I know that non-pipers have cast shade on this, but in the Highland piping world, since the pipes are mouth-blown and the reeds can change dramatically according to how much moisture they’re subjected to, pipers have awareness of whether they’re “wet blowers” or not.
(It’s why in Pipe Bands, even though all the pipers might be using the same bag and same MCS and same reeds, some pipers’ reeds get soaking wet, with the problems that wet reeds bring.)
This preamble is just to explain how I know that I’m a wet blower.
So when I play Low Whistles of the Overton style (made by Bernard himself or by one of the other makers he authorised such as Phil Hardy or Colin Goldie) which have two large flat parallel surfaces very close together I can clog them almost instantly.
I find the claim that if whistles are “warmed up” clogging issues are solved absurd. I live in Southern California and I leave a whistle in the car. There have been times when my car-whistle is so hot that I can barely hold it, yet it clogs just as quickly. People who live in cold climates would have to bake their whistle in the oven to 140f to simulate this. (They did a study, on a 95f day a car interior reached 138f. We get temps well over 95f in summer.)
The solution that worked for me is the toothpaste and dish detergent thing. What’s amazing is how one treatment will keep my Goldie Low D playing clog-free for a year or more.
On the other hand, I’ve not had clogging issues with Low Whistles with curved windways like Burke and MK. If you clog an MK, a Goldie would be hopeless until you did the toothpaste or detergent thing.
I’ve taken a few photos, but I’ve discovered I’m not sure how to post them. I use another phpBB-based forum that allows photo uploads, but I’m not sure this one does (perhaps because I’m new to it). I’ve posted a Dropbox link, but I don’t know whether this will work even though I’ve set permissions to ‘anyone with link can open’. Perhaps you could let me know?
I can’t seem to remember to buy batteries for my tuner, so I don’t really have a sense of it; I’ve no musician’s ear. I know it sounds best overall with the tuning slide open about 5 or 6mm, but that’s all.
The thickness does affect the weight, but when I stuck it on a scale and compared it to my Howard, there’s less discrepancy than I imagined. MK Pro is 239g compared to the Howard’s 186g, but it feels nearly twice as heavy. Maybe a combination of the surface, which is harder to grip, and the balance.
The wall thickness affects the tone a lot, of course. The Howard has a finely spun brass tube that feels resonant throughout the range, but I can’t feel the top end of the MK much at all. (When I say ‘feels’ rather than ‘sounds’, I mean the resonance you feel in your chest and head cavities when playing an instrument—which sounds like hippy codswallop when you write it down, but it is there.)
As for the actual sound, I don’t think I’ve properly found its voice yet. When I started learning on the Howard, it took me a while to realise that if I blow it strongly, it speaks, but if I focus the airstream and just hold back a bit, it sings. Try that with the MK and it sounds like you’re playing it through a cocktail straw. It’s not interested in air from the top of your chest, it wants it from your diaphragm, which is a different way of blowing for me. My hands are in a really bad way and cramp after half an hour of playing, so it might be time to give the MK back to my mate before I begin to find its sound. It’s certainly a lot more complex, and I guess if you can really play, it probably offers you more scope.
I’d largely agree in my (very limited) experience. But I live in Britain, and whilst I didn’t do anything to warm the whistle up in the summer, in the winter it will clog almost immediately if I start cold, presumably because warm moist air does condense on cold surfaces. You automatically open the window wide when you get in the car on a cold morning here, because otherwise you can’t see where you’re going when your breath hits the windscreen. The temperature differential isn’t so great indoors, of course, even if the room is unheated, but it does make some difference.
In my case, fatigue seems to have much more of an impact on whether or not my Howard clogs. It’s absolutely fine at the outset, the clogging only starts in the last 10 minutes of a practice. I have limited energy due to illness, and I think I just get sloppy … something changes, anyway, it’s hard to be sure quite what. If I take a break, it seems to be better again for a little while.
My music room is cold in the winter. I hold my MK in front of a little portable heater to warm it up when I play and it works great. It will rapidly clog if I play it cold, plus it’s really cold to the touch if I don’t do this. It doesn’t seem to clog when it’s warm in the room. I haven’t done any treatments to it, toothpaste or anticondense.
As far as the tone, it’s my favorite. It’s loud, focused, and smoky sounding, a gorgeous sound. I find MK’s to be very expressive, you can vary the tone a lot with breath pressure, plus they respond instantly to articulations. They are also, for me, exceptionally easy to play, though the satin finish is slippery. I put cork guitar pick grips on them where my thumbs rest and it makes them very secure to hold.
