Making a wide body, how to approach?

Whistle
1

Hi all,

Recently I acquired a vintage red top Generation C. It is a lovely whistle, but I was wondering the following;
Would it be possible to convert it to a widebody D whistle? (Of course keeping the C body)

Would this be possible with this kind of head?
Would it be possible to use a material such as Copper? Pros/Cons (just out of curiosity, think it would good)
How should all the holes be calculated / positioned? (never did a tube before

Looking forward to some opinions :slight_smile:

Cheers

2

I believe a waltons mellow D whistle tone tube will fit the Generation C head. The Waltons Mellow D and Generation C are metric in size, and very close to 17/32’’ id.

A wide bore D whistle can be made with a Generation Bb head and nominal 1/2’’ copper pipe (5/8’’ od 9/16’’ id) The copper pipe will need to be sanded down a bit (about 1/64’') to fit. It will be a session cannon whistle beyond medium
volume.

3

One of Gary Humphrey’s aluminum tubes should give the correct OD for the whistle head.
http://webpages.charter.net/raindog1970/ I think it might be the Journeyman Trad tube.

4

I’ve just put my Generation “C” and my “Mellow D” (both brass bodies) in the micrometer, to within a thou or so they’re the same, 0.56" outside diameter. Both heads are firmly affixed, so I’m not about to try swapping them, sorry :frowning:

To my unsophisticated ear, both instruments sound very similar, when playing the same notes … YMMV :wink: