I have the 3 piece Tipple with the wedge, lip plate, and offset finger holes and I don’t see it as a beginner instrument at all from the standpoint that you would “graduate” to something better. It’s a beginner instrument from the fact that for not a lot of risk you can find out if you really like the irish flute, but I don’t why I would sell it. I believe the real quality of an instrument is the talent and passion the maker puts into it and you can tell from Doug’s posts and the near universal acclaim for his flutes that he puts a lot into each one(not saying Dixon and Hamilton don’t, I just see Tipple flutes a lot more on the forum). When I examine mine, I see incredible attention to detail and I sometimes shock myself that I, a beginner at the flute, can produce some very beautiful tones with it. Looking at it from another angle, I’ve played ukulele for a while and have some very nice and relatively expensive koa ukes. The one I play the most is a second hand Fluke that has a plastic back and a laminate top. Why? Because it has all the same capabilities as the more expensive ones, it sounds nice, but it sits on my desk where I can pick it up at any given moment and play. I use the Tipple the same way. It’s always there, always ready, and my playing has improved dramatically over the past couple of months because I pick it up and play for a few minutes at a time. I also know from other players and videos that it has everything I need to produce beautiful music because Doug made it the right way. The rest is up to me.
C & F is predominantly US 
you can get a delron for a bit over 4 times the price of the Tipple 
Doug’s attention to detail and workmanship would be two of the major the reasons his flutes are recommended.
The third reason is that it is priced below anything that is vaguely comparable.
Hammy’s may be an exception for those in the EU… (so far no EU person has answered me question 
)
The only other contenders, in the under US $100 category, are a few bamboo makers.
These are not particularly Irish.
All three are capable of good tone. Get one and start developing embouchure. 
In six months or a year you can fuss about what flute you really want. No sense getting “analysis paralysis” at this point in your career. Your headed for a great adventure. Start the journey with any of those three and you’ll be fine.
Doc
For what they’re worth, these are my experiences with a Tipple I’ve owned for 18 months and a wooden flute I’ve owned for just under a year.
I have the very shiny ivory coloured Tipple two piece with wedge, both heads with different embouchure holes, and the standard, comparitively large, offset tone holes. The three piece wooden flute’s embouchure is one millimetre smaller, and it has smaller toneholes.
The Tipple is always ready to go and needs no maintenance or special care. It’s easy to play, takes little air, and gives a reverberatingly satisfying sound. It’s easy to hold and it’s loud or soft in both octaves. Its tone has more complexities the more I play it.
The wooden flute’s tone is somewhat sweeter but softer in both octaves. It takes a lot more time to get a clear tone. The embouchure has been harder to manage and is still not as readily forthcoming as either Tipple embouchures. It’s low D has nowhere near the volume of the Tipple.
The wooden flute is heavier by several ounces and seems marginally more cumbersome. I can play it with ease now but its not as satisfying as the Tipple. And, sadly, I have concluded that the wooden flute is a comparative and continuing pain. It needs continual examination with a flash light to see if it needs swabbing, which it invariably does, and every month I have to oil it inside and out, fiddling with all the hole edges and making sure the joints gets attention without getting oil on the joint threads. Most of my music and desk papers have oil stains and I have a cleaning up rag that’s so stained with oil I use it to wipe the flute before I put it away. So as not to squash the threads and give them time to spring back, I have to store the flute in three parts after every practice so the joint threads dont flatten and leak. I have to make sure it doesn’t get too hot or too cold, and that it doesn’t fall or get knocked. It’s expensive to mail, insure and repair. It cost five times more than the Tipple.
With scientific research showing that what flutes are made of doesn’t affect tone, and more professional conductors, musicians and filmmakers turning to Tipple flutes, IMO plastic whistles and flutes will become the norm soon, especially when they start getting inexpensive, newly designed and indestructible, low maintenance keys.
