Whistle from the Junk-Box

Whistle
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I have been fascinated, for some time, with how clever people like Jerry Freeman can make a cheap whistle sound so much better than the original. Up till now I have (a) not had the time and (b) been a bit afraid to do too much. I did junk a couple of whistles sometime in the past experimenting!

I had a bit of time on my hands, and I was in the act of clearing-out my whistle “junk” when the FLASH OF INSPIRATION came.

The whistle I went about potentially destroying was an ancient Soodlums C, which belonged to one of my sons when he was still at school. It was dirty and sounded like so many more such whistles. It was unstable between octaves, it squeaked and broke the note frequently, and it didn’t sound too sweet.

First thing I did was an idea I read about on this Forum (my thanks) using “BluTak” or poster putty to back fill the space underneath the windway. That was very easy to do, and it immediately produced better stability from the whistle.

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The next experiment was to file the fipple blade. I have seen this on a Jerry Freeman tweaked “Sweetone”. The old Soodlums blade had been dented and marked around the edge. First I used a small flat metal file to increase the blade angle slightly. In so doing I made the edge a bit less than straight oops!! Then I used the finest grade wet/dry paper to ‘polish’ the rough work. This made only a small improvement in the sound.

The next experiment was another “tip” I got from this forum, and thanks to all the people who put up such helpful information, I used the very fine wet/dry paper rolled up to form a small flat file - with this ‘file’ I slightly blunted the sharp edge of the fipple blade. This gave a very definite improvement if sound. It rounded the sound for want of a better expression.

Next experiment was to try a different tone body. I had a very battered “Generation” tone-body; don’t quite know why I kept it at all! I put the tweaked fipple on this dented and bruised Generation tone body and the sound was again improved, it was somehow sweeter. The two tone-bodies look very similar indeed. I am thinking does the denting (several dents) have something to do with the sweeter tone? Perhaps by causing some turbulence in the air?

I now have a stable and sweet-sounding whistle, which I essentially rescued from ‘old junk’. I am fairly chuffed with my handy-work and hope it might inspire some others out there also to redeem some old junk whistles. Total time to do all the bits of tweaking and fiddling - I figure no more than 1 to 1.5 hours. It took much longer to write this report, take the pictures, and figure how to post them. If anyone is interested I will record the whistle and put it up.

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Hi, Tony.

Very mysterious, indeed.

What you have documented doesn’t look like a Soodlum’s whistlehead at all. It looks like a pre-1980’s Generation bluetop that would have come originally with a nickel plated tube.

Has anyone seen a Soodlum’s whistlehead like that?

Best wishes,
Jerry

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Hi Jerry - I admire your work!!! Hope some day you write “the Book” on whistle tweaking - maybe you already have?

I am sure you are correct about the fipple. Let me put it this way - The whistle I found in the junk box had Soodlums on the tone-body and had the pictured blue fipple on it. I guess somewhere back the time-line it found its way there!!!

Another interesting old whistle I found was a tiny generation high G - now looking at the fipple - though smaller - it is the same design as the one I doctored. I’m going to give this one the “treatment” too and hope for the best.

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Not I.

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Maybe Ralph can find time to follow up on this tale. There’s certainly something here to merit his analytical attention and sharp eyes.

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In case anyone is interested - I am posting a picture of the whistle I doctored, side-by-side with the Soodlums tone body on which I found the blue (got to take Jerry’s expert word for it = “pre 1980’s Generation” fipple.
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Jerry is quite right about the Soodlums body being nickel plated -so is the Generation. The somewhat gold/brass colour in the photos is perhaps a reflection of colours in the room I took the pictures. If the tone-bodies didn’t have a stamp on them - to my eyes they would be indistinguishable one from the other. In the 1970-80ies most 1st level schools in Ireland would have had tin-whistles as a major part of their music programmes. My two older sons would have been through that period, that is how my old cheap whistles came to be in the house.

I had no great interest in whistles or whistling, apart from admiring Davy Spillane’s playing of the low whistle, until quite recently - my daughter-in-law, who is a music teacher, helped spark my interest. It was with new eyes I unearthed these old school relics.

Hope that helps to clarify the mystery.

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Thank you!

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In case you do want to get the dent out, you can put a metal rod inside the whistle and mount the rod in a vise on the end.

Then take a wood dowel and cut, file, grind out a a section that is shaped like the pipe. This rounded out part is is place over the exterior of the whistle on the rod and you slide it back and forth with pressure and it will take out the dent.

Another way is to obtain some wood spheres at a craft store and push each one through the bore until the dent straightens out.

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:adminok:

Thanks for the expert tip Daniel!!! I actually think that the dents give the whistle a slightly better sound. The second old Soodlums body - identical to my eyes - does not sound as nice. So I will probably keep the dents - The dents are also some of the history of my boys - God only knows whos head made the dents!!!

Go raibh míle maith agat Daniel,

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