I will have a blackwood Thin Weasel mezzo soprano D arriving in the next two days. I understand that almond oil s favored for oiling. Are there others oils that work? Lemon oil?
Also, I am new to wood whistles. I understand that one should oil about once a month. I am assuming one oils the bore and the surface wood while avoiding putting oil on the fitting. Do I have that right? Thanks.
Hi -
There are still documents available on Glenn Schultz’s website, and this will probably answer your questions. hope this helps.
Reg
I use almond oil. Works for me.
I was just going to give you Glenn’s oil formula, but now I don’t have to.
Thanks all for the info. rhulsey, I appreciate the link to the web site. Best, Cyril.
Quick addition to the question here…I noticed that the type of Almond Oil sold at my local store is from Bitter Almonds and it has a rather high alcohol content. Is this typical, or is this to be avoided?
Darling sweetie,
don’t go buying flavouring oil products like that that have alcohol in them thats used in some recipes.
Just get pure almond oil. In Australia every supermarket, health food store or chemist (pharmacy) will have almond oil WITHOUT additives.
I can’t imagine that Florida would be less than here, could it?
Oil for Blackwood Whistle
Surely you don’t think fuel prices will get that high!!??!!
Sorry, couldn’t resist. 
On another site someone posted “A good mandolin for my wife?”, to which was replied “I don’t know. Let’s see a picture of your wife.”
Dude..you’ve got to be kidding. This is the place where they invented the sales pitch “Contains 100% pure Florida orange juice”, which of course doesn’t actually mean that everything in the carton IS 100% pure Florida orange juice; just that any orange juice that happens to be found in said container is in fact 100% pure Florida orange juice everything else in the carton is listed somewhere else.
That being said, I was looking in a health food “section” when I ran accross this stuff. Lots of orange oil products here, haven’t seen much in the way of almond oil. BTW, the label on the oil I was asking about said “Pure Almond Oil” but a quick look at the ingredients had me wondering.
I think I’ll just go buy some bore oil at the band store.
I am beginning to feel sorry for you Floridans or Floridians or whatever you and Joseph E like to call yourselves. IN Australia we can get 500mls of almond oil (unadulterated) at just about any supermarket or health food store for anything between c.9 to 15 dollars.
I prefer to use almond oil for massage also. It has all the goodness of olive oil without the heaviness and odour.
From the Thin Weasel site: “The ultimate preparation seems to be one part sweet almond oil to five parts olive oil, with a couple vitamin E capsules caplets squeezed in”. So it seems the major ingredient is olive oil. Now, do you figure it should be of the virgin type, flavoured, Italian, Spanish … I lean towards the Spanish olive oil from the Cordoba area because of my experiences with the gypsies and flamenco; then of course we have the question of vitamin E; liquid; synthetic; dose and so on. Best, Cyril.
Well, to add to this - you get a really broad spectrum of care instructions from whistle makers. I have a couple of Grinter whistles - and he suggests, in one way or the other, soaking the entire whistle - fipple and all. Others are very clear about NOT getting close to the mouthpiece with oil. I figure you can’t to too far off track with the instructions from the folks that made a particular whistle.
Reg
I believe I asked Glenn about this once and he recommended extra light olive oil. I think the issue is the pH of the stuff.
the issue is not nutrition but edibility, stability and accessibility.
you need an oil that is not toxic to you (edibility) but it shouldn’t have so many other nutritional factors in it (trace stuff so necessary for healthy nutrition) that it could go off on account of those food stff components or give off foody smells for something that is not meant to be bitten.
Stability means an oil that will not deteriorate quickly under light or heat. Of the unsaturated fatty acids , oleic acid, which is most abundant in olive and second most in almond, is the most stable.
accessibility is self explanatory and self effulgent except, perhaps, in Florida.
The thing about olive oil is that it is so “foody” (see point 1) that its other advantages under the points is offset unless one refines it to defood it. Unfortunately that refining process may subject the oil to processes that could compromise its stability and shorten its shelf life.
Whereas almond oil tends to be lighter and less “foody” from the start and that is why the older longer established oily cultures of India, Persia, Eygpt have preferred, generally, to apply almond oil to their bamboo and wooden wind instruments.
I found this article: http://www.shwoodwind.co.uk/HandyHints/oilingbore.htm
The problem with olive oil is that it can go rancid. This is less true with extra virgin oil but still a possiblity but it can be offset by adding some vitamin E to it. Almond oil does not have this problem and so has always been the oil of choice for my woodwind instruments.
You must have missed my post. The gentleman who made my Thin Weasel suggests the following: "The ultimate preparation seems to be one part sweet almond oil to five parts olive oil, with a couple vitamin E capsules caplets squeezed in. Cheers.