I happened to glance up into the tube of my Clarke Sweetone the other day, and saw some sort of reddish brown stuff opposite the holes. I looked through the holes and saw the same stuff all the way up the tube. Yikes! I tried washing it out with water, giving it a nice bubble bath.. but the stuff didn’t come out. I’m now convinced it’s rust. Which is odd, because the piece of paper which came with the whistle specifically said it shouldn’t rust. Also, I store the whistle on a homemade wooden peg, which you’d think would absorb any leftover moisture inside.
I’ve noticed the tone has been a little more raspy than usual lately, though that could be for any number of reasons. Still I want to prevent any more rust(?) from forming, and definitly would like to remove what’s already there. What should I do?
But but.. this was my first whistle.. I feel the duty to try to restore it to its former splendor! (Not that it was amazingly splendid to start out with, but shhhh.)
Any ideas besides replacing it? 
OK, take some steel wool and rap it around a pencil or something and start scrubing. I think the culprit is your wooden dowl. It may obsorb some moisture but it also retains it and keeps a very nice rust home for the whistle. Its time for some tough love. When you are finished playing just through it in a tin can or something. It will thank you in the end.
Tom
PS You can always decorate the can
Pull off the head and scrub out the barrel. (I use a shotgun cleaning rod for this.)
[ This Message was edited by: Ridseard on 2003-01-22 21:20 ]
Harrumph! Tin can, I don’t think so.. thanks for the advice, though. I’ll give it the royal treatment tomorrow. Maybe I’ll even tweak it up a bit..
Maybe you can borrow Ridseard’s shotgun )
On 2003-01-22 23:21, Paul Reid wrote:
Maybe you can borrow Ridseard’s shotgun >
The shotgun will certainly eliminate a raspy tone. We had a bantam rooster and a couple of hens which escaped and became so wild that they couldn’t be caught. The rooster would greet the sunrise on a tree limb outside our bedroom window with the most raspy noise imaginable. One day I came home from work and noticed that my shotgun was displaced from its usual position in the cabinet. To make a long story short, thanks to my wife I was never again awakened by the raspy crowing of a bantam. The same method should work for a raspy whistle.
My Sweetone has displayed EXACTLY the same symptoms. “Raspy” hits it on the nose. I’ve put it aside completely. I’m glad you mentioned this, I was wondering if I had toxic spit or something!
Cara
I think the seam running down the inside of the Clarke whistles helps to trap moisture in the barrel. It’s all to do with molecular surface tension, or something.
Spit, or breath vapour, is stickier than water, and even if you flush out the barrel with water you’ll still get some drops retained inside.
I agree with Tom, I think the wooden dowel is helping trap & keep the inside moisture, promoting rust. Of course, tin doesn’t rust, so there must be an iron content in the metal.
When you finish playing, better to let the whistle lie somewhere to dry before putting it back on its storage peg.
The clarks sweetone isn’t made of tin is it? I always thought they were made of thin steel sheet which was painted or plated depending on finish ( a red one is painted etc etc)
if you wire wool the inside it will rust a whole heap faster next time!
I would clean off the surface rust with a bit of cloth around a stick and maybe spray the inside with sillicon spray - trying to keep it off the mouth parts!!
you could repaint it but its don’t always work well - spoils tone etc.
well thats my tuppenceworth
richard.
rbm, in the wilds of the English Lake District, where the fells stand proud sprinkled in snow under an azure blue sky!!
[ This Message was edited by: rbm on 2003-01-23 06:50 ]
Tin is a soft metal, almost like lead. The only thing it’s used for much anymore is metal toothpaste tubes (I believe that’s the soft metal they’re made of; correct me if I’m wrong). To my eye, Clark whistles appear to be made of steel sheet metal, same as “tin” cans nowadays, which also aren’t tin either. Hence, they can rust.
Best wishes,
Jerry
“This (manifest world) is full, and that (unmanifest source from whence it springs) is also full. Fullness comes out of fullness. Taking fullness from fullness, all that remains is fullness.”
[ This Message was edited by: Jerry Freeman on 2003-01-23 06:53 ]
Phosphoric Acid will remove rust. Either go to the hardware store and buy some (which may cost you as much as the whistle did, but hey there’s the sentimental value), or pop open a can of Coke - it’s more dilute, but with enough time will remove the rust and passivate the surface, lessening the tendancy for rust to re-form.
Thanks for all the input guys.. and no, I am not going to shoot the poor thing, I think I may be able to save it yet.
Coke will remove rust, eh? Brings to mind the question, what must it do to one’s body…
Thanks again for all the help.
-Sara, who doesn’t drink soda.
Considering that you are pouring it into a container that is full of concentrated Hydrchloric Acid (your stomach), it doesn’t do much.
On 2003-01-22 21:02, Soineanta wrote:
But but.. this was my first whistle.. I feel the duty to try to restore it to its former splendor! (Not that it was amazingly splendid to start out with, but shhhh.)
Any ideas besides replacing it? >
Just one word of suggestion: Replace it…with a HARP !!!
Just a suggestion.
Kev
Clarke whistles, both Originals and Sweetones, are made out of "tin plate. “Tin plate” is thin sheets of steel or iron plated with tin. The underlying metal can get rusty when exposed to moisture.
I read somewhere that “tin plate” was invented in the early 1800’s. Robert Clarke used the new material to make his whistles, and thus became the inventor of the “tin whistle”.
Rob S