Chiff and Fipple Forums

There's a somewhat battered R&R 3103 in the coming G&H auction on the 14h of December. Patent head with two cracks, one through the embouchure, a broken long F key guide, and the top of the block that holds the Eb, C# and C keys is missing. Original box with most of the signed certificate in lid. Starting bid £160. In the same auction there are a Wallis, a six key boxwood W. H. Potter, and a Keith Prowse

R&R 3103
https://bid.gardinerhoulgate.co.uk/m/lo ... tured%3Dno

Firewood for the winter.

Firewood for the winter. kkrell

Rubbish! I have one patent head with a crack through the embouchure that plays just fine. It's just to tape the crack/s in lieu of finding someone who can make a repair. The blocks are also easily fixed by a competent tech, Jem Hammond, Jon Cornia, Chris Wilkes, Hammy Hamilton, Jon Dodd etc.

Steampacket wrote:

Firewood for the winter. kkrell

Rubbish! I have one patent head with a crack through the embouchure that plays just fine. It's just to tape the crack/s in lieu of finding someone who can make a repair. The blocks are also easily fixed by a competent tech, Jem Hammond, Jon Cornia, Chris Wilkes, Hammy Hamilton, Jon Dodd etc.

Forgot a smiley . Jon Cornia is local to me - if it were mine, I'd have him fix it.

Have you spotted the 9th key? An extra, add on, Bb for the right hand.

Yes Kevin, Jon would be able to do the work, even the patent head. "two cracks," so I assume the barrel is cracked too. I forgot to look for, and note down, the extra key Owen.

Why bother with a cranky patent head when a new matching (cocus) head with a Rudall cut can be easily made for this flute? (keeping the old head for posterity)

Patent Head - one of the few 'improvements' that R&R did that made matters worse. I'm not saying that some don't play well but its a lot of 'Heath- Robinson' engineering to achieve an adjustment of the head cork stopper that even the most inexperienced of us can perform easily.

H

https://soundcloud.com/holmesflute/jug- ... ood-guitar

Flutesoftheforest wrote:Have you spotted the 9th key? An extra, add on, Bb for the right hand.

Add-on indeed, It's a rather crude graft of course.

H

https://soundcloud.com/holmesflute/jug- ... ood-guitar

[quote][/Why bother with a cranky patent head when a new matching (cocus) head with a Rudall cut can be easily made for this flute? (keeping the old head for posterity)quote]

Holmes, would you say there is a consistent Rudall cut ? I’ve only seen one R&R but that had a silver band around the embouchure and may have been altered.Could you describe the undercut ?

Thanks E

The question wasn't addressed to me, but I would say there is no distinguishably unique R&R embouchure cut, either within the firm's own output or by comparison with other contemporary instruments. Each embouchure is itself unique and if you get a bunch of R&Rs together to compare, even ones close to each other by serial number can have visibly very different embouchure holes. What *is* pretty consistent is that very few untampered-with R&R embouchures are short of excellent to play, whatever their visible/measurable differences.

Got to love those people.

Do not fear patent heads. Rudall & Rose patent heads are not cranky. They work very well in my experience. The crown adjuster on one of mine was quite stiff to turn when it arrived, but a little lubricant spray fixed it and it has worked perfectly since. One must bear in mind that that the patent head was patented in 1832, a mechanical innovation that adjusted the tuning, whilst moving the stopper cork in harmony in order to preserve the best possible intonation. This at a time when there was considerable variation from country to country as regards concert pitch.

Nowadays when A=440 is standard there is no pressing, practical need for a patent head, yet when playing Irish traditional on my patent head flutes, made in the early 1840's, these flutes have very good intonation throughout the scale when I tune the A to 440. I ascribe this to the excellent synchronisation of the stopper cork. Of course you can achieve this manually with a standard screw mechanism and move the cork to in order to find the best intonation, but the patent head does this very well automatically.

Both my patent heads have cracks, as do many Victorian flutes with standard lined head joints. One on the back of the head joint so this doesn't influence playability. The other has a crack, north to south, through the embouchure, the blowing edge is not affected, I use scotch tape over the crack to stop saliva, or other stuff from falling into the crack. Apart from the cosmetic aspects, I feel no need to repair the cracks as long as they don't affect the sound. I see them as a sort of safety valve that reduces the chances of future cracks.

Bid for R&R 3103 if you're after a Rudall flute. You could get a bargain. It could go for under £1200

No not a fixed 'Rudall cut' as has been pointed out. Every maker these days, bar a few, can make a canny approximation to 'a Rudall cut' not 'the Rudall cut'. This is the standard that each maker will have as an aim at least (for R&R copies).

'Patent heads' will always remain cranky to me. Steampacket gives all the reasons of the crankiness while defending PHs. I repeat that I don't doubt some PH can sound nice. The standard cork/stopper can be manually adjusted easily in around 20 seconds and could have been 200 years ago ergo no need for all that internal mechanism.

I am disappointed though, that R&R didn't spend more time on a foot pump operated tuning slide!

H

https://soundcloud.com/holmesflute/jug- ... ood-guitar

I am disappointed though, that R&R didn't spend more time on a foot pump operated tuning slide! H.

Yes, I understand your disappointment. Now Norman are you aware of Rudall & Rose's patent foot joint. This patent was submitted to the patent office in 1836. By merely rotating the foot joint end cap the sounding length of the flute can be shortened or lengthened quite considerably. The body of the flute consists of a series of telescoped brass tubing, sheafted in cocuswood, or boxwood for the economically challenged. As the foot joint end cap is turned clockwise, or anti-clockwise and the body of the flute becomes shorter or longer, the tone holes automatically rotate into the correct positions thus allowing the flute to played as a piccolo, a standard C flute, or a B-flat flute.

jemtheflute wrote:What *is* pretty consistent is that very few untampered-with R&R embouchures are short of excellent to play, whatever their visible/measurable differences.

Here here.
There is no one style of cut. Some have sharper chimneys; others have very pitched ones requiring a focused lip.
I have played ones with banded embouchures and others with inlaid lip plates, and still others with carved ivory inserts.....as well as the basic wood, both cocus and boxwood.

Each is very different, if left unaltered, and i believe very intentionally made for the flute to which it is attached. A small-holed Rudall&Rose reacts very differently to embouchures cut for a large-hole model.

I am currently playing a boxwood 4xxx series flute that is nothing short of stupendous. And I have yet to determine what it is about the embouchure that makes it this way. And it is a medium-holed model.