TubeNet

..that a typical Bb soprano clarinet and a Bb trumpet are both closed end tube systems and both have about the same frequency range (clarinet slightly lower) yet the clarinet has half the tubing length?

The "fundamental" of the trumpet is actually an octave below its Bb open note but is not [usually] playable, so the tones it produces are an octave higher than you might expect from its approximately 5-foot tubing length.

..a soprano sax is about the same length as a clarinet, is conical, and is about an octave higher than said clarinet.....

I believe that a soprano sax is about 15.75 inches long and a Bb clarinet is about 25, so they are not "about" the same length, and the lowest note on the clarinet is about a sixth lower than the sax, not an octave. The mouthpiece cavity and the holes on woodwinds strongly affect the vibrational modes in a way not readily apparent without a mathematical analysis. I refer you to books on instrumental acoustics such as Benade, Olson or the old Scientific American brochure on the Physics of Music, which can tell you much more about this subject than I can.

The presence of the bell is responsible for the harmonic series being different from just a straight tube. I have a brass techniques book that explains it, but it's packed away for school right now.

A good place to start:

http://www.phys.unsw.edu.au/music/basics.html

This is a great site with some off-the-beat discussions, including how Heisenberg's uncertainty principle relates to tuning.

I apologize for the erroneous length figures in my previous post. Not having a sax at hand, I used the lengths given by Olson in his textbook, which, when I consulted with actual sax players, were obviously wrong. Shame on him (and shame on me for not checking further).

Sill, the sax vs clarinet question is easy to answer, and though I was a little off on the lengths, the principles are the same as described previoiusly. The soprano sax is about 700 mm long compared to the clarinet's 670 mm (now I am using the figures from the website
www.phys.unsw.edu.au/~jw/saxacoustics.html).
The sax is basically a closed conical pipe having its fundamental wavelength at twice the length of the pipe and the clarinet is basically a closed cylindrical pipe having its fundamental wavelength at four times the length of the pipe. Thus the fundamental frequency of a conical pipe should be about an octave above that of a cylindrical pipe of the same length. The fact that the Sax (lowest note Ab3) is not quite a octave above the clarinet (lowest note D3) is because of several minor factors. It has a slightly longer length, and the end effects of the bells and mouthpieces are slightly different.

A little research is a wonderful thing!

What are you guys talking about? BOTH saxes and tubas are made out of metal, not cloth.

Jeez. Some of the threads you get on here...

Charlie Goodman wrote:What are you guys talking about? BOTH saxes and tubas are made out of metal, not cloth.

Jeez. Some of the threads you get on here...

They do weave a bit, don't they?