Please Help - my oud smells ... more and more AGAIN

Hi Tony

my oud also smells sometimes like...???...BAD!! But it is not a humidity-problem I think. Mine only smells if I play outside in the sun.As soon as I move to shadow it disappears- the smell, not the oud- slowly.
I had the same problem with a small wooden drum before. Dont know if it was the glue or the skin...however.....try to get some cloves,peel an orange, stick the cloves in the orange skin and put it in the bowl...hmmm....if the oud have open soundholes.This may not kill the smell totaly but`ll make it much smoother:
Hope it helps.
Good luck,enjoy your trip!!

P.S.: If it doesn`t work and you cant get rid of the smell, try to hide the oud under your neighbors bed

very simple use dudrent ........ )

Marcus, your reply is a little like when a guy asks how to kill his mother in law, and somebody says "I have a mother in law too". I fear the time for cloves and oranges and chocolates and flowers is past

I can smell the oud from 3 meters away. Playing it is what they call a mixed feeling, they used to say like "my mother in law driving off a cliff in my favorite mercedes". In this case I can add .. "and with me in it too."

I had to run the air conditioner for a while. Froze my butt off, but the bacteria are fine. I had a raccoon once. They are so much like humans, they make monkeys look like clowns. My raccoon used to flush objects down the toilet, just to see them go! Anyway, one thing he used to do, infrequently thank God, was to scratch his butt and then sniff his fingers and make a disapproving face with a shiver. That's how I feel when I try to play that oud!

Aymara, yeah, hmm, a German suggests a South African gas ... I'm at the stage of hiring Chemical Ali, but I think he's no longer with us. I fear finding anything like F10 is unlikely: their business telephone directory only lists tours, tortillas and time-share condominiums.
It took me two days, in a city of 200,000, to find a Spanish-English dictionary. You'd think they spoke creole!

A taxi driver took me to a supermarket, a Wallmart, a "papeteria" (up a flight of stairs), a bookstore, and everywhere the same "no se", the same blank look and the same rack of recycled school notebooks, motorcycle magazines, photos of wrestlers and "novella" comic books. What do they bother writing in those notebooks?

There are cultures in which the dictionary is considered unnecessary. At the mention of a dictionary the most chauvinistic people will look at you like you are suggesting they wash their feet! "I KNOW what the words mean, you ... estupido" .... "Disinfeccion? Porqe? my cheekens is ALL cleen, senor! Yes, my seester ees cleen too!"

How about Irradiacion? Well, there are some people who shouldn't fool with nukular stuff.

Dudrent ? what is dudrent?

More ideas, please!

Sorry I could resist... But I hope you'll find something better !

Dear mr mrkmni: 1) this is not a Sukar oud, I noted it was "of unknown make". Sukar ouds have a nice smell of fresh wood. 2) Ouds do fine in hot and dry, yes. Tropical and humid, no. People have all sorts of problems in high humidity. Mr Powell, for instance had his "muy complexo sarouditar" come unglued in Cairo. He's lucky the papier-maché didn't clump into a gump.

Seeking "remedios para tragedia malodorata", I have so far only found "desodorante para flatulencias", under "inventos absurdos", which (as my dictionary is not yet unpacked) I believe means "inventory of our absolutely [best]".



http://inventosabsurdos.com/2007/01/13/desodorante-para-flatulencia...

Quote: Originally posted by fernandraynaud

... and somebody says "I have a mother in law too".

That might be your chance to sell this oud at a high price. Otherwise you risk being arrested as a biohazzard terrorist, when returning it to the US

Yes, though I'm an anti-fascist, I do.

To get serious again ... F10 is not a gas, but a highly concentrated fluid, that has to be fluxed with water. But it also kills germs, when evaporated. It is also used by veterinarians to cure respiratory infections in parrots by inhalation, which is much less harmful to the body (organs) of the bird, than the usual pharmaceutical products, which have a lot of negative side effects.

