Finally got a good one...

Irish Flute
1

Hi. After making a couple of duds I finally got a nice little flute in C. I guess that’s an unorthodox key for an Irish flute, but I wanted something else besides D and I only had enough pipe for a C. Hah hah hah!!

This was my fourth attempt. My first attempt was a low D (made from some scrap 3/4" sch. 40 pipe I had left over from a whistle project) that turned out fairly nice other than the fact that I mis-plotted the B hole and I had to make it so large that my finger would disappear down inside it up to about my elbow! Hah hah hah! My second and third attempts, an A and Bb respectively (made from the same hunk of 1/2" sch. 40 pipe as this little C flute), also turned out fairly nice also, but the holes just didn’t seem to be logically laid out to suit me. Some were spaced too far and others were too close. You know what I mean? Anyway, I’m very happy with this one! My project for tomorrow is a flute in Bb with a lip plate. I already have the blank roughed out and I’m going to let the glue for the lip plate season over night.

Oh yeah, if you read this post Doug Tipple, I used your suggestions for making the embrouchure and it worked like a champ! Thank you. Do you have any suggestion for cork placement? The one in this flute is made from a 1/2" thick slice of a 5/8" diameter dowel rod and is tapped in about halfway between the edge of the embrouchure hole and the top end of the flute.

2

S. B.

Looks good.

Standard is 1 diameter from center of hole.
If octaves play wide toward hole (a little is a lot)

3

Standard is 1 diameter from center of hole

1 diameter of what? 1 bore diamater (i.e. .622" from the center of the embrouchure hole)?

4

Yes, one bore diameter from the stopper to the center of the blow hole is fairly standard. However, if you move the stopper a little closer to the hole, it will help bring in some of the upper notes of the second octave which tend to be a little flat.

I use wine corks for the stoppers on the small 1/2" schedule 40 pvc pipe. I cut 1/2" sections of the cork, and I remove excess material with a fine rasp and finish with a sanding paddle. Wooden dowels are not compressible like cork and do not make good stoppers because it is hard to keep them in place.