This is more out of curiosity than anything, but it’s something that I’m sure would be helpful to those looking at Dixon whistles, which seem to be in almost every shop in the UK and Ireland. In High D, Dixon offers a number of models, including one piece and two piece polymer, polymer with brass slide, brass and nickel Trad, and heavier brass and nickel models. The Trad seems to have a slightly smaller bore than the rest, although this is from eyeballing, not measuring.
However, to my eyes, every one of these models has the same basic head shape. If I’m correct, this means that the difference between all of the models comes down to the tube and tuning slide/lack thereof. A comment on this thread says something to that effect, at least as far as the Trad and “alloy” whistles are concerned:
Does anyone with a number of Dixon models care to chime in with a comparison of the heads? To my eye they look identical, but this is just from browsing models in the local shop.
Would you say that the G whistle’s head has the same proportions as the D whistle, ie is the G whistle head just a bigger version of the D?
I’ve played a few of the Dixons and liked them, just ones that friends have and whatnot. The alloy D seems to have been a popular mid-range (non Sindt/Burke) “upgrade” whistle for a while, although the Killarney hasn’t sort of supplanted it in terms of what I see being played by good players at sessions nowadays.
On the high Ds the head looks identical (got the DX001, the nickel trad and the DX204). On the alto G the head is slightly different–the windway is flat while on the high Ds it is curved on top and flat on the bottom. Same goes for the low Ds (got the trad and plastic one piece)–on those the windway is also flat and not curved on top. I can maybe take a pic tomorrow.
edit: I noticed that the windway on the high Ds is not completely curved on top all the way through–it becomes flat where the air hits the blade. Probably to give a little compression to the air stream.
Oh, yes. They are very different. The DX001 is very smooth, clear and quiet. The trad nickel is a lot louder and “edgier”, more chiffy. The DX204 is different again, about as loud as the nickel trad but with a more “solid” sound, because of the heavy brass tube. Less “hollow” sounding and a bit more stable and a louder bell note.
Here is a pic:
From left to right: DX204, nickel trad, DX001, alto G alloy, alto G trad, plastic one piece low D and trad brass low D.
The low D trad is a bit more “squeaky”, needs more breath control and accurate fingering. The ABS low D sounds more stable, is more forgiving. Besides – the trad low D is one heavy mofo at 310 grams. Simply bought it because it is so rare and popped up on ebay but in fact I think the ABS is the better whistle (probably one reason they discontinued the trad low D). Quite opposed to the high Ds where the DX204 is definitely a notch above the rest (and IMO also above the well respected Killarney, at least sound wise – still love my Killarney though, but if I had to choose … luckily I don’t have to).