Quote: Originally posted by fernandraynaud

I'm going to go to a Farmacia in dark glasses today and ask for some sort of bio-poison.

Quote: Originally posted by fernandraynaud

liquid Hydrogen peroxide using improvised spray bottle ...

I just had a flash of insight into the nature of hell.

You know how you can always wait for something to cool off, because there is a "sink" that heat will be pulled to? The same is true of moisture. Things will dry out, because there is a "sink" that absorbs moisture. Well, imagine now a place where there are no "sinks"! Nothing EVER cools down. Nothing EVER dries. Now let us imagine being there with a smelly oud. In other words the most divine and inspiring instrument, but one that has that nagging flaw. You want to play it, but it's so distasteful you end up playing air hockey instead. That's Hell.

Quote: Originally posted by fernandraynaud

I just had a flash of insight into the nature of hell.

Oh man, that all sounds like a nightmare, where Freddy Krüger will be coming around next playing your stinky oud with a knife instead of a risha

I wish you the return of luck!

Regarding drying the oud's wood ... maybe it helps to blow with the hair dryer through the sound holes from a greater distance so that the only effect is dry air blowing inside instead of hot air ... the hair dryer reduces the humidity in the blown air drastically.

What do think friends? Might that be worth a try?

Quote: Originally posted by alfaraby

Is it possible that 50 years aren't enough time to make this stink fade away?

50 years. That's a long time to NOT look forward to. That's close to hell. I'm almost resigned to losing this oud.

Adding to the glue BEFORE? And remember Edward Powell's misadventure with liquid hide glue (we don't know regular hide glue would have served him better)? This whole story sheds some light on the popularity of aliphatic resin (synthetic) glues, which, on the other hand, creep under tension and cannot be undone/redone.

Since most instruments don't stink, it's a specific mistake that was made on a few. Like what? Keeping the hide glue too long? Insects in the glue pot? Failure to follow basic toilet hygiene while building an oud? What?

It's ironic, that Alfaraby has an "oud Adani". Alfaraby and I have teased each other about our respective "oud Adani". Alfaraby, dear brother in suffering, somehow I doubt your smelling oud is your "oud Adani", but I ask anyway: is it? If so, we have a legitimate case to take to the United Nations.

The night with the air conditioning was not good. The oud mostly dried out; I feel miserable. The soundboard has risen a little from the moisture, so the bass strings slap it, but that's probably reversible if I EVER get to a place with where things dry out. How does ANYTHING dry out in this God-foresaken place?

On an important front there might be some who would argue that the oud smells "a lot less", but I'm not one of them. This is turning into an obsession. I think about this too much. I'm starting to have increasingly frequent thoughts of smashing it. Occasionally an evil thought comes to the fore: "sell it!". Yes, take it back to the States and sell it. I can probably get what I paid for it. The guy who sold it to me seemed like he was OK with ANY price. Now I think I understand. If you ever take this oud to a humid place, and it "flowers" on you, even if you return to the desert, and it calms down, you will always smell it in your mind, and you will never love it again! The only option is to pass the cursed oud on to another naive player.

Alfaraby is right. It's like deodorant on sweaty underarms. But Chris has made a discovery. Coffee is used to neutralize smells. Like in perfumery, they keep cans of coffee around to re-zero the nose. Even in perfume stores. So one idea is to just put coffee beans in the oud for now. Once I get back to civilization, I have many options, leading up to "disposing of it". This last term covers a range of solutions, from a muddy swim in the swamp among the snakes and alligators, to Christmas time firewood, or being smashed on stage as part of an "art piece", to a swift merciful blow against a cement structure, all the way to a glamorous presentation on e-bay: "A work of art! be SURE to get it!"

Of course I should find the guy who sold it to me, and leave it on his doorstep. You know, like a story from 1001 nights, a bad dream, the oud Jinn who ALWAYS returns home.

I still have 4 days to try to live with it. Try coffee beans and keep playing? Or attack it with chlorine bleach? Just put a paper bag on its head and call it "habibi"?

