David A Bierman Band instrument repair

10/04/2025

09/27/2025

The Maiden voyage of my new saxophone/ woodwind work holder mandrel.
I should have bought this a long time ago. It's much easier than mounting the instrument on a cloth covered tapered wooden mandrel via the Bell. Now a light test tool or leak light as it's called can easily be sent down either the Bell or the main body of the instrument without removing it from the work mandrel. This particular one is made by the Ferree tool company.
Used in conjunction with my newly bought LED rope test light which is brighter than the incandescent light I used to use makes the job of adjusting up called regulating go much more efficiently.

09/26/2025

Stretching or using thicker Springs does not compensate for a broken valve guide...

09/14/2025

I learned this past week that a long time mentor and business neighbor passed on somewhat suddenly last week. This news kind of sent me into a tailspin that day because it was unexpected.

This has been a challenging summer between the passing of my 103 aunt, the floods and the 5 weeks of rain in May, then heat wave then more rain on and off throughout July.

And now the passing of a mentor and business neighbor who has always been available throughout the years whenever I had questions within my field and business.

In the mid to late 70's he snd his wife moved into that building until his family outgrew the house . He and his wife had gotten married in the yard to a string quartet with harpsichord. Mind you I was finishing high school at that time. He was very supportive of my choice of majoring in music education and always gave great advice when I needed it in college.

Later after his family out grew the house he kept that property and the building for his business of string repair. And after I finished College and went into repairing band instruments he gave me great business advice un the subsequent years.
He was a good Mentor so it was quite a shock with his sudden demise..

It's quite a loss to the string Instrument Repair world, but most of all i will miss his advice whenever we got together for lunch and was very helpful when I subcontracted string repair work to him since i don't usually do string repair.

Rest in peace IBK

09/11/2025

May we never forget...

08/01/2025

Damaged Thumb / octive key mount gets soldered back on the flute.

08/01/2025

It's always fun playing Detective hunting down the adjustment screws on the newest generation of low end student model flutes.😉😁🤣🤣

such as on this School owned flute in the picture. It's in such a position that you can't get your smallest screwdriver under the key without lifting or moving the B flat key lever a bit . And making a small L-shaped screwdriver still would not fit under that key the way the manufacturers set that key up.
And it doesn't make sense to remove the key because you still must check the adjustments up at the B flat key via the bridge adjustment as well

Then we have other areas on low end flutes where they forgot to put adjustment screws in and in my opinion there's really no need to have professional style keys on low end student level instruments like in the last two pictures such as on this G key set.

The same goes in my opinion for the first valve slide throw on student level trumpets. In my opinion there's no need for it. And in fact in over 50 years of playing trumpet I can only remember one time I even needed to use the first valve slide throw. And that was only because we held out a first line e for about four or five measures in a coral accompaniment piece.
But that's another story.

07/27/2025

This poor McCormick tuba came in for the most part in about three or more pieces. This was after it had just been repaired about a year and a half ago. Unfortunately it was loaned out to another school in the same district and this is the condition that was returned in. Most of the braces were broken on it or missing and the third valve tubing was disconnected from the Bell section.

After about 5 hours labor over several days which included reparing the dent in the Bell section where a brace mounts after it exits the third valve assembly , then cleaning and servicing the instrument , next replacing or repairing about five braces along with soldering about three or four other braces and reconnecting tubing the instrument is once again ready to be used. Granted it's not pretty but it is once again functional.

06/23/2025

Incoming summer repairs...

Ironically enough the last couple of days of school in the Northeast in June always seem to be the hottest.

And since school business offices close out the purchase orders on July 1st all this has to be invoiced before then or the existing purchase orders are closed out by then
The problem is School business offices work on a different schedule than the music departments which require using the instruments for graduation right up to the last day of school. Making this an extremely busy week for band instrument repair shops at this time of year.

Then the schedule levels off a bit during the summer but the high school stuff must be back by the middle of August in most cases, next the middle school stuff has to be ready for the first day of school just after Labor Day and Elementary School bands usually don't start till the end of September.

I equate the band instrument repair shop at this time of year with working in a toy store the week before Christmas... it's our super busiest time of year.

I always chuckle when people comment that I can relax throughout the summer...🤣🤣🤣
It couldn't be further from the truth.

06/06/2025

The effort that goes into making just one part of an instrument in this case a bass clarinet Bell

https://www.facebook.com/share/v/1DjEti5Yo5/

06/03/2025

This video on the history of harvesting cork used on different spots on band instruments especially for neck corks on saxophones and clarinet tenon joints looked especially interesting. Much of the Court comes from Portugal and it can take about 9 years for the first good growth of cork bark to be useful.

https://www.facebook.com/share/v/19bKYLzjBy/

05/17/2025

The new teacher in this school inherited a whole bunch of instruments form the previous band director who never sent anything out to repair . They were all mixed and matched from different brands of instruments within both woodwind and brass instruments.
This means instead of doing a straightforward repair one has to play detective and spend extra time to figure out what part goes with what before the actual repair work can be done. This just makes repairing the instrument take longer.