I just did an experiment: i played my Generation whitecap (supposedly a soft whistle) and my Humphrey widebore (supposedly a loud whistle) for my wife (an impartial judge) . I played both whistles as softly as i could manage.
Guess which one she said was softest?
The Humphrey, of course.
And i agree with her. The melowness of the Humphrey comes across as being softer than the penetrating sound that the whitecap has on the second octave.
Now you must test them with competing instruments. Put your wife on fiddle, and the little kid with pink sunglasses on bodhran. Preferably, get the dog to howl also. Go.
Glauber - I agree with you that the whitecap isn’t really soft. It’s purity makes it sound louder on my clare 2 piece than the original clare cap…which just moved back onto the clare since I really like it’s chiffiness. The whitecap is now back to my oak for a very pure, in tune, whistle.
I observed similar results, that the whistle(s) that sounded the softest did not always register as the softest on a decibel metering program.
c:\program files\audacity\tuner_e\tuner8.exe
Volume test, microphone at 30 inches, ambient noise level ~47 db
Play two notes, the low D (or C) and the high D (or C)
Bellnote/high D (xxxxxx oxxxxx)
55/60 Elfsong C
53/63 Clarke C original
58/62 Elfsong D
59/62 Walton D brass
59/63 Susato D poly (Dublin non-tunable)
60/70 Susato low D poly (Dublin non-tunable)
The Susato and Walton sound louder, the Elfsong sounds softer than the readings indicate.
. I played both whistles as softly as i could manage.