I love how they look, both the design and the anodized finish, which is significantly tougher than bare Al. Easily my favorite whistles. I’ve decided I’m only going to play MK’s and sell my other makes.
This important and popular topic of clogging brings to mind the issue of how in general, the larger the windway dimension, the longer it will take for clogging
to happen. Meaning that going from high D down to low D and low C, the lower the key, the larger the windway gets, so theoretically, for an identical whistle
design (pick one), at some point, a lower key would see clogging become much less of a possibility or issue, vs a higher key in that design.
I know that clogging is a problem with high key whistles, but I’m amazed of the clogging problems with low key whistles, considering how much larger
the windways are.
I can’t imagine buying a low D or low C whistle that is known to clog easily, because the windway is about as big as it’s going to get in any whistle. I’d go for delrin
or other plastic as a mouthpiece design, or some mixed or fully metal design that’s known to not be a clogger in the lower keys. So this is a great topic for whistle shoppers.
The variations in windway design such as “soft blower”, “medium” or “hard blower” with the varying levels of resistance and windway dimension, should be available
to everyone before purchasing.
If an alto or low whistle has a consistent problem as being “an easy clogger”, then you’d better know how to deal with it and like the tone and playability
and put up with the issue, or you’re suffering from WHOAD in a way that’s unnecessary. Sell it! With high D or higher keyed whistles, different predicament with
the related laws of physics going on; tiny windway = easy fast clogging possibility.
Hence, still need someone to invent a whistle mouthpiece heater for some fully metal designs in high keys. Makers of
non-clogging all-metal whistles in low keys should be using that as a major selling feature, not just a minor note, or not stated at all.
Hmmm. in my experience plastic whistles clog too. I don’t know why some people are wet blowers and some aren’t. I’m a wet blower and I clog high whistles too. Do low whistles clog more easily than high? I’m not sure. MK’s tend to clog less for me than most other whistles, including delrin heads. I’ve sold delrin whistles due to clogging. Goldie whistles are known as cloggers, yet many pros play them and don’t seem to have a problem. Why? Is it technique? Toothpaste treatment? I’m doubtful of the claim that curved windways clog less than straight. Is it true in people’s experience? I don’t have any answers.
What’s interesting with clogging and material, there’s seems to be no consistency. I’ve had giant water globs stick to my Delrin Reyburn low D right on the bevel. always in the same spot. But unlike on some other whistles it doesnt seem to have too much effect. I may re toothpaste it, I recall that fixing it when I got it originally. VS on my thunderbird and Goldie, having a water glob on the bevel ruined it. Toothpaste helped but wasn’t enough so I gave up and sold them. I couldn’t do anything without noticeable moisture issues. My Burke A could occasional clog up inside a bit when I first got it. It just never has issues anymore. My MK is virtually immune to moisture issues. I feel liek it possibly had some minor moisture issues at first but liek the burke they went away. I almost wonder if sometimes playing it makes a coating of gunk or something that repels water. Because that’s the only thing I can think of for my MK and Burke. I only wash the outsides which get mouth gunk on them. I’m worried that cleaning the inside could make them start clogging lol.
Now, if I understand correctly, the stopper on the Mk whistles is also aluminium? So we have a thin, wide windway whose ceiling, floor and two side walls are all made from a material celebrated as a great conductor of heat? And we insist on breathing water-saturated air through it? Then isn’t condensation and risk of subsequent clogging pretty much guaranteed?
Interesting to compare the coefficients of thermal conductivity for various materials. I’ll set them out in order of most conductive at the top, with the most insulating therefore at the bottom. The unit is watts per meter Kelvin (W/mK), but don’t worry about that, just compare the numbers.
The Mk construction also means that the windway can never really heat up. It’s connected thermally with the entire tube, which will act like a Heat Sink, conducting the heat away from the head and your hands, and radiating and convecting it into the room.
So, isn’t there an argument that the front end of whistles, say up to and including the blade, should be made of a low thermal conductivity material to minimise condensation and the risk of subsequent clogging? Whereas the bodies should be made of a high conductivity material to minimise heat gain and subsequent tuning change as you play?
Gulp. Haven’t we just invented the Generation Whistle?
*I’ve given both tin and iron so we can see where tinplate whistles like the Clarke’s might lie.
I keep thinking about the fact that my swimming goggles are all-plastic, and despite the low conductivity, if I put them on my warm face and stick it into cold water they mist up so much I can’t see anything. But if I apply antifog coating, there’s no [visible] misting at all. It completely changes the way the water interacts with the surface.
