This lovely violin, made by Hippolyte Chrétien Silvestre, was brought to the workshop to identify the source of a mystery buzz which had been plaguing the instrument for some time.
The owner, along with their orchestra colleagues had been trying to locate the problem without any success. Inevitably in these cases, because nothing seemed obviously loose from outside the instrument, suspicion falls on the internal parts of the instrument. In this case it had been decided by a high calibre violinist that the bass bar was clearly at fault, and must be replaced immediately.
When playing the instrument, it did rattle and buzz in an alarming way, so I can understand their concern perfectly.
On opening the case, immediately I noticed how much rosin had built up on the belly of the instrument, especially around the upper eye of the treble sound hole. As an instrument in constant professional use, this can build up quickly if not cleaned off regularly.
After a thorough examination in the workshop, I could only find one potential culprit for the buzz, all the seams were glued tight, and nothing was loose on the instrument. The culprit was indeed my initial suspicion, that the treble sound hole was the cause of the horrible buzzing.
If rosin dust, along with fluff is allowed to build up, or is pushed into the sound hole when cleaning, it will start to form a hardened crust and begin to bridge the gap between the wood.
Because this area of the instrument moves a lot when playing, this bridge rubs against the other side. The resulting amplified sound would make you think that something catastrophic had gone wrong with the instrument.
In the end it’s a simple fix, the instrument had a through clean (which it had needed for some years), and I carefully removed all the debris that had built up on the inner edge of the sound hole. The last two pics show the finished violin, the varnish is certainly looking a lot brighter too!
Cue one happy owner, especially as they had initially feared potential repair costs in the thousands.
Categories: Restoration
Slight Violins 
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