that absolute accuracy is not relevant to the lute, as one may want to compensate, by ear, for the slight intonation problems due to the differences in thickness and pliability of diapasons versus octaves and treble strings. Surely, nothing would prevent a lutenist from slightly detuning (by ear) once the open strings are tuned to compensate for this (if necessary). In relation to this problem, Gregory Gordon (Lute News Number 79, p. 14) mentions a letter from Chris Coakley stating that bass strings are less stretchy than trebles, and so the pitch-distorting effects of both plucking and pressing down the string on the fret are greater on the bass side. I don't know whether tuning by ear can better help compensate for this sort of difference; however, since I have adopted loaded strings, this bass/treble difference seems far less of a problem. Loaded strings, have quite a thin stretchy Venice core, and I think these two qualities makes them behave closer to the mid Venice strings: their Venice flexibility means that their true vibrating length should be almost identical to that of the other Venice mid strings (which does not seem to be true of either thick bass gut, or for stiff wirewounds); while their high density means that they are only slightly thicker than the Venice mid strings. There is of course a difference in this respect, in relation to trebles and octaves, but it is much less significant than with thick pure gut. As a result the intonation problems implied by G. G. between basses, trebles and octaves, are barely an issue with these strings. Although I can't prove this, I have the intuition that better overall sympathetic behaviour results from using them, and this gives greater sustain, to all voices (not just to the loaded basses). If this is so, then the accumulative effect of perfect tuning via
[LUTE] Re: tuners + Loaded
Dear William and All I am also enjoying the T-122. In general, it is far easier to use, when you are thoroughly accustomed to it than the Korg OT-12. However, I have just encountered a problem concerning the battery holder. It seems that all 9v 6LR61 batteries are not equal. Duracell Plus are fatter (deeper) than Energizer, for example, and when I replaced the Energizer with a Duracell, I could not close the cover. I suppose the T-122 has been made with a particular battery in mind. This is unfortunate, as it slightly mars a good tuner. Another slight problem for me is that you do have to remember combinations of keys to reset the reference frequency, temperaments, etc; and in this it seems to use the dreaded mobile phone, as its model. I am definitely mobile-phone challenged, and thus have to keep the manual close to hand. However, most of you just won't have this problem. There is just one other gripe that I have: the tuner allows you to preset open strings for a number of instruments, but it is not possible to simultaneously memorize the open strings, the reference frequency, and the temperament, that you are most likely to use with that instrument. Both these last have to be set independently. You also have to scroll through all the precoded instruments until you get to the one you need. There is no short-cut available, using a number letter or whatever. David Tayler, I htink it was, suggested that the Korg should always be used, when ever possible, with the note out-put mode switched on, just to practice tuning by ear. This does not seem to be available on the T-122. I still tend to use the Korg when I am completely restringing my lutes, but this may be part of the learning process. However, for every day use, the T-122 is so much more accurate, and once you are used to the strobe, which initially is off putting, it is so much more intuitive. This is the first Turbo Tuner model (to my knowledge), so some of these minor problems (for this user) may disappear in the next version. It is still an excellent tuner that should surely be judged by how well the lute sounds after tuning. Although the difference in accuracy with the Korg is beyond most human hearing, when applied to a single string. It does seem to me that the effect can be accumulative. I suppose this has something to do with sympathetic resonances between strings. I seem to remember having read, in a message to this list, something to the effect, that absolute accuracy is not relevant to the lute, as one may want to compensate, by ear, for the slight intonation problems due to the differences in thickness and pliability of diapasons versus octaves and treble strings. Surely, nothing would prevent a lutenist from slightly detuning (by ear) once the open strings are tuned to compensate for this (if necessary). In relation to this problem, Gregory Gordon (Lute News Number 79, p. 14) mentions a letter from Chris Coakley stating that bass strings are less stretchy than trebles, and so the pitch-distorting effects of both plucking and pressing down the string on the fret are greater on the bass side. I don't know whether tuning by ear can better help compensate for this sort of difference; however, since I have adopted loaded strings, this bass/treble difference seems far less of a problem. Loaded strings, have quite a thin stretchy Venice core, and I think these two qualities makes them behave closer to the mid Venice strings: their Venice flexibility means that their true vibrating length should be almost identical to that of the other Venice mid strings (which does not seem to be true of either thick bass gut, or for stiff wirewounds); while their high density means that they are only slightly thicker than the Venice mid strings. There is of course a difference in this respect, in relation to trebles and octaves, but it is much less significant than with thick pure gut. As a result the intonation problems implied by G. G. between basses, trebles and octaves, are barely an issue with these strings. Although I can't prove this, I have the intuition that better overall sympathetic behaviour results from using them, and this gives greater sustain, to all voices (not just to the loaded basses). If this is so, then the accumulative effect of perfect tuning via a Turbo tuner, could be far greater when loaded strings are used. (ie the more accurately tuned the lute is, even beyond what the ear can distinguish, the greater the sustain). This intonation question is quite different from the problem of whether a good loaded bass diapason can be as true as a good pure gut bass diapason. I think Mimmo Peruffo has made a great improvement to that issue; but in any case the intonation question and the good sympathetic behaviour of these basses with the Mid strings, make them, in my opinion, the ideal 11c bass strings.
