Most of the beloved members of my whistle collection sport some sort of cool logo. Some appear to be plastic, either stick-on or decal. Others are engraved. (My Tony Dixon low D is decorated with gold plastic tape!)
The whistles I have been making are copper.
How does this soft of metal lend itself to engraving?
Is this sort of engraving easy to farm out to someone with CNC mill or engraver?
Lacking the skills or equipment to do engraving, I think I need to opt for something in the stick-on dept.
What materials are all you whistle makers using with success (or failure)?
Do you print labels on your own equipment (details!)?
Do you order them from some particularly helpful (or non-helpful) source?
Since your whistles are made from copper, I wouldn’t suggest a sticker. That will make the whistle look cheap. I could be wrong, but I think you have two ways to put your logo into the whistle. One is to get a metal punch stamp and make a jig with a dowel that fits on the inside of the tube, snugly, so when you “punch” the stamp on the outside of the barrel. You could do this before you put your final finish, and perhaps use a dark amber gel or something similar to rub into the impression to help it stand out a little better. Having a subtle presentation will add to the sophistication of the whistle. The second method would be to take to a machine shop, or similar and have it done CNC, which I would think would cost more, unless you’re doing a boat load of whistles.
I don’t know anything about prices, but it’s usually not too hard to find places that do engraving–trophy shops, and the like.
There are some computer-controlled engravers now that will even engrave on curved surfaces, if you can find a place that has one. Back when I did that kind of work (1983-88), they only worked on flat surfaces, and everything else had to be done by hand.
Most of the computer-controlled engravers have some CAD-like capability for laying out graphic logos that can be saved and reused. We did that by hand on a graphic tablet, and it was fairly expensive–it took me a couple of days to do the Hells Angels’ fanged skull with war bonnet, and we charged by the hour. I bet that’s a lot cheaper now that it’s all semi-automated. I think we charged fifty cents to engrave the logo each time, once it was in the computer.
The possible disadvantage of a stamp is that you need a pretty good touch to get uniform results.
Thanks for that link!! I currently don’t have a logo for my whistles-- I just use a hand vibrating engraver to engrave PB '05 on the tuning slide. I’d really rather have something embossed into the wood. Subtle and classy.
I have a old stampless/stickerless whistle that looks to be a walton, but without the sticker, it just looks boring. I took a ring I got from a vending machine and cut it to fit the barrel, then slided it on. It’s basically just a big band with a smiley face cut into it, but it looks really good on the whistle.
I diasagree about the sticker necessarily making the whistle look “cheap”.
A well designed logo and a decent printing job can make for a very attractive sticker, adding to, not taking away from, the value of the item in appearance.
Well done stamping can be very nice too, but poorly done doesn’t make for high class looks either.
Paul, I’m surprised that your beautiful work doesn’ get fancier documentation. Your whistles were on my short list when I was comparison shopping with Abells.
The hand vibrating thing is the only real complaint I have with my Burkes. Looks like granny scrawled something on her way out the door (Sorry Michael, I still love your whistles!)
Speaking of embossing the wood, a branding iron might work well on your whistles, Paul. The coolest package I have is my Tully. The little wooden box has a really cool brand burned into it. And the ID is formed right into the silver head coupling. Any secrets revealed by Eric will go no further than this forum…
I spoke with the “most knowledgeable person” at Infinity Stamps and he told me a stamp for 1/2" tubing could be no more than 1/4" tall. Or 3/8" tall if stamped onto the coupling. He told me to change my logo…
I have reduced my logo as far as 3/4" tall with good results for lip balm packaging. I was rather concerned with going any smaller. Especially when he asked me, “Is that it? Is that what you want stamped? Looks kind of like a butterfly with a bunch of lines next to it.” He was looking at my website and couldn’t make out any image to save his life. And that was probably 2-3" tall on his monitor! (It’s hard to throw your naked babies out into the street for public scrutiny..)