Every whistle and recorder I've ever seen, has the airflow coming out of the windway, entering the window area and approaching the blade exactly in a line parallel with the linear length of the tube. Yet the blade is there to split the airstream coming into the window from the airway, to create a resonance frequency in the tube, with much of the air going up out of the whistle, and the air within the whistle tube going into a carefully controlled resonance, a "note" and tonal quality that we hear.
My question is, have any of the whistle designers, builders and tweekers ever tried slightly adjusting the air stream angle/direction going towards the blade, such as aiming the air slightly upward, slightly above the line parallel to the length of the tube? The blade edge position may have to be adjusted as well, or perhaps, first the windway position where air enters the window area, lowered slightly and the blade remaining where it is commonly seen now in designs, ........ but the idea being to get the air directed slightly away from parallel to the length of the tube, perhaps to aid whistle response and tonal projection.
Has anyone experimented with this? Adjusted the windway angle approaching the blade? Adjusted the windway angle and the blade edge position? Anything work out? No doubt there is only a tiny angle variation available to work with, it would require precision work trying things out.
Question about airflow direction towards the blade
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RoberTunes
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Loren
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Re: Question about airflow direction towards the blade
How did you measure this? I mean, otherwise you can’t simply “know” the airstream is directed exactly as you describe.RoberTunes wrote:Every whistle and recorder I've ever seen, has the airflow coming out of the windway, entering the window area and approaching the blade exactly in a line parallel with the linear length of the tube.
Yes, recorder makers have experimented with this over the years.Has anyone experimented with this? Adjusted the windway angle approaching the blade? Adjusted the windway angle and the blade edge position? Anything work out? No doubt there is only a tiny angle variation available to work with, it would require precision work trying things out.
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Alaskamike
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Re: Question about airflow direction towards the blade
I think you can accomplish the same thing by adjusting the blade steepness (pitch?). I know that when I place a brass wrapper on the blade reduce the whistle's loudness, the angle of the resulting blade is steeper (because I hold it in place with a lump of blu tack)..RoberTunes wrote:... but the idea being to get the air directed slightly away from parallel to the length of the tube, perhaps to aid whistle response and tonal projection.
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Narzog
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Re: Question about airflow direction towards the blade
I'm not a whistle expert. I've just done a lot of testing making whistles, mostly 3d printing prototype heads to test stuff. None of my tests are overly official. But People would be surprised at how many different ways you cna get a sound out of the whistle. I've put mouth pieces on a tube that the tube was supposed to have the lip cut into it, with no lip blade and it still worked. Also a lot of my windways have an angle, similar to a 7, or an upside down 7. In that the roof or floor is flat, and the roof is angled, or the other way around (this is just easier to make than having both floor and roof angled evenly). Technically this could send the exiting air at an angle, but I've had no issues.
It also could depend on where the lip is. Like on my feadog, if you look down the windway, the lip is around the middle of the exit. Your air would need to be at a really steep angle to not hit that. VS some whistles you can have the lip at the very bottom of the windway, or even not visible from the windway because the lip is below the exit. In this last case, having it angled down could help probobly. But I find it works on low whistles just because of the bevel at the exit of the windway, which makes some air go down anyway.
I haven't done a lot of lip testing. But you can cut a really steep lip on a super thick pvc pipe, and it works fine, and lip blades on a thin aluminum pipe are the opposite, much more sharp. Both seem to work fine. As I said earlier, you can actually get a sound out of a unsharpened lip. I would like to know more about how the lip sharpness effects tone.
One thing I've noticed that I don't understand, is some of my whistles make a lot of 'Ffffffffffff' air sound (not the whistle tone itself, its like a mouth piece sound, similar to having bad embouchure on a flute), and some have almost none. Not sure exactly what causes this.
It also could depend on where the lip is. Like on my feadog, if you look down the windway, the lip is around the middle of the exit. Your air would need to be at a really steep angle to not hit that. VS some whistles you can have the lip at the very bottom of the windway, or even not visible from the windway because the lip is below the exit. In this last case, having it angled down could help probobly. But I find it works on low whistles just because of the bevel at the exit of the windway, which makes some air go down anyway.
I haven't done a lot of lip testing. But you can cut a really steep lip on a super thick pvc pipe, and it works fine, and lip blades on a thin aluminum pipe are the opposite, much more sharp. Both seem to work fine. As I said earlier, you can actually get a sound out of a unsharpened lip. I would like to know more about how the lip sharpness effects tone.
One thing I've noticed that I don't understand, is some of my whistles make a lot of 'Ffffffffffff' air sound (not the whistle tone itself, its like a mouth piece sound, similar to having bad embouchure on a flute), and some have almost none. Not sure exactly what causes this.