Let’s just say that the flute is only 100 miles from me, and I can pick it up on Sunday… 
Hugh
for the life of me I can’t figure out why we keep the #s secret. 
It’s not as if no one knows you have a Rudall, for goodness sakes. You just said so.
You’re right. I don’t know why I did that besides copying and being unsure of the last digit at the moment I posted, but I could have said 177x. You’ve seen my flute, David, although its looking a lot better now. 
Cindy
Love and care will do that!
and what about this
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/190689570651
removed from sell after few hours… I guess is a 4000 serie
and from the description there are no cracks in the patent head…
Yeah, I saw that. I suspect the vendor was nobbled. He clearly knew nothing much about what he had. Unfortunately I was in work and couldn’t easily message him to warn him about sharks and tell him a bit about it (and ask the serial no.) - I intended to, but by the time I could it was too late. Let’s hope he withdrew it because he did a bit more research and discovered the likely value and decided to go another way about selling it, or even to keep it, rather than that he accepted a relatively paltry side-offer which he believed too good to be ignored. I hate seeing that happen.
I contacted him after the withdraw, but haven’t got reply so it just up to him…