i wonder if this is the Muse’s way of telling one to shut up ?
i’m huffing my way through a set of tunes and suddenly , i’m just …huffing ?
my cork popped down as far as the embouchure hole and that certainly put a stop to my gallop .
i might add that no one missed my playing in the next few sets .
talk about adding insult to injury …
Hammy is away in foreign parts , so i can’t ring him , so , i wonder if anyone can point me to a thread where this problem is dealt with ?
i do remember someone mentioning positioning the cork , with the swab stick , but there is no mark on the thing to show what distance it should be in the head .
so i wonder if anybody is awake at this hour , so i can cry on their shoulder.
maybe i should call the Garda help line , or Flute Aquisition Anonymous , or Norton Anti Virus help centre , they’re always so helpful…
wrap some thread around it until it will stay put.
use the stick to measure the bore at the embouchure hole (inside diameter) Mark the stick
shove the cork in too far
push the cork away from the embouchure hole with the stick until the mark is at the center of the hole.
you should be close
if the octaves sound good quit while you’re ahead
else fine tune the thing with the cork ( away from the hole will lower the upper octave more than the lower and visaversa )
“visaversa”? Is this the modern, credit-card based substitute for flipping a coin?
Generally agree with your advice, Denny - PTFE tape would do as well as thread for a temporary filler/tightener, but if it is one of Hammy’s cork-lapped bungs, ultimately you probably need to renew the lapping, Jim. Don’t be paranoid about it - it’s no big deal and an easy fix. An easy way to mark your rod is to use the end of the tube where it sticks out as the tuning slide - put the projecting part of the tube on a flat surface, stand your piece of dowel against it on the vertical diameter, press it against the end of the tube and rotate it. You should get a score line on the wooden rod equivalent to the tube diameter (no, you can’t damage the tuning slide unless you use a steel rod!) which you can then clarify with pen if necessary - no measuring needed! (Internal diameter of most simple system flute heads is 19mm.)
Sorry, sometimes the space bar doesn’t fire properly, that should have been visa versa. Not like flipping a coin so much as just the other side of the thing.
Oooops! I was trying to be humourous/play word-games (as usual) rather than just being pedantic. (Would you credit it? ) However, the Latin is vice versa.
just to let ye know , the stopper in 4this Hammy flute is not cork , nor is it wrapped with thread .
it’s either plastic or wood with a clear plastic ring for a fit which allows for some movement .
i may put a single wrap of PTFE around the ring to give it that really air tight fit .
the reason it popped was , i’m sure , that i had been giving it lackery , down at the Willie Week , and the flute is fairly new so it’s just settling in .
for those of ye who have a hammy flute , the marker on the cleaning stick is at the bottom , not at the eye for the cleaning cloth as i thought . just make sure the mark is in the middle of the embouchure hole when touching the stopper .
as regards the vice , well, flute playing is now officially designated as such and it can only get verse .
and the double post ? don’t ask , just to say that there was drink involved .
i’m off now to learn those good old Irish tunes , The Top of the Cork Road ,The Humours of Cork , When Sick is it Cork You Want , and Put a Cork in it Jonjoe .
