From time to time I see fairly inexpensive simple system piccolos on ebay as well as for sale on the board. Has anyone here ever taken one and had a whistle head made for it? Would the keys wind up being awkward in the verticle position?
The keys are not very akward if you can already play piccolo or flute (which I can) but the problem is the tuning. Because the piccolo head and the whistle head are different sizes and produce air and sound in different ways, the tuning is almost invariably really messed up.
The octaves? Or the whole whistle in general?
In my experience, the whole whistle.
I had an older wooden German 6-key Eb piccolo body, and I tried different whistle heads on it, and the notes were just all over the place, some too sharp, some too flat.
Well crap. So much for a keyed whistle.
Keyed whistles do exist, but I’m under the impression that they have to be designed and planned for that way. Just putting a whistle head on a body designed for a piccolo doesn’t usually work…
Did you try any wider bore whistle heads?
I changed on of those Ebay “Jazz Studio” piccolos into a small chromatic whistle.
It required making a head for it that would play in tune.
The instrument in it’s normal condition is terribly out of tune, the new whistle head also corrected this except for one remaining tonehole was out. It turned out that a piece of metal post was sticking out inside the tonehole. A quick repair using a dremal tool on it and now the instrument plays a lot better.
I sent the whistle to Paul Busman once, who has played it some.
I did.
Since piccolo bodies are usually thicker than their corresponding-note whistles (i.e., a D piccolo is usually bigger around than a D whistle), I used whistle heads from C, Bb, and A whistles as well as making other kinds of contraptions with plastic pipes as “connectors” inbetween the whistle head and the piccolo body, but I never got it in tune.
I have read here about some whistle heads for flutes. I think Daniel Bingamon makes one and Jessie K had another one for sale some months ago.
I suppose if I buy a piccolo to try this on and it doesn’t work out I can always play it as a piccolo.
Piccolo emboucher(sp) is really hard to hold for an extended period of time, because it’s so much “tighter” than flute’s, perhaps not. 
Vbunny you always amaze me with your wit. 
If yer playing picc as a picc for any amount of time, do put a foam earplug in your right ear. Piccs are able to make nasty amounts of SPL, and even symphony players use the earplug trick.
I got one that you could buy if you want it…
Ok. Tell me a bit about it.
Hello. Check your pm’s.
I did indeed, and it played very well. The piccolo itself looked pretty nice and it’s too bad you can’t simply buy one of these inexpensive instruments and play it as-is. Dan did a very good job on it.
Dan does nice work I have one of his S4s but I have been trying to sell it.
Boy, did miss read the title of this thread.
I was thinking that it would be a new Generation mod.
Just need some PVC and a whistle body!
Now where is that high G whistle I have…