I’ve been doing some reading lately about whistle making and whistle physics, and I have a question about tunable whistles.
When making a whistle, each hole is placed at some predetermined ratio between the middle of the “fipple hole” and the end of the whistle. So if you tune a whistle by pulling the headpiece away from the end of the whistle, you are changing the distance between the fipple hole and the end of the whistle. But the holes remain fixed, so they change pitch (obviously, that’s the point of a tunable whistle).
But since the right frequency of a note is based on being a percentage distance between the fipple hole and the end of the whistle, and since the holes remain fixed, it seems like you could really only get one note in tune when moving the headpiece if the whistle was in tune with the headpiece pushed all the way in. It also seems like this problem would be more pronounced the higher the notes get (i.e. the further from the end of the whistle you go, the more out of tune with each other the note becomes).
Maybe it doesn’t make a noticeable difference, but I was wondering if my thought process is correct. Thoughts?
Haven’t heard of it being a problem with whistles much - most tunable whistles are of recent manufacture and tuned to A=440. The few millimeters you have to move the head doesn’t make enough difference to be noticable.
It can be a problem with older flutes - sometimes made to be played at 415 to 455 (or higher). If the head is adjusted enough to play A=440, intonation and internal tuning suffers.
(Long answer to tell you Yes, your thought process is correct.)
However, on the tunable whistles I’ve seen, the tuning slide isn’t long enough that you see much difference in the normal two-octave range of the whistle.
Flutes usually have longer slides and the effect is more pronouced the further away from the “optimum” tuning for the instrument you go. Flutists have the advantage of not having a fixed windway like a whistle, allowing them to “lip” the notes into tune as they go. Whistle players can “tune” a little with breath pressure as they go, but there is a real limit to how effective and useful that really is.
I have a whistle that is in tune with itself when the slide is jammed up all the way, but in this condition, everything is very sharp. When I pull the slide out enough to get a good lower octave D, the whistle is no longer playable. Based on this I have to assume that the principle explained above is correct. When you move that slide you DO put everything out of tune with itself. (BTW: The manufacturer has graciously agreed to ship me a new one).
