Old (or antique) vs. new Tibetan singing bowls?

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Permalink Reply by Joel Olivé on September 7, 2010 at 5:38pm

Dear Rain,
how are you? I am a old tibetan singing bowl lover, and I want to fix a broken one (I already got it broken) is the middle one of a trio. It is a very special one (even broken). I traied to get it fixed in a very prestigious jowelery workshop but it's still ringing. It looks like a strong hit was done to it, but no material is missing, just the scratch (something like a "h" shape). It is a 16x5.5 cm bowl.
I would really love to have it, at least, without ringing when increasing the sound (in less volume there is no ringing).
Does any one can help me?
Good Forum!

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Permalink Reply by Martin Bläse on January 18, 2011 at 6:13pm

Dear Joel,
today I soldered two broken singing-bowls.
Perhaps this is also possible with yours.
I can do that. But sometimes the crack from the heat during soldering increases.
If you want I can try it with your bowl.
Martin


Joel Olivé said:

Dear Rain,
how are you? I am a old tibetan singing bowl lover, and I want to fix a broken one (I already got it broken) is the middle one of a trio. It is a very special one (even broken). I traied to get it fixed in a very prestigious jowelery workshop but it's still ringing. It looks like a strong hit was done to it, but no material is missing, just the scratch (something like a "h" shape). It is a 16x5.5 cm bowl.
I would really love to have it, at least, without ringing when increasing the sound (in less volume there is no ringing).
Does any one can help me?
Good Forum!

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Joel Olivé on January 23, 2011 at 10:38am

Dear Rain,
Please could you specify some details of the reparation you could do to my old singing bowl?
Please, send me a message for details, shipping address, etc.
Thanks,
Joel

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Permalink Reply by Jens Mügge on February 10, 2011 at 4:34pm

Joel Olivé said:

Dear Rain,
Please could you specify some details of the reparation you could do to my old singing bowl?
Please, send me a message for details, shipping address, etc.
Thanks,

Joel

 

 

Hi Joel,

have you read that Martin offers you to repair your singing bowls too ... and did rain provided you with more detailed informations ... I like to know more about that too ...

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Permalink Reply by Rain Gray on February 10, 2011 at 7:52pm

Namaste, Joel! Sorry it's taken a while to get back to you on this but as you may have read here, or in my profile, I spend a lot of my time each year in the Himalayas collecting what many consider to be the world's finest singing bowls.

Now concerning fixing broken, or cracked, singing bowls: Every year I receive emails from singing bowl lovers who have had the same problem-- one of their much loved singing bowls has fallen and broken. Unfortunately, I've not been able to help them due to the fact that the solution is much more that just repairing the crack.

This is due to the combination of things which make up a good singing bowl. It's a combination of metallurgy (being a bronze alloy consisting of a number of different metals), thickness, overall physical volume (diameter and height), and the way it’s been made, either by casting or forging or a combination of the two. It's this last element which is very important as it is during the casting and/or forging (which some refer to as "beating") and the subsequent cooling of the metal which creates the inner tension which greatly affects the overall polyphonic sound quality of each singing bowl. Without the proper amount of inner tension the singing bowl will be discordant. Think of it like a guitar string. Without the proper tension it will be out of tune. The same is true of singing bowls, however this tension was "put" into each bowl when it was made.

Now when a singing bowl is dropped on a hard surface, or even perhaps if struck too hard with a plain wood stick, it can crack. In the process of cracking sometimes the inner tension changes, which as mentioned will result in a bowl which is now out of tune. Other times this will result in a "buzzing" sound appearing when the bowl is played. The usual attempt to repair bowls in this condition includes soldering (with lead or silver solder) or welding (with silicone bronze) the crack. The problem is that although the crack has now been filled, the application of intense heat changes the inner tension of the singing bowl which then results in a discordant out-of-tune sound.

