I love this ocarina. When we get to the August Car-Fluting episodes, you’ll get to see really why. Also, you’ll get to see why I felt this mod was worth doing, but I won’t make you wait until August for that.
This is my favorite ocarina. I want to start out saying that before I come in and point out a shortfall in the design. The shape is great, the look is awesome, but with a body shaped like a diamond with concaved surfaces, your grip tends to slide and move during play…well, mine does anyway.
So I started thinking, the solution could be as simple as spraying the ocarina with some sort of rubber coating. I thought truckbed liner spray would be ideal, but I’m lazy and cheap, so instead I used the sub-par crap I had laying around. We’ll see, this could be a chance for Plasti-Dip spray to impress me…but usually I think it just peels right off (which can be a vert useful feature under different circumstances).
I’ve heard that debris and stuff in the chamber can really mess up the intonation, so I rolled up paper towel strips and plugged all the holes.
Then of course, I sprayed it! I didn’t worry about getting an even coat, this has nothing (well, ok, almost nothing) to do with aesthetics.
But it seems the little attention I did pay to aesthetics came up to bite me. I taped off the part of the ocarina where grip was not a concern. I thought it would look cool to have the contrast, but the rubber compound didn’t appreciate my plans!
In case you missed that, the compound adhered to the tape, so when I pulled it, it really put a damper on the whole “aesthetics” bit. Oh well, I really don’t care, as long as it sounds good and grips right :)
So, the final product may not be as handsome as the original, but now that it’s had a chance to dry completely, I think the coating will hold up well enough and provide some grip. In a few years, I may just peel it all off and replace it with something stronger, but for now, I’m calling this a success!
Thanks for checking out some more of my work! As always, I hope you enjoyed witnessing as much as I enjoyed creating!
© Photos and words by @albuslucimus, except where otherwise indicated.
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