Quote: Originally posted by fernandraynaud

Try coffee beans and keep playing?

Quote: Originally posted by fernandraynaud

Alfaraby, dear brother in suffering, somehow I doubt your smelling oud is your "oud Adani", but I ask anyway : is it ?

Absolutely not ! "Adani" smelled just as fresh as wood should. Was it the Adani that stink, I think I would have smash it on cement floor decades ago !
The smelly is a rare piece of art of an outstanding maker, whom I shall not reveal for the man's reputation sake . I can't smash it, neither sell it, nor give it back or away . It sounds like heaven and whenever I play it, I almost hear ABDO NAHAT moans in his grave. The oud is a real fortune, therefor I have to preserve it .
I can't choose coffee because of the fine rosette condition. Once I try to remove it, it shall crack down into pieces. I couldn't find F10 around either, so I shall wait to see what would you do Fernand , and follow in your footsteps , if you'll let me !

Aymara : Thanks for the advices .

Waiting
Alfaraby

Quote: Originally posted by alfaraby

I couldn't find F10 around either, ...

The first stage of the anti-odor attack was the Lysol. I don't know what's in it, but alcohol and water are the "base". So when I sprayed the inside of the bowl it got wet enough I had to look for a way to dry it. The air conditioner helped a lot. Was the smell gone? No. Was it less? yes. Was it acceptable? No.

Yesterday I got to sit in a cigar maker's seat and make a couple of cigars. They had coffee too. I got 1/4 Kg of ground coffee beans.

So the next step was to throw about 100 grams of ground coffee in the oud. And shake and shake. That helped a lot. I can see that what Chris found is quite relevant. I cannot say if the coffee by itself would have done it, but after the Lysol, it's a victory. I have to search in memory to try to recall the smell. It's gone, the coffee seems to eat it. So the question is how you approach it in Alfaraby's case. I think there have to be two parts, one to kill, the other to deodorize. So what I would do if I could not reach inside is to get some sort of vaporiser to make a fog, and get it in the oud through a hole in the shamsa. In the liquid I think that chlorine bleach 50% with water should work, maybe weaker. If something like F10 or Lysol is available, it should work too. They have vaporisers for asthma etc. And then I would make a very very strong coffee extract and vaporise it in there too. Maybe there are ways to make coffee so the color is light but the essences are strong? I don't know.

My remaining problem is that the soundboard has swollen, probably from the lysol adventure, maybe just from the ambient humidity, and I don't know if I can expect it to go back down. Do I need to wait for dryer climate, or is there a trick I can try here? Might it never return to the old shape? Does anyone have experience with the spooning soundboard effect?

You can see how much it has risen, maybe 1 cm, certainly more than 1/2 cm. Are there any known tricks for quickly absorbing humidity? Run hot air from the hair dryer through it?

I think I'm going to try to sell the oud here, as all instruments are horribly expensive, apparently due to high duties. Absurd prices. And nothing made locally. Ibanez bass: $1350. Mexican Fender guitar: $1400. Of course they have never imagined, let alone seen, an oud. i will have to explain it is muy popular in America!

Quote: Originally posted by fernandraynaud

I cannot say if the coffee by itself would have done it, but after the Lysol, it's a victory.

If the distance is high enough, you could blow warm (but not hot) air into the soundhole ... this air is very dry and will bind humidity. But as you know, this is a bit risky.

Discuss that with our luthiers.

Quote: Originally posted by fernandraynaud

I can't imagine the 1:125 F10 dilution being necessary.

The concentration is lower, when it becomes a gas ... and F10 is that cheap, that it doesn't matter much

Because then I don't need to dry the wood And who knows, if it makes spots, loosens the glue or something else, we should avoid. The gas will do what we want, so why risk anything?

Show them videos of Speed Caravan Make the oud popular in Central America and import more ... LOL

Quote: Originally posted by fernandraynaud

But I also thought the wood, if it stretched, would shrink again in the dryer climate at home.

