This tool has changed my life! Since I got started in the mouthpiecing arts back in 1992, I've measured countless mouthpieces - from big Tenor Saxophone Jazz facings, to small Austrian Clarinet Orchestra facings - and everything in between. The standard "tip wands" I have used over my lifetime worked sort of okay, but they had frustrating issues. 1. Saxophone mouthpieces are typically expressed in thousands of an inch, requiring a totally different measuring wand, whereas clarinet mouthpieces employ the metric standard - again, requiring a different tool. 2. And to add to the turmoil, no two wands measure the same! 3. As we get older, our vision gets more challaned and it has become more difficult to see the wand's readings. 4. Using a wand is a practiced art form, which is cumbersome and inelegant. 5. Workflow could be better. Tip wands require the process of gauging two, three, four times in order to get the average, from which your findings will only be moderately accurate. That takes time and skill - and it isn't as accurate a method as what I've been wanting for all these years.
Over the years I tried to find a better gauge, a better method - but I never really found happiness with the alternatives on the market. They were cumbersome to use, and didn't fit within a typical mouthpiece maker's workflow, and at their worst, the indicater-gauges on the market that I've used actually scratched my mouthpiece tiprails!
So I ended up sticking with the old standard "wand", but then came the problem of finding a spare. No two measure alike! I purchased ten wands hoping to find two or three which were accurate. And so most refacers end up with mental awareness of how their wand stacks up against the truth. Furthermore, at this time no metric wand exhists! They are not available anwhere for purchase. One can find some nice imperial tip guages for saxophone mouthpieces but that leaves my needs short.
So in a quest for a better measuring experience AND now that I've got a factory where our engineers need to be able to measure, and experience the same numbers that I experience, it became essential that we invent a better method of measuring tip openings.
First, we had to explore what is out there, and what actually gets the best results, and then improve upon that baseline. So our engineer who is a machinist suggested (brilliantly) that we should use old fashioned metrology standards which a machinist would understand. And from there it became an obvious choice to develop a "pin gauge" methodolgy. For those who don't know what a pin gauge is, basically they are cylindrical steel "pins" of sequentially larger and larger diameter, which are VERY accurate. You can get them in all sizes, and the simple idea is that when you slip the pin between your glass gauge and mouthpiece held together, you will gauge the size of the tip gap. AND this technique allows you to accurately interpret the gap at the very tip of the tiprail OR the inner tiprail as it relates to the baffle. It's quite simple and quite accurate. This pin gauging technique became the standard at our factory, And it was repeatable by any user - as long as the technique was understood, and improtantly there was agreement that the inner tiprail was the target - right where the baffle and tiprail unite.
Why should the inner tip be the point of discussion? Well it is the area of a mouthpiece that I have long used to base my actions in the refacing process - it is the part of the tip that the "tip wand" measures and my friends in the refacing arts embrace. Some large firms do in fact contrarily reference the outer tiprail measurement but they are in the minority so our gauge is setup for the standard the majority of the world has embraced, and has used for decades.
It should be noted that saxophone mouthpieces - especially in the jazz community are expressed as a simple number, such as 6 or 7*, etc. Those numbers are arbritrary, but have some general meaning. With our gauge you'll develop an awareness of your personal truth, and how it relates to the industry's advertised numbers. Beware as the truth might differ from what is advertised!
Back to the BEHN Gauge - So our design emulates the results of using a pin gauge, BUT our guage is super easy to use. No more misplacing tiny pins, mixing them up, or possibly losing them. Everything with the BEHN Tip Gauge is righ there on your bench in one form that can easily fit in your hand. You can instantly and easily toggle between imperial and metric standards without any fuss. And you'll get repeatable results day after day.
Behn Tip Gauge
The BEHN Tip Gauge's body/base is 3D printed and constructed from a rigid exotic Carbon-Fiber material which we painstakingly sourced specifically for this product. As other plastics such as PLA are great for some things, they can impart deflection or "flex" within the user experience for a tool meant to be extremely accurate. So we explored our options and determined our Carbon Fiber Plastic to offer the best in rigidity, durability, strength, and non-deflection characteristics.
The BEHN Tip Gauge's mouthpiece-bed is glass. This glass bed adds a second level of rigidity, it is super flat, and it is the best material where thermal expansion is minimized, AND it is very good at maintaining a dust-free surface. Where granite stones, or other "flat metrology" materials seem to be dust magnets, plate glass is the best at keeping itself clean from debris. Furthermore, since the glass measuring gauge is a common tool within the refacing community, it was an obvious decision to add a glass plate within BEHN Tip Gauge's design - it just feels right.
The BEHN Tip Gauge's digital indicator is accurate and made tough enough to handle the every day use in a factory environment. Our standard indicator is a relatively innexpensive guage that is made in China. We can't promise the brand or color scheme of the indicator we deliver with your BEHN Tip Gauge, but it will be accurate, it will be digital/electronic, and it will work with the ease and precision we require in our factory.
Mitutoyo is our first choice in the BEHN factory. Their metrology equipment is just great. We've got 6 Mitutoyo calipers, several micrometers, height guages, test indicators, etc., all by the Japanese firm Mitutoyo. We've come to rely on their quality of construction, and quality of design. So if you are looking for the best metrology brand - for the very same thing we've been using in our factory - a Mitutoyo Digital Indicator is available at an extra fee. Frankly the readings will be the same as the inespensive versions, but you'll get some extra features, such as a memory function which will maintain its zeroed out setting when turned off and back on again. That's a biggie! And the quality of construction is simply unsurpassed. If you use your gauges daily, consider the Mitutoyo option.
Additional hardware such as the set-screw which allows you to rotate the indicator's viewing angle is made in our factory in America.
Like all other BEHN products, the BEHN Tip Guage is Made in America, in our Oklahoma factory. The indicator however is not.
And for the very best, we offer a Premium Glass Bed option which is a very thick (1/2") bed for your mouthpiece's table to position against. Our standard glass plate is a sufficient 3mm thick, but worthy of consideration our heavier duty and super high quality thick glass bed is a very nice add. It improves the tool's weight and guarantees the very best user experience. It is a pricier option than one might think, but the extra bulk of the thicker glass required that we amend and "beef up" our carriage design. Paired with our "Better" indicator, or even better - the Mitutoyo, and add the extra glass plate, and you'll have exactly what I use every day. I love it!
