Pro an cons with different flute materials..

Irish Flute
1

Hi. I just sold my ebonite 6 keyed flute to a very talented young chiffer and although I at present time doesn’t have a flute I will get one again in the future. But I am confused and uninformed about the different pro and cons of the different flute material out there.

Is it possible to make a list with descriptions and maybe pictures of flutes made of different materials. I am interested in for example weight, tone, colour, hardness, risk of cracking, maintenance, volume, ease of playing, looks.. everything one have to take into consideration when ordering a flute.

I personally really like the look of mopane flutes, but it looks like the majority of flutes are made of Blackwood. Am I correct or not?

Hope new and seasoned fluteowners would chip in!

Thanks, Ketil

2

In the scheme of things, material plays a small role in the the sound that is produced by a flute. It should probably be low on your list of concerns, (unless you’re dealing with extreme climate issues).

I assume the 6-key ebonite flute wasn’t working well for you. What is it that you’re after?

3

I don’t have enough experience to comment on the sublte differences in sound between materials but how they feel under the fingers is quite different. Wood feels the best to me, soft with the least amount of slipperyness. Ebonite feels harder than wood and also not very slippery and has a great, resonant tone that I can feel in the lower octave. Delrin is quite slippery under the fingers, particularly when my fingers are just washed and dried and I sometimes have to rub a tiny bit of moustache wax on my fingers to give them some tackyness when playing. Delrin also marrs easily if you bump it against a hard, rough surface like brick or stone.
I do not think any of these attributes are significant enough to dissuade the purchace of a well made flute. I love my delrin forbes, slippery feeling and all.

4

Most woods will also marr if bumped against a hard surface. It is all in the finishing of the Delrin, I like to sand in a micro grain into the surface, rather then just buffing it. This takes more time, to get right, but it will make it less slippery. Mopane is a very good tone wood, so is Blackwood. I like Cocuswood the best, but kind of hard to come by in a new flute.

5

Drool

http://shop.irishflutestore.com/Hammy-Hamilton-6-key-Pratten-in-Cocus-Silver-Hammy6kcocusMcAllister.htm

Made for a piper’s grip though

It’s true, i remember now i played a delrin flute at a session recently and it had a very different finish from my Forbes. It was lovely silky to the touch with no slipperyness.

6

Hm, might have been a Copley delrin, or something of the such. My Copley is exactly as you described, “silky to the touch, with no slipperiness”.

Anyway, to the original topic, delrin, to me, seems to be loud and vibrant, but I wouldn’t say it has the same warmness and something else I can’t describe, that wood does. Maybe it’s just my playing style, and that I only own a delrin flute. Oh well, from fairly extensive internet research, I have found that blackwood is dense, and tends to offer a very bright and hard tone. Boxwood tends to lend a slightly “fluffier” sound. It’s lighter in weight, and it sounds a bit warmer and sweeter than blackwood. I’ve also heard that it is more prone to warping that blackwood is. Of course, all of this depends on how it is made, played, and cared for.

7

Say if you have to decide between identical flutes by the same maker in blackwood, mopane, rosewood and delrin.. What would you choose and why! There must be more to it than looks and feel? In guitars and other stringed instruments there’s often, but not always, a distinct difference in the tonewood used. Is it really so with flutes that the player dictates the sound regardless of material?

8

Ketil, scientific studies on the subject seem to show that there’s no significant difference in materials used, it’s the shape that matters. Some people agree, others don’t. And we’re talking of musicians of all levels, flute makers etc.

Personally I think that there is a difference, and I wouldn’t order a flute that is not made of blackwood or cocuswood, even though I did try some great flutes made from other timbers.
If you’re a beginner, it wouldn’t matter anyway.

There are plenty of threads on this forum on the subject, but my suggestion is to not think too much about it, you’ll form your own opinion with time.
Just go for blackwood, which is a great standard wood, or mopane if you’re obsessed with the look, or delrin if you’re scared of breaking it. They’ll all do…

9

Guitars are quite different acoustic generators than flutes.

The wood of the guitar top is a diaphragm that vibrates to generate the sound (Ok, vibrating strings to the saddle through the bridge to the top). The shape of the sound box and the woods strongly contribute to the tone of the guitar.

With the flute, it is the player produced jet of air being split at the embouchure hole that is vibrating and the column of air in the bore supports the tone. The player, the embouchure cut and the bore profile have more to do with the tone than the material. The material just contains the vibrating air column. It does not carry or amplify the vibrations as in the guitar.

Feadoggie

10

IMO, this is largely true but perhaps slightly too strong. The material does carry and color the vibrations somewhat, but
very much less than in the guitar. I think this is the simplest and most plausible explanation for the tendency of different
materials to have distinctively different sounds.

