How do they match: Musical Instrument Repairers and Tuners

  • Metal Reed Tuner

  • Make wood replacement parts, using woodworking machines and hand tools.
  • Cut new drumheads from animal skins, using scissors, and soak drumheads in water to make them pliable.
  • File metal reeds until their pitches correspond with standard tuning bar pitches.
  • Remove dents and burrs from metal instruments, using mallets and burnishing tools.
  • Repair cracks in wood or metal instruments, using pinning wire, lathes, fillers, clamps, or soldering irons.
  • Solder or weld frames of mallet instruments and metal drum parts.
  • Strike wood, fiberglass, or metal bars of instruments, and use tuned blocks, stroboscopes, or electronic tuners to evaluate tones made by instruments.
  • Wash metal instruments in lacquer-stripping and cyanide solutions to remove lacquer and tarnish.

  • Refinish wood or metal surfaces.