I got a thank you letter from Sam Harris stating that by merely sealing
his secondary pouches, he has solved his problem.

While I am glad that Sam got the problem "fixed" to his own satisfaction,
I don't want other readers believing that by merely sealing your pouches,
you are able to actually fix the problem that Sam claimed to have.

There is absolutely no way that sealing the secondary pouches would cure
a valve that worked at low vacuum, but not at high vacuum. There was not
one single contributor who even suggested that as a possible solution,
and I promise everyone reading this, that they are correct. Whatever
happened is spurious, tenuous, and iffy, and will probably happen again
very soon.

Applying onesself to the principles and understanding it _that way_ is
really the _only way_ one is going to learn how valves work, and the
characteristics when they malfunction. Sam, I believe, has masked the
problem, which will eventually return to haunt that player. When the
problem is a combination of marginal and accumulative things, then you
can expect to "cure" it by simply changing the percentage of leakage
in a particular area.

If, by sealing a secondary pouch the valves work better, then I suggest
that he definitely check the travel of the primaries and the integrity
of the seal between primary and secondary through the channel and gasket.
He has temporarily "fixed" a more basic problem. If Sam really wants to
do it "right," he will not settle for the quick fix. He will find out
what caused his problem and reason it out. I sure encourage Sam to get
it right, because sealing the pouches, while a good idea, is not the
fix for his stated problem at all.

Craig Brougher