11

I tend to prefer boxwood. Originally it was because of the perceived softer edges of the sound. But I’ve found that my personal sound has the softer edges that I like. Now I have arthritic hands, and I like it for the lighter weight. I also like that it’s different and was the preferred wood three centuries ago. One of my teachers called my boxwood Olwell. “hot blonde”.

That said, my next flute will be a keyed Olwell in rosewood, because I’ve concluded that my current rosewood Olwell is the Finest Flute Ever Made. I think it comes in at 9 ounces, which will come in handy with all the extra hardware.

12

i love rosewood as well, it’s light and holds a sharp edge.
boxwood probably has the most personality, and changes the most as you play the flute, half an hour into playing my boxwood Murray it becomes so focused and buzzes in my hands.
blackwood is so reliable, and low maintenance.

13

Yes, I think rosewood is underrated.

14

I’ve concluded that my current rosewood Olwell is the Finest Flute Ever Made.

I’ve played a rosewood slideless Olwell, it was for sale in Miltown Malbay this year, I think it was a Nicholson model but I’m not sure, it had thick ivory rings. Best modern flute I’ve played (I put antiques in a different category), just amazing.

15

That’s a wonderful flute, I owned it for it a time. I wouldn’t go as far as to say it was better than any of the other half dozen other Olwells I’ve played, or several other modern flutes I’ve owned though. It’s a very fine and lovely flute though, no doubt.

Loren

16

David had another couple of Olwells there, and I tried quite a few others around, and had one with me for a week or so some time back, they were all great sounding flutes but none of them impressed me as much. It has probably to do with the model, Nicholson (is this right Loren?) as opposed to Pratten. I tried only one other Nicholson model, blackwood with slide, it was great but still I didn’t love it as much. Must be that that particular instrument suited me particularly well for some reason.

17

I see that M&E lists both ebonite and poly flutes (as well as rosewood).

My question is, how do ebonite and poly differ as a flute material? Is one lighter than the other? The delrin (poly) flutes I’ve tried have been very heavy, much heavier than a similar blackwood flute.

About different woods, they make a very noticable difference in flutes. Each wood has a certain sound and performance.

The clearest example I’ve experienced was at the annual National Flute Association convention a few years ago, at the booth of a guy who makes wood headjoints for Boehm flutes.

He had quite a few headjoints there to try, two, three, or four in each of several different woods. I don’t remember now which woods exactly, as I recall blackwood, boxwood, cocobolo, and a couple types of rosewood. Anyhow four or five different woods. And he had a very nice sterling silver Boehm flute body to try these headjoints on.

I discovered that each wood had very specific properties, tone, volume/power, ease of high notes, flexibility, etc, and I could quite easily have sorted the headjoints by wood, blindfolded. Within each group of like-wood headjoints there were very subtle differences, but between each wood-type there was a clear gulf.

All of the headjoints used identical “specs” though of course each embouchure was hand-cut.

Here’s the site for the convention. I urge anyone with an interest in any sort of flute to attend at least once.

http://www.nfaonline.org/Annual-Convention/

18

Sorry Lorenzo, I missed this first time around.

I thought the Rosewood Olwell you’re referring to seemed a Nicholson when I owned it, but the previous owner told me it was a Rudall. (Understanding as we do that none of Pat’s flutes are Prattens, Nicholsons, or Rudalls exactly) That Rosewood Olwell did have the most phenomenal first register, but the more I played it, the more I felt it sacrificed too much in the second register as an offset. In the end I much prefer a more balanced flute, which I find Olwells Nicholson and Pratten models very much are. Still, “Rosie” is instantly inspiring with her tone and volume and I do believe the Rosewood played a significant part in that. I’ve seen it before with flutes and recorders we made at Von Huene - instruments made in batches to identical specs and the rosewood models definitely had a different tone and more volume and punch. Would have kept Rosie except I was mildly allergic and a killer Boxwood Olwell Nicholson became available - tuning slide and all - that I couldn’t pass up. Had to let Rosie go to make it happen though.

19

Panceltic piper- I have owned, simultaneously, an M&E 6 key polymer (rod stock pvc) and an 8 key ebonite M&E . Both were heavy, but Michael builds thick walled flutes and uses some heavy alloy for the lined headjoint and slide. Polymer and delrin do not break, but ebonite will (it is tough, but will likely break if dropped). I preferred and kept the ebonite model, but I also have and really like a Walt Sweet shannon (delrin) which I find a light flute. However Walt’s flute is thinner walled and uses a minimum disruption type of tennon which keeps down the weight.

Before I bought the Sweet, I was beginning to think I preferred ebonite over pvc or delrin (I have also owned a delrin Seery), but now I am back to thinking design and difference between individual flutes, even by the same maker, are much more of an issue than material.

Hope that helps.

Eric

20

Thanks!

I like Sweet’s thinking there. Since poly is denser than blackwood, one should have a thinner flute in order to have the same density as a wood flute.