A Sticky Issue: A Comparison between Different Rosins and Volume Produced

Overview

Objectives/Goals Being a violin player, I was interested in finding if different violin rosins would actually help make a louder sound. Methods/Materials The materials used in this project were: my violin and bow, six different rosins, a decibel meter, a metronome/tuner, measuring tape, rubbing alcohol, cleaning materials, and masking tape. I found and taped off a section of my bow where I could produce the loudest continuous violin sound and used a metronome to make sure I was moving the bow at a consistent speed. I tested six different rosins on sample notes in three different ranges of the violin register (B flat on the G string, F# on the A string, and high F# on the E string) and measured the highest consistent reading a decibel meter would give. I also tested as a control, no rosin before each rosin test. Results I was surprised to find that the maximum volume each rosin could produce on the E string note varied from 90 decibels to 97 decibels, on the A string the levels varied from to 91 decibels to 94 decibels, but that all rosins produced a similar maximum volume to no rosin on the G string note. (90 decibels). The rosin that could produce the loudest sound on the E string was the fifth loudest on the A string. Conclusions/Discussion Different rosins seem to each have different effectiveness on different strings and frequencies. The G string, which is the lowest string on the violin did not respond very differently to different rosins. I would like to expand this study to include all four strings and also repeat the procedure using a cello.

Competition history

• CSEF 2009 Product Science (Physical) (Junior Division Only) · Entry J2206

Resources

• CSEF project summary ↗

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