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Re: Review: Brass body Killarney D whistle
Posted: Mon Apr 18, 2016 6:36 am
by Mr.Gumby
you could pick up those three whistles and have a completely different view from mine.
I am sure we'd have different views on nuances but I like to think that broadly speaking we'd agree.
Clips can help form an impression. I always listen to clips on makers' sites and will avoid maker who put up clips I would consider not played too well. But that's probably a discussion separate from the present one.
Reviews can be tricky and having an inkling of the playing background of the poster can help weighing up things. That said, I have not been very lucky with whistles that had a history of being waxed lyrical about on the forums. So I handle what I read with care in most cases.
Re: Review: Brass body Killarney D whistle
Posted: Mon Apr 18, 2016 6:53 am
by benhall.1
Mr.Gumby wrote:you could pick up those three whistles and have a completely different view from mine.
I have not been very lucky with whistles that had a history of being waxed lyrical about on the forums. So I handle what I read with care in most cases.
And quite right too! I'm with you 100% on that one. (As you'll have gathered.)
Re: Review: Brass body Killarney D whistle
Posted: Mon Apr 18, 2016 1:04 pm
by Peter Duggan
benhall.1 wrote:The Gen is the most difficult to play - if I was more in practice with it, I'm not sure that it wouldn't be the best.
From what I can hear, I'm certain it wouldn't. The Killarneys just have a tighter sound and cleaner response where the Gen sounds vaguer as well as less comfortable. So I might have got your Killarneys the wrong way round, but no mistaking the one I wouldn't want!
Re: Review: Brass body Killarney D whistle
Posted: Tue Apr 19, 2016 9:22 am
by tin tin
Got to play my new whistle at the session last night, and it was great. Fit right in with two fiddles, a flute, a concertina, and a bouzouki: lovely balance, tone, and volume (not too loud). It's a keeper.
Re: Review: Brass body Killarney D whistle
Posted: Tue Apr 19, 2016 2:53 pm
by Nanohedron
I guessed C was the one. Hooray me.
But I need to point out that the ramp may be the only thing that makes the difference; looking at Ben's pics, both Killarneys' ramp surfaces show tooling that I would have considered rough, and furthermore each looks differently done. I wonder if leaving the ramp this way is by design, from the maker's experience that such roughness is what brings out better tonal focus somehow. One would think it causes turbulence, but maybe that's the trick, and if true, how it's done could make even more difference. It's a thought, anyway.
Re: Review: Brass body Killarney D whistle
Posted: Tue Apr 19, 2016 2:59 pm
by benhall.1
Nanohedron wrote:But I need to point out that the ramp may be the only thing that makes the difference; looking at Ben's pics, both Killarneys' ramp surfaces show tooling that I would have considered rough, and furthermore each looks differently done. I wonder if leaving the ramp this way is by design, from the maker's experience that such roughness is what brings out better tonal focus somehow. One would think it causes turbulence, but maybe that's the trick, and if true, how it's done could make even more difference. It's a thought, anyway.
You're right that the tooling on the ramp of each does look rough. It's odd that it doesn't lead to any sort of roughness in the tone. Well, not to my ear, at any rate.
However, as to whether all of the differences are down to the differences in the head, you'll see in my original post that I tried to factor in for that:
benhall.1 wrote:It occurred to me that a lot of the differences between the two whistles may be because of the head, which is just slightly different (as you’ll see when I put pics up). So, of course, in good C&F tradition, I swapped the heads. A lot of the differences were lessened when I did that, but not all. The old head played pretty well on the brass bodied whistle and I slightly preferred the sound to the old head on the nickel bodied whistle; the new head (from the brass bodied whistle) improved the nickel bodied whistle; but the best combination was definitely the new head on the brass bodied whistle.
Re: Review: Brass body Killarney D whistle
Posted: Tue Apr 19, 2016 3:03 pm
by Nanohedron
Oh, sorry, I missed that. But such nuances to consider!
Re: Review: Brass body Killarney D whistle
Posted: Wed Apr 20, 2016 11:25 pm
by tstermitz
Nanohedron wrote:I guessed C was the one. Hooray me.
...looking at Ben's pics, both Killarneys' ramp surfaces show tooling that I would have considered rough, and furthermore each looks differently done. I wonder if leaving the ramp this way is by design, from the maker's experience that such roughness is what brings out better tonal focus somehow.
Gene Milligan mills the ramp of his whistles, and he has changed from smooth to somewhat rough, saying that it makes no difference to the sound, but is much easier to mill.
I expect that the edge smoothness is much more important than the ramp smoothness.
Re: Review: Brass body Killarney D whistle
Posted: Thu Apr 21, 2016 4:01 am
by gobharp99
Is that the real Ben, or do we have an imposter? Again?
Re: Review: Brass body Killarney D whistle
Posted: Thu Apr 21, 2016 4:27 am
by benhall.1
gobharp99 wrote:Is that the real Ben, or do we have an imposter? Again?
I'm at a loss. What do you mean by this comment?
Re: Review: Brass body Killarney D whistle
Posted: Thu Apr 21, 2016 5:21 am
by maki
tstermitz wrote:Nanohedron wrote:I guessed C was the one. Hooray me.
...looking at Ben's pics, both Killarneys' ramp surfaces show tooling that I would have considered rough, and furthermore each looks differently done. I wonder if leaving the ramp this way is by design, from the maker's experience that such roughness is what brings out better tonal focus somehow.
Gene Milligan mills the ramp of his whistles, and he has changed from smooth to somewhat rough, saying that it makes no difference to the sound, but is much easier to mill.
I expect that the edge smoothness is much more important than the ramp smoothness.
My ramp is rough with obvious machine tool marks.
But it sounds and plays great. No problem.
Re: Review: Brass body Killarney D whistle
Posted: Tue Apr 26, 2016 12:34 pm
by gobharp99
HI, sorry if that was a bit ambiguous Ben. There was a lot of hassle the other year with a bloke on the whistle forums. He sometimes took similar sounding names i.e. benhall2 (as an example) and posted things he shouldn't be posting. Anyway, he used to do whistle reviews, so I just clocked this post and put 2 and 2 together to make 5, sorry
Joel
________________
"It's not because the flute's too difficult"
Re: Review: Brass body Killarney D whistle
Posted: Tue Apr 26, 2016 3:03 pm
by Steve Bliven
gobharp99 wrote:... ambiguous Ben....
Good name for a jig.
Best wishes.
Steve
Re: Review: Brass body Killarney D whistle
Posted: Tue Apr 26, 2016 3:18 pm
by Nanohedron
gobharp99 wrote:He sometimes took similar sounding names i.e. benhall2 (as an example) and posted things he shouldn't be posting.
This Ben is moderate. So moderate, in fact, that we even made a moderator out of him. It's been 5 years since, so he might be bored, but I seriously doubt he'd be leading a double e-life.
Re: Review: Brass body Killarney D whistle
Posted: Tue Apr 26, 2016 11:39 pm
by benhall.1
gobharp99 wrote:HI, sorry if that was a bit ambiguous Ben. There was a lot of hassle the other year with a bloke on the whistle forums.
He sometimes took similar sounding names i.e. benhall2 (as an example) and posted things he shouldn't be posting. Anyway, he used to do whistle reviews, so I just clocked this post and put 2 and 2 together to make 5, sorry
Joel
Not on this Whistle Forum he didn't. I've checked. There's never been anything here connected with my name such as you suggest.