I was thinking of getting an $850 delrin flute to see if I could do better than either the Tipple or the wooden flute. Then I read a recent post by Doug and Denny showing me how to change my TIpple’s wedge’s position with a simple two second operation that now produces a sound that has, as another Tipple tooter says, changed my Tipple into a comparative Stradivarius … So I’ve saved myself $850 and the future of my wooden flute is now even more uncertain …
Just a few thoughts from a home hobbyist …
K.
KeithSandra,
I’m glad you’re so satisfied with your Tipple. For the price, dollar for dollar, they are the best deal for a keyless flute, absolutely. But I think you are off-base with your overall assessment: I have yet to hear a Tipple sound anywhere near a professional quality Irish/simple system flute–not even close. Sad but true: if you want the best sound, you have pay for it. Not that I’m a great player, but I find wood flutes much more interesting and satisfying tonally than any delrin/polymer flute I’ve played, and I’ve played a lot of delrin/polymer flutes. Look at the top players–none play anything but wood and they only use flutes from the top makers.
I like to have a practice flute around - I don’t have to clean it, and I’m more inclined to whack the cat
who’s crawling up my leg, trying to get me to understand the concept of ‘internal tuning’
Mate, thats a stretch.
You can’t make ANY evaluation of it, let alone fair, bad or any other adjective.
What was the question? 
I’ve sold a few PVC flutes in D, Eb, C and B.
For small handed persons and anyone who wants a flute with easy grip I’ve got a nice playing Eb model with offset holes 3 and 6.
Dominic Allan offers wooden conical bore student flutes for £150, which can be part exchanged up to 70% when ordering one of his regular flutes. I think that is a very good deal for someone starting on flute.
no, sorry. It was back in this post and was purely an import question.
As to the relative merits of the, under $100, offerings of the combined EU makers I’ve no idea. 
AKIBA:
Regarding your assertion that most of the best Irish flute players choose to play on conical-bore wooden flutes:
Well, maybe for the time being, but as the reputation of plastic flutes and whistles gathers strength, surely this will change; is in fact changing as we speak?
The older generation might have a prejudice against anything “plastic”, but the young in general, and our young designers of cars, planes, space machines, instruments, office and home and home features etc etc etc, certainly don’t.
The present attitude against plastic versus wood is going to puzzle future generations if current scientific evidence that says the materials used on wind instruments have no different effect on tone or musicality is correct.
The present attitude that wood is best seems suspiciously like personal prejudice based on anecdotal evidence. If so, it’s wrong, and plastic, or probably any other suitable material, is just as good as wood musically, and far better from a cost and use point of view.
This Wooden Emperor looks increasingly nekkid!
K.
Hi KeithS,
It seems to me that your opinion on this issue is suspiciously naive and misinformed. I’ll admit I’m not the expert. So let’s take a look at the top experts in the field of making the finest simple system flutes, for Irish music or otherwise. Olwell, Wilkes, Doyle, our own Casey Burns and Mr. Holmes–I believe none of them make a flute out of anything but wood. Don’t you think that if they could find a cheaper, more indestructible, lower-maintenance material that performed/sounded/played just as well as wood, they would use it? Other makers make a few delrin flutes, Hammy and our own Terry McGee, but only as a concession, not as their main choice, which is wood. And what about the baroque/traverso makers? Take a look at all this evidence and tell me what you find. Also, top players care more about sound/tone and performance–if plastic was so great, a far greater number of players would be using it. As it is, almost none do. Tom Doorley of Danu used to play a delrin Seery but now, I believe plays a wood Olwell. It’s not just tradition or prejudice; I believe one could say it is a fact.
I think arguments based per se on material only tend to fatuos - oops I mean fatuous.
Lets take two “plastic” flutes .
A Tipple flute and a professional McGee flute of delrin.
The two are are not parable IMO.
Look at what Terry McGee says about his plastic flutes - see under “polymer”:-
http://www.mcgee-flutes.com/materials.htm
They are as expensive as his wooden equivalents and as good as them in his opinion.
The price (cheapness or not) has little to do with material but more to do with workmanship - the making of the embouchure, the tone hole, the bore and other things.
Akiba:
Your argument is so illogical I’m embarrassed.