My plastic whistle mouthpiece isn’t very different to the metal one when it comes to clogging. It’s a bit better, but then again it does takes much less effort to blow the Howard than it does the MK. And then there’s the mouth contact; I play with the plastic mouthpiece only just inside my lips and something of an embouchure, but if I don’t stick the MK right in like a lollipop I can’t get enough air into it. I’d imagine that effort and mouth position must have something of an influence, as well as the material and surface characteristics.
More generally, the difference between wet and dry playing might come down to individual factors like breath technique, dentition, and playing posture. I tire quickly, and my head tends to droop a bit as the energy fades—it’s possible that my whistles block more when I’m fatigued partly due to gravity. If my head tilts downwards more, moisture is more likely to run into the mouthpiece.
PS: to go back to the swimming goggles … in the dark old days before every sports shop sold spray-on antifog in convenient little bottles, everyone used saliva!
I was thinking of this as I warmed the teapot for my morning brew. If it’s the temperature of the material that matters I think Heat Capacity comes into it as well, although the range is not as great.
It’s interesting that fine and much admired wind instruments, including whistles and Boehm flutes, are made from materials at both ends of the conductivity range.
I’m sure there are discussions here about the ‘quick suck’ technique. I think some people said they did it as habitually as they breathed.
Yeah, good question. In the swimming pool and googles situation, the goggles may be plastic and have low conductivity, but they are thin. The swimming pool is enormous and has a vast supply of cold.
And the antifog stuff doesn’t prevent condensation, it prevents the formation of droplets. It’s a “surfactant” or “wetting agent”. Which brings us to another topic - surfaces, surface finishes, and surface treatments. But let’s hold off on those until we see if anyone is able to shoot down my basic hypothesis - that an all aluminium windway is a recipe for condensation.
My plastic whistle mouthpiece isn’t very different to the metal one when it comes to clogging. It’s a bit better, but then again it does takes much less effort to blow the Howard than it does the MK. And then there’s the mouth contact; I play with the plastic mouthpiece only just inside my lips and something of an embouchure, but if I don’t stick the MK right in like a lollipop I can’t get enough air into it. I’d imagine that effort and mouth position must have something of an influence, as well as the material and surface characteristics.
As I mentioned above, I think there are going to be issues other than conductivity. Narrow windways probably clog faster than fat windways. Some surface finishes faster than other surface finishes. Etc. But let’s take this an issue at a time…
More generally, the difference between wet and dry playing might come down to individual factors like breath technique, dentition, and playing posture. I tire quickly, and my head tends to droop a bit as the energy fades—it’s possible that my whistles block more when I’m fatigued partly due to gravity. If my head tilts downwards more, moisture is more likely to run into the mouthpiece.
Heh heh, I was thinking along these lines as I mused on the topic after lunch. Settling back in my recliner, playing a few tunes, noting the whistle was horizontal…
PS: to go back to the swimming goggles … in the dark old days before every sports shop sold spray-on antifog in convenient little bottles, everyone used saliva! >
Now you’ve already teased us with possible use of bra band whistle warming technologies. I’m not sure we’re quite ready for the transfer of bodily fluids…
I did wonder whether there was a thread on whistle shopping, especially for beginners, but the search facility doesn’t work on my Mac.
I’m lucky enough to know someone whose brother runs an instrument shop, and benefitted hugely from his willingness to offer advice and let me try several whistles at home (many small businesses aren’t very wheelchair accessible—other people have different access issues, such as there being no specialist store for miles). I wonder how people manage when they have to buy online, as I’m sure I’d have picked the wrong starter whistle if I’d done that.
I also wonder about surface treatments. The MK’s don’t clog as much as several other makes of whistles I’ve owned. Could it be that the anodized surface helps with the clogging issue? I’ve also noticed, as someone else stated, that my whistles clog less after i’ve been playing them regularly for a few months, maybe even after just a couple of weeks. Some people have said that as they become more experienced, (months?, years?) they clog all whistles less. Do they slightly alter their technique, perhaps unconsciously? What could they be changing?
I too used to spit in my goggles before swimming. It seemed to really help. Most of the water in the windway is condensation, not spit. Could it be that the clogging issue improves after months of playing due to a tiny bit of spit getting in there and slowly coating the windway and bevel? Should we all be hacking a big goober into the windway of new whistles, smooshing it around with a piece of card, and letting it dry before we play?