The few antique Tibetan singing bowls which I have personally tried to have fixed via welding had their sound totally ruined. I believe this was due to the high temperatures inherent in the oxy-acetylene welding process used to repair the bowls. Others who have tried this method have experienced similar poor results sound wise. There may, however, be low-temperature solders which could be used successfully (as long as the inner tension of the bowl was not changed when it got damaged). In lew of this, a re-forging of the bowl after the crack was repaired would be necessary to "put" the internal tension back into the bowl. But if this is not done by a very experienced metal smith, and then only one who has much experience in forging singing bowls or gongs, the results will likely be hit or miss with miss being the norm. This is why it takes me so much time here in the Himalayas to find the really great, world-class, singing bowls-- most of them just don't have the proper internal tension-- and why I only select, on average, 1 out of 200 singing bowls!

Joel, Good Luck with fixing your singing bowl. And if you or anyone else reading this post happens to find a way to successfully repair them please let us all know!

Om . . .
Rain Gray
Lalitpur, Nepal


Joel Olivé said:

Dear Rain,
Please could you specify some details of the reparation you could do to my old singing bowl?
Please, send me a message for details, shipping address, etc.
Thanks,
Joel

• ▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Martin Bläse on February 10, 2011 at 8:47pm

@ Jens: Why don't you ask me if you want to know more about this?

Most of my work are things of which at least one expert said it's impossible :-)
Believe me, I have much experience with metal, with hammer, with fire and with sound.

To repair singing bowls I use a very special silver solder.
I've soldered many bowls already successfully.
The biggest problem was not the sound.
Some times the inner tension ist so strong, that the crack becomes bigger than before, when the Bowl cool down.
Then I solder again and again and at the end of the bowl does look very antique, indeed.

But most times it works better and the sound was realy good after soldering.

Martin

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Permalink Reply by Jens Mügge on February 11, 2011 at 6:46am

@ Martin ... I like to know more about this discussion how it is going on. Therefore i thought that I have to ask Joel but sure I can contact you and will contact you if one of my non-antique singing bowls from Nepal should be cracked one day. All of my twelve singing bowls are fit and I hope they will be fit the rest of my lifetime - later someone can sell them as antique singing bowls.

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Permalink Reply by Frank Perry on February 11, 2011 at 3:29pm

I think it important to point out that a crack on the rim is pretty well fatal - as regards returning to the sound that the bowl once made. I had an old friend (the late Hector Benson) who had a small collection and one of these he took to bed with him each night. One night it fell out of the bed and cracked on the rim. He was an engineer but he couldn't repair the bowl. I had a wonderful bowl of somewhat rare design that had a very nasty crack in it - fortunately near the base or upon the sharp curve. Very little sound comes from the bases of most bowls. The crack had been filled with some awful gunge but played ok until a certain volume when it then buzzed. Hector silver-soldered it for me and without any need of oxy-acetylene torches. This meant that the bowl itself didn't need to be reheated. He owned another wonderful bowl with psycho-spiritual energies and this I played throughout the duration of his mending my old bowl. It has been as good as new since that repair. I hope that this helps. Frank

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Permalink Reply by Martin Bläse on February 11, 2011 at 4:25pm

As well, I do not have all these problems.
About the age of my bowls I need not worry about
because I myself have forged them all.
Because of the kind of manufacture, they are all guaranteed unbreakable
and if they did not sound good, I would have given up this hard work long ago.

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Permalink Reply by Martin Bläse on April 29, 2011 at 11:12am

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Permalink Reply by Frank Perry on April 29, 2011 at 2:08pm

Hi Martin, thanks so much for doing this - it's really good to know that there are ways and means of fixing serious problems like these. I've never had a bowl crack on the rim myself - old or new.

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Permalink Reply by Rain Gray on April 29, 2011 at 3:12pm

Namaste Martin: Thanks for posting your YouTube video. I gave it a look early this morning here in the Himalayas. Then I glanced over at the growing pile of antique singing bowls with small cracks or holes here in my office. These are singing bowls I've purchased here over the past 3 years and didn't realize they had old hairline cracks or pinholes due to dirt or gunk filling in. It wasn't until the bowls were washed that these things appeared. These are all Master-quality singing bowls and I was going to return them to my suppliers. But, after seeing your video, I think I'll wait!

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