I am interested in learning how to make whistles. I have successfully built the Low-Tech PVC whistle. Now I want to try to make a Low D. Does anyone have any suggestions? What material should I use? What type of fipple plug should I use? How should I find the placement for the holes? What type of mouthpiece should I make? Thanks for your help!
~Jordan
Play with this for a while…
http://www.cwo.com/~ph_kosel/flutomat.html
The hard part is to average the square whistle voicing from a round flute embouchure. Take a look here too…
I you want some quick experience with PVC, I’d suggest you try a flute first. I made one using Doug Tipple’s instructions in about 1/2 hour and am incredibly surprised how well it plays. With almost minimal effort, I made a flute that play on-pitch and sounds really cool. In fact, I’ve been playing it (and the Tipple 8-hole I subsequently bought) more than my whistles lately - oh woe is me!
Doug Tipple seems like a great guy, btw…
Pat
Double post
I made a flute head for my CPVC whistle bodies. Well yes, I can get sound out of it, but far from impressive… I don’t know whether there’s a problem with the design of the head or with my fluting. I’m pretty good at getting sound out of a bottle, after I’ve got the beer out of it.
Regards,
Owen Morgan
Yacht Magic
Anchored in the lagoon, St Maarten
My new blog.
Click here for my latest reported position. (Use the satellite view.)
Hi Jordan, you’ll find full directions on my page. Making a good low D is easy! If you can’t find a plastic rod the right diameter, a wooden plug will work fine.
That’s quite enough w(h)ining! And you have to practice hard to get the first step right too!
Seriously though, you just have to practice forming the embouchure a while - plenty of info all over the place on that! Then, if it gets you hyperventilating, you’ll be all light-headed without needing the beer! Much cheaper and healthier - oh the untold joys and benefits of flute-playing! - but enjoy it while you can because the effect soon wears off.
BTW, for flute embouchures, use my tube expansion tip above to form a thicker part for the embouchure chimney and lip-plate - expand a piece of tube about 6cm/2.25" long, slip it over the head tube, shrink and glue it into position by running superglue around the ends, then drill and file out your embouchure. You get a much better, stronger, more flexible tone with a decent depth to the embouchure.
Jordan,
There are a few web sites that can give you a jump start. Of course Guido Gonzato’s plans work well, if you can find the right pipe. Guido makes a good whistle. You can trust his plans to be tried and true.
One of the first sites I found back in the 90’s - the last century, the last millenium even - was Dennis Havelina’s. It has all kinds of DIY musical projects outlined. The low D page is here.
http://www.ehhs.cmich.edu/~dhavlena/low-d.htm
These plans use an aluminum shower curtain rod which you can usually find at any home center. The plug described in the plans is a wooden dowel but other materials can work as well - like cast resin or poly-clay.
I make low D’s from PVC cold water pipe from Lowes. It has a 21-22mm bore diameter with a 2.5mm wall thickness.
Feadoggie
Thanks for the help y’all! 
Hi Jordan, you’ll find full directions on my page. Making a good low D is easy! If you can’t find a plastic rod the right diameter, a wooden plug will work fine.
Hey Guido! I’d like to thanks you for making those great plans. Yesterday I made a fairly good low D from them. As far as material goes, I was using 3/4" CPVC for it (I had to use PVC for the mouthpiece because CPVC wouldn’t stretch over the barrel.) I think I’m, gonna make a few more before trying metal. I couldn’t find a plastic piece that fit in the whole correctly so I had to use wood. I have heard that some people put wood fipple blocks in boiling candle wax. Does that help to keep moisture out of the wood? Thanks again!
~Jordan
Actually I’ve made a PVC flute once. It was a design I came up with. It didn’t sound too bad actually.
Hi
The idea is to boil the plug in candle wax until it stops bubbling. That means all the air has escaped from the fipple plug and been replaced with wax, or at least all the air that was in the surface pores of the wood. I find that if I cut or sand the plug after boiling, I have to boil it again.
However, the last fipple plug I made from wood, I simply coated in superglue. Get the proper stuff, either from someone like Locktite or from a model builder’s shop, not the supermarket variety which is usually low quality and often way past it’s shelf life. Cyanocrylate glue (superglue) is nasty stuff before it has cured, but no problem when curing is complete.
I just made a Low A from aluminium shower curtian rod and found that the 1/2 inch CPVC hot water pipe I used for the soprano whistles fit nicely inside it, so I filled a length of the CPVC pipe with epoxy and used that for the fipple plug.
Regards,
Owen Morgan
Yacht Magic
Anchored in the lagoon, St Maarten
My new blog.