Two things certainly should not be combined: the quick suck method and the goggle anti-fogging stuff. Here’s why:-
“Researchers at Duke University have discovered that these anti-fogging sprays and cloths may contain potentially harmful chemicals. Some types of per- and polyfluorinated alkyl substances (PFAS) have been tied to impaired immune function, cancer, thyroid disease and more.”
I wouldn’t advise putting the stuff in a wind instrument at all.
I wonder if it might help to drill lots of tiny holes through the fipple to allow capillary action to draw the moisture away from the windway. The lower pressure in the windway might draw air in through such holes to prevent that working in quite that way, but if air comes in instead it could still make the droplets more mobile and encourage them to be blown along through the windway and out the far end.
That organized list of whistle materials and their relationship to clogging is a great help!!!
Looks like two main options are successfully used to prevent excess clogging:
surface treatment, various methods
including a non-metal material for the windway.
Alba seems to have the second method in good use; synthetic albanite used as the windway plug forms about 50% of the surface area in the windway, thereby radically
dropping the condensation production characteristics, vs what 100% aluminum contributes. The Kerry Busker is described by Phil Hardy as an improvement over the
previous Thunderbird design, for clogging issues, by shortening and adjustments in windway design, yet still all aluminum. So some specs in the mouthpiece area
are considerations too. You can see that in one of the videos on his website. Setanta offers synthetic as part of the windway, or full brass, and if you ask me, the better
tone comes from part or full plastic on those whistles, and they probably have less clogging.
As for construction materials, I’m still amazed that more whistle tube bodies aren’t made using stainless steel, considering how durable it is. The cost of the instrument would not
be as low as the mass produced brass/plastic market bottom contraptions, but the ability to produce a very durable and precision instrument would be high. Perhaps weight
would be an issue for lower keys (same thing with brass vs aluminum going on), but for alto A and higher, surely stainless steel would produce a great whistle. Wall thickness
could be adjusted by the manufacturer, as it is with brass and aluminum.
Sports referees take note.
Condensation in the windway is also very much a concern with instruments made entirely of wood. This is evidenced by the windcaps on flageolets and discussions just like the present one among recorder players. To their slim good fortune, wood absorbs surfactants as metal and plastic cannot, and applying them to the windway has a more than brief transient effect. The caveat about proprietary preparations is serious but the two most common active ingredients, polyethylene glycol (PEG) and sodium lauryl sulfate (SLS), have pharmaceutical uses and their low toxicity has been substantiated in numerous studies. SLS is a common ingredient in toothpaste and is likely what provides the pivotal effect in the “toothpaste fix.”
PEG is available in a range of molecular weights with varying properties. Recorder makers have been supplying 10% aqueous solutions of PEG 400 for as long as I can remember. It is commonly applied by filling the windway with it for a few seconds and then blowing it clear. I haven’t noticed this to have much of an effect on whistles with aluminum windways. However, putting a few drops on a slip of heavy paper and sliding it back and forth a few times in the windway does a more useful job of it, likely because it also has an active cleansing effect. This correlates to the toothpaste fix without any extraneous particulate matter, but also without whatever it is in the toothpaste that may slow the clearance of the surfactant.
Totally, that’s why I didn’t recommend it. It’s a shame because it works well, at least on plastic, but even after it’s thoroughly rinsed it off you don’t know what’s still lingering the first few times you play.
I did a little more mouthpiece investigation just now, on the relative sizes of the windway opening on the plastic Howard and the aluminium MK. For this I used the highly accurate, scientifically validated how-far-in-can-you-get-a-cocktail-stick method. The results were as it appears to the eye—the Howard is narrower.
I was prompted to do it by having to abandon all attempts to play the MK this afternoon, as I could hardly get through the first eight of a simple march tune without having to stop and unclog. I had prewarmed it, but it was a bit chilly in there at 14.5C/58F. Just as I was getting to like its scuzzy tone, too! I haven’t applied anything to it; it’s not mine and the toothpaste I’ve got, like most, is abrasive. Though I suppose I could get a tube of that stuff designed for dentures, and ask my mate if I can give it a go.
It’s an interesting thought. Sounds like some science is needed! Who’s got two with the same heads, that need roughly the same air?
I was also thinking about recorders and clogging. Wood recorders clog, and the suck method seems universal with recorder players. Plastic recorders clog much more quickly than wood. I don’t believe plastic is the answer. I’d love to try a good wooden low whistle, both for their tone and to see how resistant to clogging it is.
As far as durability, that is one reason why I like anodized Al. It’s harder than bare AL, prevents corrosion and is a barrier between you and the Al . It also looks great, IMO. I’m surprised it’s not more commonly done. It must add to the cost of manufacturing whistles.
