R&R 730 for sale on Ebay.
Bids over $6000!
If you all club together it will do nicely for my christmas present…
Are those little rollers on the bottom 3 keys?
I’d say yes.
To the rollers.
Not your prezzy.
Extra Bb touch, B foot (with rollers!), vgc and what a lovely embouchure! And all for a mere £3k!!!
Another new SN for DM too(?)! And a straight Cnat touch. So many recent points raised re: other flutes all in one! Now, if it just had a spare PH… oh, and its grease pot and cleaning rod with integral screw-driver, what might it be worth then? It’s probably too early to have needed a certificate from Messrs R&R, though.
It’s loverly.
Well at least you don’t have to worry about the flute being head heavy, with that foot! Whoever buys it, can send it to me to get it cleaned up… 
It’s nice, because no one has “fixed” it yet! It seems that a lot of the work is spent trying to fix the repairs, done in the past. 
i dont know jon, that sounds highly suspect… where’d you ever get an idea like that?
Jem: certificates showed up just before the four-petal mark did, around the 3000series. (no access to the catalogue here at work so I can’t say with any precision)
My suspicion is that the petals (new stamp) and the certificates came at the same time, but the stock of old marked flutes remained to be sold first, ergo the certificates appearing first in the cases.
These certificates did not include the serial number of the flute inside (funny, how else to prevent the “fraud” they worried so much about?) or any other identifier. The numbers on certificates appeared with the second batch, which had a cartouche on the right side.
No big deal on the straight C shank (touch). this was the style for quite some time until the uplifted touch showed up (again, the catalogue has the details to show when that was…just don’t have it handy right now).
I think i have this one on my catalogue, but will check.
The address is funny on first blush, but just my own react.
I’ll be checking
dm
I’ve checked and everything on this flute checks out.
The serial number is good and so is the box. The address is one of the earlier of the Piazza mark (which incidentally was just on the other side of the building for R&R from all their other addresses at Tavistock).
A bit steep for my tastes, but I don’t doubt there’s some dealer-wannabe out there who will pay way too much for it, stuff it away and then attempt to sell it as an expert some time from now.
You’ll know it when you see it.
A nearly duplicate flute sold in September, #704. A nice Rudall with the same rollers on the foot keys. Even had the same pin at the A hole. But condition wasn’t near as good.
The flute had flat key cups and a high-E trill. Slightly different, yes, but very very similar.
Very nice!
Looks like there could be a silver pin inserted just at the side of left Hand 3 hole?
Not obvious to me what its for, might have been a bit of damage at the birth? Key Block has been refitted. A crack, what’s the thinking?
This ebayer often sells flutes and used to have a different ebay ID.
Kevin
I think this is known construction method on some R&R. You can see it on the other key blocks.
Perhaps as a device to strengthen the key block? Or to keep to block from changing shape and seizing up the key?
Chris Norman’s boxwood has them pretty clearly seen.
My Rudall and Rose (#4009) also has the little round metal pins in the keyblocks, as is seen in the blocks for the G# and long F keys on this flute. But I wonder about the one on the C key, which is right up against the third finger hole of the top section. At first glance I thought it was an imperfection in the photo, but it can’t be that as it shows up in the same spot in two different photos. That doesn’t look all that stable, but I guess if it’s survived all these years it must be.
That was another R&R feature, I believe the pins are to try to prevent cracking between the block, as sometimes this happens. They are steel pins, not silver, as far as I know…
i’d be amazed if anything RR used on a flute…especially the early ones…had anything on them that was not sterling silver, ivory, bone or cocus/boxwood.
They took meticulous care to ensure everything they did was to their reputation, so I’d think steel…ugh…is very unlikely.
I’ve a couple RR that used Ivory for these block pins, whose job it is to stabilize the block to the body, to prevent the stripping that sometimes happened when keys caught a pocket, another key in disassembly, etc. Basically rips the block off.
That’s why some of them did not have these pins, though most did, as they were not likely to be “ripped off.” The long-C, long-F, D#, foot keys, often had it. Not always the Bb and not often the G#. I’ve never seen a short-F block with the pin.
And with the serial number, helps immeasurably. Rudalls that lack a serial number are very suspect, less so that they are forgeries, which is doubtful, but very likely they were “seconds,” that just didn’t rate being stamped so should never convey the dollars a numbered flute brings.
Worth remembering, I’d say, if you’re ever pedaled a Rudall with no number.
Don’t recall why, but for some reason I was under the impression that they were steel as well. Not a good idea, really, if so; a rusted pin could actually split a block itself. Perhaps John Kerr would consent to introduce a magnet to his flute and confirm or deny this pernicious rumor. Cheers,
Rob
The only magnets I have in the house are refrigerator magnets. As such, they stick to my refrigerator but not to my flute.
And in looking at my flute right now, I see that it only has stabilizing pins in the blocks for the short keys (Bb, D#, G#) and not on the longer ones. And the pins are brass-like in color, rather than silver-like. Could they be gold or brass or even ivory, rather than sterling silver or steel? I’m no metals expert, so I can’t tell.
Also, from looking at my flute now I see that I have a small round imperfection right on the sharp edge of one of the key blocks. Probably just a defect in the wood or a small ding that may or may not have been touched up sometime along the way. But if this little round spot were shiny, it would look just like that round spot on the edge of the hole in the eBay flute that I remarked on earlier. So that may actually be a similar wood imperfection that reflected in the photo flash and not a metal stabilizing rod in a strange position as I surmised earlier. Or maybe it’s a piece of metal inserted there during a repair.
I guess you forgot about the second spring under the keys, that were made from spring steel… The pinning could be Brass, I will check when I get to my shop. Better bring a magnet!
Well, it went - 1 bid for the starting price to a GB buyer with an interest in ITM judging by his other purchases.
FWIW, I think £3k for a top-notch R&R is not bad money - sure, a lot to find for most of us, but, for the sake of argument, if I somehow lost mine and was searching to replace it (with insurance money), I’d probably expect, and not be unhappy, to pay around that. It’s kinda decent retail price rather than auction-room bargain, though, which is why it shocks the long established regular R&R buyers like DM. I’m not surprised it didn’t push up from that.
Re: block pins - I recall Paul Davies telling me they were steel. My flute has three, in the blocks for the G# and extra Bb keys, and (not going right through) the Eb key block. The ends of mine are a dull brown that almost matches the timber - probably rust! I don’t think they’re brass or silver, and they’re definitely metal.