Click here for my latest reported position. (Use the satellite view.)
Hi
I have heard that some people put wood fipple blocks in boiling candle wax. Does that help to keep moisture out of the wood?
The idea is to boil the plug in candle wax until it stops bubbling. That means all the air has escaped from the fipple plug and been replaced with wax, or at least all the air that was in the surface pores of the wood. I find that if I cut or sand the plug after boiling, I have to boil it again.
However, the last fipple plug I made from wood, I simply coated in superglue. Get the proper stuff, either from someone like Locktite or from a model builder’s shop, not the supermarket variety which is usually low quality and often way past it’s shelf life. Cyanocrylate glue (superglue) is nasty stuff before it has cured, but no problem when curing is complete.
I just made a Low A from aluminium shower curtian rod and found that the 1/2 inch CPVC hot water pipe I used for the soprano whistles fit nicely inside it, so I filled a length of the CPVC pipe with epoxy and used that for the fipple plug.
Thanks for explaining!
Here’s a design I came up with:
What do you think? I’ve got it all figured out except for the coloring part of it. What do you suggest I use to color it? Thanks!
~Jordan
Hi
The easiest is to use pipe that has a nice colour to start with. My soprano whistles were made from CPVC hot water pipe and when matted down with fine sandpaper, it looks sort of like bone or ivory. I made a low D whistle from PVC electric conduit and that looked very plasticky, so I spray painted it Gold. I’m not sure it doesn’t look more tacky now… Anyway, I found I didn’t like the low D concept that much. The Low A I built from aluminium is a much nicer instrument and can easily play along with soprano D whistles. It does require more air than a soprano whistle, but not nearly as much as the Low D.
Edited:
Oh, your design looks nice. I just start out with the length of the tube hole positions and sort of let them evolve from there. And I place the tuning slide as low as possible to make it more portable. The only caveat here is that you might want to make bodies for different keys, so the slide has to be high enough up the whistle to have room for the first hole of the highest key body you intend to make.
Regards,
Owen Morgan
Yacht Magic
Anchored in the lagoon, St Maarten
My new blog.
Click here for my latest reported position. (Use the satellite view.)
Where can I get colored PVC? Thanks!
~Jordan
Hi
That’s the million dollar question (or should that be million penny). As I said, the bone coloured CPVC hot water pipe don’t look half bad, and I expect that’s readily available at any plumbers supply shop. The cold water pipe has rather thick walls and is more of a plasticky white colour. The electrical conduit available here looks pretty horrible, but I know that it’s avaiable in black etc. other places.
Keeping your eyes as well as your mind open the next time you’re in a hardware store seems like the best plan. And, I’m sure someone here will give you some hint on what’s available in the US.
Regards,
Owen Morgan
Yacht Magic
Anchored in the lagoon, St Maarten
My new blog.
Click here for my latest reported position. (Use the satellite view.)
OK, thanks! We’ve got two harware stores in town (ACE and TSC). TSC doesn’t have anything worthwhile, but ACE might.
Jordan (and everyone), try an electrical factor’s for conduit - i.e. a trade supplies place for electricians. That’s where I used to get mine here in GB when I was messing about with it. They should carry a wider range of colours and sizes (always depending on what is actually on the market in the USA) and will probably be cheaper than a DIY/General Hardware store, even if they won’t give you trade prices. (Know a friendly electrician?) I got it in longer lengths too - 4 metres rather than 2 or 3. (Take the roof rack, or a junior hacksaw!) They will also have trade catalogues that you should be able to look at to browse for what’s available in the way of accessories and fittings that might be useful - again, that will be a wider range than a high street or retail park store for the general public will carry. Same general point will apply to plumbers’ merchants - though you’ll probably find a quite different range of things there than at the electricians’.
Thanks for the tip!
Well, I tried making one and it worked! here are some photos of it: http://photo.xanga.com/jordannb/albums/c763b71432393c (next to a Kerry Chieftain and another whistle I made that didn’t turn out quite as well. Thanks for the help!
~Jordan
One technique not mentioned…
Forming PVC over a tapered manderel using Polymer clay (pre-baked PVC). An incorporated wooden beak, similar to the Bainbridge instruments, would alleviate concern over cloride contaminants. Yes?
Double Bainbridge with “beak”
http://www.dumic.org/images/26.jpg
Many Ocarinas are made using the “mold” system. Replacing the clay with polymer clay for whistle construction would be easy. I’ve made a few prototypes in this manner (a version of the Gelfling twin-pipe called a “Shepherds Pipe”). Any experimenters?