Tour of the Selmer Factory

I had the recent honor of visiting the Conn-Selmer factory in Elkhart, Indiana and what a treat it was! I got to witness just a few of the steps that go into making clarinets, bass clarinets, double reeds, and saxophones. Most of these instruments take anywhere from 7-10 years to produce, raw material to finished product, and the process is far more vast than I ever imagined.

Precision

The big thing that struck me throughout this visit was the absolute precision at every step of the process. When discussing the variables involved at any step of the process, we were always discussing variations on the order of thousandths of inches. Very, very tiny details that have drastic impacts. Again, this was something I intrinsically knew but seeing it play out just hit differently. The machining is exact but still requires human touch to finish correctly and beautifully. Here’s just one example:

Lossless Wax Molding

Keywork on clarinets, oboes, and saxophones is made out metal/brass alloys that are then plated with silver or some other sort of metal as desired. These keys are sometimes made using a clay mold of the desired keys pressed together by a giant machine using extreme pressure and speed. But the clay wears out over time, and the machine has to be calibrated constantly down to the thousandth of an inch. What Conn-Selmer does is pour melted wax into these clay molds and form a cast around the resulting wax key. This cast is then heated to 1350°F, evaporating the wax and leaving a perfect mold in which to pour heated metal into, resulting in the perfect key every time without the need for brute force and allows for a stronger key. This means that there were 2 molds made and used for every key on every Conn-Selmer woodwind, and that’s before plating, polishing, and installation.

Experience

I spoke with quite a few technicians while I toured the factory floor and observed many of them in action. My favorite was the spot welding on a low E/B key for bass clarinet. Each key has its own vice of sorts that holds it exactly in place, allowing the technician to heat the metal and weld the key together. I asked just about everyone I could how long they’ve been personally manufacturing instruments. Not a single answer was less than 15 years, in fact most technicians answered anywhere from 20-30 years! It’s quite a team they’ve got assembled there.

The old Selmer factory is also located in Elkhart, but has since been converted into a senior apartment community called Gardenview Apartments. During my visit to the current factory, I learned that a few residents of Gardenview worked in the old factory and that they were able to arrange it so that their current home is located in the same general area as their workbenches were when it was a factory. That is an unbelievable depth of passion and commitment to what can only be described as a craft, and that is what I saw in the Selmer factory today. Amazing.

TL;DR

Visit the factory when you get the chance. Conn-Selmer manufactures everything from brass to woodwinds to percussion. You will not be disappointed. It was absolutely worth a flight from Houston to South Bend (with a layover in Chicago) and a 30 minute rental car drive to get to Elkhart. As of this article they’ve closed off tours (I was the last, just in time!) for the foreseeable future due to COVID-19 delta, but I’m told tours will be open again as soon as feasibly possible. Ask when you can visit, and book a flight!