There’s hope! Thanks, highwood. I haven’t found the end of the list, as yet.
By the way, a discussion on tuning has broken out on the Flutemakers forum on Yahoo, apparently as a result of this thread. Interesting reading.
Feadoggie
yes an interesting conversation about tuners
on this board Micheal Burke recently mentioned (I am paraphrasing, I maybe reading more into the comment or reading between the lines) that at least some (most?) of his customers play their whistles into tuners and of course expect them to be ‘in tune’ - pity that may not be the most musical or best way to tune a whistle.
Yes, I read Mike’s comments too. I really like his whistles.
The Flutemakers discussion is about effects on tuning by maniulating hole size, position and undercutting. Of course it quikly got into different interpretations of flute physics.
Feadoggie
Yeah, that’s my fault 
. It is interesting reading, but I’m not sure there’s been a lot of useful information.
“Put the holes in the right places” is a good metric, but there are times when that isn’t possible, e.g., to make a small-handed flute or low whistle. And I haven’t made low whistles, but I’m surprised that there aren’t second octave problems with cylindrical bores the way there are with flutes.
Aha! I thought your original proposition was well put. Having read through the entire archives of both of the flutemakers sites, I think the request for a synopsis was justified. Those threads go all over the place. It is also interesting, as one poster observed, that the usual frequent participants of that board have not weighed in with their thoughts.
Much of what I have read on tonehole tuning deals with instruments with comparitively thick walls and complex bores like recorders, clarinets and wooden flutes. The Woodwind Quarterly is one source. I think this may be due to the fact that calculating holes size and position on these is more difficult than on an instrument with thin walls and a simple, cylindrical bore. (I am imagining this next part.) So, you do your design, drill your holes and then work on the tuning. Once you get it right you document the results and carry on. Still there must be a high degree of knowledge gained by tuning each hole over time. And that surely could be written and shared across makers. The list provided in your query was a good start.
You’re right, “small-handed” models put a damper on hole size and stretch parameters. And those problems are there in low D whistles too. I have made quite a few cylindrical bore D flutes and they will exhibit the problem but can be mitigated somewhat through design compromises and lipping. I have yet to get a pvc Low E, Eb or D whistle done that I am really happy with but I also haven’t spent oodles of time trying to get it right either. Maybe this will be the year.
Feadoggie
Newbie question: I’ve joined the yahoo group, but what’s the other flutemakers site?
The group that preceded the flutemakers group is also on Yahoo, just do a search for “flute tech”. It has not been an active group since about 2003 although some posting has taken place since then. The flutemakers group has all the current discussions. There has also been a whistlemakers forum there. It has been dormant for some time as well. There are enough folks making whistles around here now that, if interested, maybe it could be brought back to life.
Feadoggie