Bow rehair
Choosing the best horsehair
Choosing the right horsehair to meet a musician’s needs is something that requires experience.
Sometimes it is not even an easy job for a luthier/bow maker to find selected horsehair of perfect quality that has not undergone bleaching.
Horsehair is produced and worked in different parts of the world, from South America to Canada and Australia, but most of it comes from the Chinese province of Hebei.
Selecting, washing, and combing the horsehair is a traditional, laborious profession that is not well paid and requires a good deal of experience and skill. It is a disappearing art in China, since the younger generations would rather do other forms of work that are less tiring and better paid. All this unfortunately has a negative impact on the horsehair market.
After a lot of testing and after finding some reliable suppliers, I am able to offer customers the following types of hair.
Mongolian Stallion is a top-quality horsehair. It is extremely fine, elastic and well selected in a gauge that perfectly suits violin and viola bows (excellent with strings in natural or synthetic gut).
Siberian Stallion compared to Mongolian, this is slightly stronger and tougher, with a higher gauge. It is a good match for viola and cello bows, but also for violinists looking for a more decisive contact and bite.
Thick White this is a thicker Siberian hair with a selected gauge (diameter 0.18 - 0.22 mm). It is used on bows for the double bass but would also suit the more demanding cello player.
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Black and Sorrel Brown are thicker, tougher hairs which are perfect for use on bows for the double bass.
Lastly, White Chinese is a mixed horsehair that is robust and perfect for studio and carbon bows...
Bow rehair
Personally, I prefer re-hairing "French style", fastening with a ferrule in the frog, then combing the hair towards the head. This means I never have “losses”, an important factor when gauging the right amount of horsehair beforehand.
The horsehair is then dampened and evened out to create optimal even tension.
Small maintenance interventions, such as the replacement of the eyelet,, the tip plate, the pad or the silver winding, can be required, as necessary.
