From: Rick Epping <104124.33~ompuserve.com> Date: Mon, 19 Jan 1998 10:39:38 -0500 Subject: Re: wholetone reedplates
It's my understanding that the first wholetone reedplates were made with 980 plates and the later ones with 260 plates. Tooling for reedslots is very expensive to produce, running from tens to hundreds of thousands of dollars. As for the reeds, there is only one reed for a given series (such as the chromatic series comprising the 280, 270's, 260's, CX-12's, Toot's, Chromettas, etc.), in a given length and a given pitch. The only exceptions in this series would be those chromatic models using other reed materials, like the Silver Concerto and Amadeus, or the 980 Koch. I have not actually seen any of these wholetone plates, but as the 980-C and 260-C use the same reedplate (slot #1, 19.50 mm long) and the 980-G and 260-G use the same reedplate (slot #1, 20.20 mm long), it may be that the first wholetone set had brass reeds as do the 980's, and the later ones tombac reeds, as do the 260's.
