I apologize for asking a (most likely very common and often ill advised) question as my first post on the forum, but gotta start somewhere.
Anyway, I am looking into buying a keyless flute in the future and I figured I would consider my options. I have indeed read many posts on here advising against eBay flutes and cheap flutes in general, but the likely hood of making another large purchase is very slim for a long time. I’m getting to be a bit of a multi-instrumentalist these days, though all woodwinds (concert flute, ocarina, recorder, fife, low whistle, pennywhistle).
I happened upon this one on eBay which seems somewhat better looking than the average eBay “Irish Flute”. As a general rule I am avoiding any that seem too cheap for the material, from a seemingly random/unrelated shop, or are made in the Pakistan region. So if it isn’t too much trouble, I’d love some thoughts on this one:
What makes me wonder is it is referred to as am “8 hole flute” but it has only six holes, as most simple system flutes do, and no venting holes. If there were the two venting holes I could understand it being called an “8 hole” but the fact they are possibly counting the embouchure hole and the bell aperture as two more holes makes me wonder if their assertion of “fully playable” is based on little more than a marketing ploy. Also If it did have more than 6 holes it wouldn’t use the standard fingering which is important.
Primarily my budget is that of $100 or less. I know, highly unlikely to find anything of worth in this price range.
If all else fails I will probably just get a Tipple, but plastic is my least favorite material for instruments, having had many so far. I have heard great praise of Tipple’s flutes, and trust they are fantastic. I just am easily swayed by hardwood instruments.
That’s a pakistani flute…
For your budget, I’d follow AbraXas advice
Or, you could get a good quality bansuri of the same pitch, but they’re not tunable and the sound is not ideal for irish music.
a few years back i “won” one of those on ebay…the wood we really nice looking and i felt that there is no way it could really really suck and had to be worth at least the $20 i got it for (it looked just like this one)…it really was not worth the money. before i threw it away, i drilled the embouchure hole bigger…filled it with epoxy and cut a new embouchure hole…it played better, but still too faint…so…new cork and joints…
the wood is so light (it’s probably a very light type of mahogany?)…
i threw it away not to sink anymore time into it.
Like Eilam, years ago I purchased one of these flutes from ebay. The ebay photo looked good, and the seller had a good feedback rating. However, when I received the flute, I soon realized that it was merely a FLO (flute like object) and not a playable flute, contrary to what the music store had advertised in such glowing terms. It saddens me that some online music stores, many of which also have a physical store front location, would deliberately victimize the public with false claims, but that is how it is in the modern world.
If you examine the two photos in this ebay auction, you will see that the two photos are not even of the same flute. The top photo with the long end joint probably has exhaust holes on the sides or bottom of the flute so that they are not visible in the photo. However, without exhaust ports, that flute could not possible play in tune. The bottom photo shows a 6-hole flute with end joint of normal length. The given length of 23 inches makes sense for the 6-hole flute. However, the auction description talks about the auction being for an 8-hole flute. The auction description is all mixed up and doesn’t make sense. I would avoid this auction. Instead, I would buy a wooden flute from someone that I knew who would comment honestly about the true merits of the flute.
I’m proud to say I never gave in to the impulse to buy one of those. (I started on a Tipple). But I did try one out that a local woman had advertised on Craig’s List. And it’s true — the wood is quite lovely.
I also was foolish enough to pick up one of these flutes from e-bay. It literally could not be assembled, much less played. With all the thread removed from the lower tennon it was still too large to enter the foot joint socket. Quality control on these is pretty much nonexistant. With a small bit of customization I finally got it together, removed all the poorly wrapped cotton thread and replaced that with a nice yellow synthetic, then tried it out. It was clear that the toneholes had not been properly placed and/or sized. I ended up sending it back and just lost out on the overpriced shipping. If anyone got one of these with a yellow wrap I would have to assume that the “instrument assembly specialists” the vendor mentioned didn’t end up doing anything additional to that return.
OTH I did attend a group lesson recently where someone had what appeared to be this type of flute. Perhaps they got a rare good one, or had someone do a major overhaul, but in any event it didn’t sound too bad.
For your budget you are much better off with a Tipple, Miller or Murphy to work on your embochure while you save up for a conical flute.
Thanks everyone I appreciate all the replies! It is as I had feared then, another eBay crap FLO. I guess I would have never expected a store with related items and a storefront to sell falsely. Lesson learned, and without spending a penny!
I’d love some links to Miller or Murphy flutes, haven’t really heard of them yet.
And if you’ll look at the signature in the post immediately before this one, you’ll see this link: http://dougsflutes.googlepages.com/. Doug makes great flutes, and in your price range. Like a lot of folks, I started on one, and still have it. This thread is a reminder to me to get it out and give it a toot.
I am familiar with Doug’s flutes, his D and G are on my wish list! I have seen Jem Hammond play some wonderful music on them and they sound great! I just wonder if I will have a hard time fingering the low D; one of the reasons I went with a Chieftain and not a Goldie/Overton was the spacing between holes 5 and 6 are modified to be much shorter in the chieftains.
Speaking of Tipples, is it possible to get a flute with the octave correcting wedge already installed? I try not to mess with adjusting stoppers and internal bore related things if I can help it.
Also, didn’t notice the Miller link at first, sorry and thanks!
I have recently started installing the wedges (permanently with superglue) in the headjoints of all of my flutes as a default procedure, unless, of course, I am asked to do otherwise.
7:45 PM. Well, actually I just rotate it toward the player to remove it from the airstream as much as possible, but I still need to be able to get my toothpick with superglue through the embouchure hole and onto the interface of the wedge and flute bore that is closest to the embouchure hole. I use double-sided tape to secure the wedge in the desired position before I start the gluing process.
could ya believe it? 