"It’s called “Argumentum ad populum” – a logical fallacy in which a statement is assumed true because you or even most people believe it to be true; e.g.:
"All these good people only make wooden flutes -
“Therefore only wooden flutes are any good …”
or:
"Most people assume wooden flutes are better than flutes made in any other material no matter how good the maker of the non wooden flute is or how good the non wooden flute is …
“Therefore only wooden flutes are any good, no matter who makes them or how good or bad the non wooden flute is.”
Strewth.
I get your point, Keith. But you have zero evidence on your side. And my argument is more solid than you portray. I think you’re the one embarrassed by your weak assertions that have little weight. I’ll stake my claim on Olwell and all the top makers and all the top players and my own experience. How much experience do you have with simple system flutes anyways? How good of a player are you? What are your credentials? Do they out-trump all the makers and players who swear by wood as the top material?
So, what do you guys think? Dixon 3 piece or Tipple?
At the risk of entering the fray, I’ll say as a fairly recent noob myself I started on a Tipple and have since purchased much more expensive instruments. I’ve also owned and played Dixon 3 piece flutes, and liked them as well.
I agree with your earlier post that you can’t go wrong with a Tipple. It was a good instrument for me to start on and decide whether I had the ability and desire to stick with the flute before investing more money. It fit my budget at the time and has been a good one to develop technique on. In my simplistic opinion, for the money I don’t see how a beginner can go wrong.
–jeff
Highjacking—guilty as charged 
.
Just for the record. The flute makers I’ve spoken with generally speak poorly of delrin not because of the final result but because it’s a pain to work with. Flute makers are wood workers. Thye don’t like working in plastic. I suspect that has as much to do with it as anything. Pat Olwell made one special order flute in delrin that I know of. Said he absolutely hated working the stuff. From all reports it was a great flute.
That said, I do think wood sounds better. When I play the same flutes (maker, model, embouchure cut) I can definitely hear and feel a difference. Interestingly, my wife can’t tell the difference from 10 feet away.
The acoustic differences are probably over-blown (no pun intended) but there is something wonderful about wood.
Sorry for the re-rail of the de-rail. Go buy a TIpple or a Hammy Practice flute or a Dixon. Or spend a few more bucks (than the Dixon) and Get a Copley delrin or a Forbes or an M&E or…or…or…
Just get sumpin’ and start tooting. You’ll be buying another flute later. No sense fretting about the first one. Any of those three would be great.
Doc
Hi!
A few days ago I tried the Hamilton, but I am disappointed: My cheap Dixon one-piece Low D have a more “full” and “broad” sound that sounds more “Irish” in my opinion…
What do YOU think about the cheap Dixon one-piece Low D considering it to the Hamilton?
The Hammy seems to sound quietly, a little bit “boring”, and without any “honk” - which I like at my Dixon one-piece, but the Dixon is more difficult to play I think…
Hmm, when I like the SOUND of the Dixon (warm, “rough”, sometimes like a “honk of a big ship”), maybe the Tipple would be the better choice?
Or the 3-piece Low D from Dixon? What about THIS one comparing it to the Hamilton concerning the sound?
As a relative beginner it will be very difficult for you to properly evaluate a flute, particularly after only a short time auditioning one. Each different instrument requires an adjustment to your embochure, and sometimes fingering, to give its fullest sound. While I haven’t personally tried a Hamilton practice flute, he is pretty well known for making a flute that can really “honk”, much of which is related to the embochure cut. It is possible you just didn’t give it enough of a trial.
I had a similar experience the first time I tried a McGee GLP. At the time I found the sound to be quite veiled and thought that it didn’t measure up to the M&E that I was currently using. Now I play an antique that could be the model Terry used to design the GLP, and prefer it to the Pratten and Hawks style flutes I also own.
It also may be that you are now used to the sound from a cylindrical flute (as well as the air requirements), and prefer it. If so, you will surely be pleased with one of Doug’s flutes, as by all acounts they are an upgrade on the Dixon 1-piece.