bow / qianjin trouble

[spansar]

hello! the night i got my erhu, i watched a vcd for guidance. the instructor didn't demonstrate this in detail, but somehow unhooked the bowhair from the end, fed it between the strings, and hooked it back together.

"aha!" i thought. "that's how you do it." so i tried to disengage it by removing the loop end from the bow heel. man was it on there tight. i literally ran several blocks to the nearest superglue vendor and back, because i broke the heel.

so from then on i had to remove the tension adjustment screw to free the entire heel, then detune the strings so i could actually fit it between them. this was just a minor inconvenience, until one morning i discovered that as a result of storing my erhu too-detuned, the qianjin had come loose.

someone posted this link:

www.senmaike.net/erhu/20040704/pic20040704_e.html

i am too intimidated to try this on my own. i'm beginning to coordinate arrangements for a lesson in portland--probably for the morning of march 4.

what kind of string is best for tying qianjin? where can this be obtained?

[davidmdahl]

Before I got my current terrific erhu, I started on a nhi (Vietnamese version of the erhu) that was a real mess. Among other things, the qianjin was too loose. Rather than removing the existing qianjin or doing anything fancy, I just wrapped some waxed dental floss around a few times and tied it off. A more traditional wrapping would look better by my Rube Goldberg approach worked like a charm.

Based on my experience, the type of material used for the qianjin is not very important as long at it works. A traditional wrapping with some sort of thread will look the best and function well, but this is not critical. I have been tempted to try out a plastic adjustable qianjin as is described on George Gao's website, but so far the traditional one I have is working fine.

Best wishes,

David

[sanmenxia]

Any ordinary thin string is OK. The "proper" way of tying the qianjin is just neater, the ends of the string doesn't stick out. You can tie it any way you like.

[YouLanFengChune]

not true, san men.

If you tie it haphazardly, it becomes slightly unbalanced. There will be resultant vrackling noises....

[maaltan]

Its no big deal tieing the qianjin really. Just focus on that initial loop. You can just tie under the existing qianjin for practice, sort of how they did on that page.

the slip under knot is the most intimidating part and its really not that big of a deal. you could always just take 5-10 wraps without going around the strings to practice the knot part without having to worry about tension so much.

I do it .. oh once or twice a week just for heck of it .

[spansar]

Well it isn't pretty, but I think I've got it. Spent the day showcasing my meager skateboarding skills in front of several teenaged relative-pro's. Wrangling with the fear of bodily injury gave me the courage to wrap the qianjin, methinks. Perhaps at a lesson I'll have more time for other things!