How to improve low whistle of a home?

Whistle
1

Hi everyone! :smiley:

Some time ago (almost two years) to buy from another forum user (Joseph), a Chieftain low whistle in D and E body.

On the topic of the sale (Chieftain Low D & E Pack For Sale - #11 by Joseph - Whistle - Chiff & Fipple), Joseph says that insert a small piece of toothpick to improve the sound. Obviously I lost that piece a few days (hahaha), but I make other, also found that if I put a piece of toothpick in the center of Windway greatly improved sound. Without this piece of toothpick sound is adversely affected… :sniffle:

The truth is that this whistle has several flaws and is very difficult to play, I come from playing about 7 years ago and I can consider myself an intermediate player. The body in E do not even want to mention, since it is really out of tune. Joseph was offered for sale this whistle due to the purchase of another set, and that probably played it mainly in the church, which was not tested for reels, jigs, second octave, notes transition, etc…I think they are manufacturing defects.
The truth is that Joseph was always friendly and it was a pleasure to buy my first and only low whistle. :thumbsup:

After this time, I can say “I need something more”… and I would love to buy low whistles of better quality as MK, Overtone, etc … but as some know, I am a “poor” guy, and I had to work hard to just buy this set in the second hand, in addition to living in a country where Celtic music is completely unknown (Chile), YEAH, the country of miners, hahahaha.

So the question to this is the next…

How I can improve my low whistle in a home?
perhaps using a drill to enlarge a few holes, shaping, cutting and sanding here or there? or otherwise …

Maybe do a job to similar to what I would do the great Jerry Freeman, but in big version. :slight_smile:

some ideas friends?

Million thanks!

2

I’ve modified most of the whistles I have. It seems that various makers have different approaches to what’s “in tune”. So a person could stick to one make of whistle, and learn to blow that make into tune, so that he could pick up any of his whistles and play without having to make any whistle-by-whistle adjustments.

Since I have whistles of various makes, I’ve modified them so that each plays the same way as regards to blowing them to play in tune.

It appears that the way I blow a whistle (and have done for over 30 years) happens to agree exactly with how my MK is voiced. My MK, my several Burkes, and my Freeman Tweaked Generation Bb all are voiced exactly the same and are among the few whistles I play that I haven’t modified.

My old Feadog, several Generations, several Susatos, and my two Overtons have all had to be modified to play an in-tune gamut.

Often it’s just a matter of carving out a hole or two. My wonderful old Generation C has had nearly every hole carved and the bottom chopped because one note was sharper than all the rest. I have Susatos like that too. Both my Overtons had a flat “A” and an extremely flat “B” in both octaves. One also had an extremely flat bellnote (we’re talking a quartertone off, so flat as to be impossible to blow into tune).