It should, but I'm not 100% shure.

PS: The housewife besides me says, dry coffee works and to get rid of the moisture fill in dry noodles

In Europe it's THE sport of the masses ... I myself find it boring, though the world cup is more interesting. My sport is the Nürburgring, the world's greatest race track, the "Grüne Hölle" I especially like oldtimer races. But currently I watch "24 hours of Le Mans" on TV ... that's more thrilling than soccer.

I my case, I wouldn't put this specific oud on any risk whatsoever. It's, as aforesaid, a rare highly valuable oud, but it's fragile and weak, so I'd never dare to let it face humidity, let alone WATER !!! I shall have to look for dry gases only to kill the tiny bastards first, then try the dry ground coffee to kill the odor left behind, then shake it out or have it vacuumed out with a tube; but never, I mean never, use any sort of wet mixtures whatsoever ... not even coffee based.
The problem though is the rosette. It's very fine and has thick woofs and kind of stitches. But ground coffee can be eased out the narrow holes anyway.

My question however is : is there any kind of "gases" that might kill the bacteria, that can be found in a pharmacy or a drugstore ? Once the enemy is gone, we'll manage to clean our home easily afterwards, with coffee or without .
I'm not really contributing anything of value to this debate, so excuse my ignorance... I got B` in Chemistry in high school & never rehearsed it since then

Anyhow, thanks for the helpful thoughts

As for football : Do you know wh said why run after one ball - get one for each player ? )

Yours indeed
Alfaraby

Quote: Originally posted by alfaraby

I wouldn't put this specific oud on any risk whatsoever.

Quote: Originally posted by alfaraby

As for football : Do you know wh said why run after one ball - get one for each player ? )

That's why i prefer motorsport ... everybody's got his/her own car

Quote: Originally posted by fernandraynaud

Maybe Aymara's F10 will finish the job ...

I bet it will

I think, your problem is the climate and the remaining moisture in the wood. It seems, Lysol didn't kill all bacteria and due to the good conditions they grow rapidly again.

Quote: Originally posted by fernandraynaud

He pointed out the obvious, which is that the rotting glue is getting weaker as it rots, until it fails altogether.

Quote: Originally posted by fernandraynaud

the rotting glue is getting weaker as it rots, until it fails altogether

Quote: Originally posted by alfaraby

Does this process take half a century to take place ?

Quote: Originally posted by alfaraby

In a hard case in a closet for a couple of years & out only for hours to play, once on a while, then back there !! Is this wrong ?

A couple of recommendations I read said an oud should be out, enjoying the air, and never stored in it's case. That's what you'd call "counterintuitive", but it makes sense, in retrospect.

I continue to be amazed at how delicate a balance an oud is, the tension of the strings against the bridge and soundboard, like a living thing, a bird in flight. That's why I love the simplicity of that Sukar neck adjustment, it's right in line with the oud's dynamic tension, like a sailboat under full sail.

Hank Levin was saying that the soundboard on many modern Turkish ouds is no thicker than the cardboard they pack shirts with, and if you ship them under full string tension, any impact tends to shear the soundboard across the grain! Whoa! And the play of humidity is so intense!

I can understand that you would want to protect your antique. But it's as if equilibrium with the environment were the only possible defense. And you don't find a lot of 400 year old ouds, or lutes. Maybe if your glue only started to spoil you have a good chance with some sort of fumigation, and Chris' F10 sounds like a very good idea. But my Adani seemed ok until the central American humidity woke up the buggers. My wife picked up on it the minute I brought it home, she had a crib with bad glue as a child, and they had to burn it, she's sensitized to the odor. She had diplomatically asked if I didn't think it had a strange "something" to it

I'm too lazy to lock my instruments down, anyway. I leave my instruments on those metal "A stands", scattered all over, ready to pick up and play. If space were a problem, I'd get those wall "forks".