Blowing machine

[trill]

. . . is this what you were hoping for?

Where's the annealed copper shim ? Is it in this picture ?

[Terry McGee]

Will do. Cue the bleating either way!

How dare they make a better whistle than I can for only AUD $22! Or,

These guys have been making whistles since 1843 and that's the best they can do?

Just calculated the volume, and from that, the approx "equivalent diameter", if that notion has any validity. Comes out at 13.25mm, just under my Highly Tweaked Soodlums Mellow D (13.48). That seems fair enough - they play at similar power but with quite different tone. Quite a way up from the Generation D at 12mm, and down from the Generation Bb (whose head it is) at 14.9mm.

[Terry McGee]

. . . is this what you were hoping for?

Where's the annealed copper shim ? Is it in this picture ?

It is, but you can't see it. It's stuck up under the ramp, with its front face just peeking out probably about 1/4mm at most.

I'm tempted to try adding another to see if that helps or hinders. But I should probably wait to see what the Sweetone tells me.

Still wondering how we could measure "voicing"...

[david_h]

It rather looks like someone (and of course it might have been me!) has got in there and pared it back from it's out-of-mold state. Anyone else see such signs of tampering? Could yours be that, david_h?

No. I bought a Bb, C, D and G (ouch) in quick succession and by comparison the C was clearly not right. I messed with the ramp and ended with something that was useless for anything other than almost silent practice.

So after that I kept away with the scalpel (and was more mindful of the risk of breaking things). To the extent that I now notice that my Feadog Mk1 has a thin tongue of plastic on the end of the windway floor. I will wait for these investigations to progress further before deciding whether to remove it or not. If I do I'll take the opportunity to do a before and after spectrum.

[Tunborough]

Apologies for disappearing for a while. Things have been busy around here. I did find two Easter eggs in Terry's latest data. The first is something that we have covered before: The whistle continues sounding at substantially lower air flow than I thought possible. On the graph, it is the tail at the bottom end of the first regime, below around 12 m/s.



Modelling suggests that there wouldn't be much (or any) sound below about 950 Hz, but Terry is hearing sounds down to 622 Hz. I'd like to know where the energy for this sound is coming from, but that question may be above my pay grade.

More later when I have more time.

[Terry McGee]

Woah, you sure about those velocity figures, Tunborough? It's frightening to see the effects of our puny breaths sped up by the windway and expressed in M/Sec. Imagine you puff and one second later the molecules hit a wall 12 metres (nearly 40 feet) away. (I know that's not going to happen, but it gives us a sense of scale.)

Let's pick a point in the middle of the First Regime. 20 M/Sec equates to a wind speed of 72KM/Hr, or nearly 45 miles per hour. Beaufort recognises that as the junction between Fresh Gale and Strong/Severe Gale! Putting the slates on your roof at some risk.

And if we go for a strong 2nd octave note, we double the windspeed to over Hurricane Force, with the expectation of Devastation!

So if we pull back to the very low flow zone that Tunborough finds unlikely, we see that's 6 to 12m/sec. Or windspeeds between 13.5 and 27mph. "Moderate to Strong Breeze". Beaufort advises: "Whistling heard in telegraph wires". Banshee territory.

[trill]

. . . Still wondering how we could measure "voicing"...

I nominate comparing power spectra.

On a related topic, I have a lab-test idea: a tapered tube.

Since long+short tubes have been under study recently, how about a tapered tube ? For example, make a tapered tube of length equal to the long (or short, if easier) tube. Chose a taper similar to what other instruments have. Maybe use the "equal volume" criteria mentioned previously.

This would allow us to observe how "tapering" affects the voice.

Of course, sound recordings would be needed. That raises the whole "standing-wave" issue mentioned previously.

In those previous comments, the options were: a) hang every spare doona to dampen reflected sound, b) move the test rig outside. Perhaps there's another way: do a frequency-sweep of the room as-is. See where the room-resonances are. Maybe (somehow) fold that into the interpretation. Or, maybe do some tests comparing with+without doona. See if the standing waves show up in our intervals of interest.

Equipment needed: tone generator, loudspeaker, microphone, recording device.

Here's a recorder: https://www.amazon.com/Zoom-H1n-Handy-R ... B078PTM82R

I'd be happy to chip in to help purchase.

[Terry McGee]

. . . Still wondering how we could measure "voicing"...

I nominate comparing power spectra.

That would measure the outcome of the voicing, and is certainly something we should aim for. I was thinking more about how to measure the actual physical aspects of the voicing. Eg how does the windway line up with the bottom of the ramp. Without a methodology here we are working a bit in the dark.

On a related topic, I have a lab-test idea: a tapered tube.

Since long+short tubes have been under study recently, how about a tapered tube ? For example, make a tapered tube of length equal to the long (or short, if easier) tube. Chose a taper similar to what other instruments have. Maybe use the "equal volume" criteria mentioned previously.

This would allow us to observe how "tapering" affects the voice.

I'm certainly attracted to the notion. Ideally, for comparison purposes, you'd like to use the same head as we used on the long and short cylindrical tubes. But if we tapered down from that diameter, we'd end up pretty small, and that wouldn't be a fair comparison either. Thoughts, anyone? How do we achieve the most meaningful comparison between the cylindrical and tapered tube setups?

Of course, sound recordings would be needed. That raises the whole "standing-wave" issue mentioned previously.

In those previous comments, the options were: a) hang every spare doona to dampen reflected sound, b) move the test rig outside. Perhaps there's another way: do a frequency-sweep of the room as-is. See where the room-resonances are. Maybe (somehow) fold that into the interpretation. Or, maybe do some tests comparing with+without doona. See if the standing waves show up in our intervals of interest.

I'm up for doing some experiments here. There had been another annoying complication - a slight leak in the air line connector where it meets the Pressure Regulator. Of no significance in regard to the work we've been doing, but the hiss would have been a nuisance for any recording. I finally worked out what was going wrong - an incompatibility between the plug and socket of a snap-on connector pair. So much for standard sizing, eh? I was able to shuffle connectors around the workshop and end up with no audible leakages anywhere. Which also extends the "mean time between compressor top-ups"!

Equipment needed: tone generator, loudspeaker, microphone, recording device.

Here's a recorder: https://www.amazon.com/Zoom-H1n-Handy-R ... B078PTM82R

I'd be happy to chip in to help purchase.

I've probably got the makings of a viable recording set lying around. So let's concentrate on what we'd want to measure and I'll see where we come unstuck.

My box player dropped in today, so I flashed my Frankenflute* tapered bore Whistle at him. He demanded an audition and was really impressed. "You can really hear the wood" he offered. Now, where as I am pretty confident that we are not "hearing the wood", I do agree with his assessment. There's something in the timbre (and probably not the timber!) that is encouraging and rewarding. I'm guessing that has a lot to do with the taper, but that's to be proven. I'm hoping that the Clarke Sweetone hopefully winging it's way towards me will help by providing an intermediate step between a thin-walled cylinder and a relatively thick-walled cone.

I put the piccolo head back on and gave it a blast. He cringed and pleaded for mercy....

So encouraged, I decided to plug and recut the 2nd hole, to bring the upper octave b note down to pitch. Top b on a D whistle is shrill enough - you don't need it tending sharp as well!

*The term Frankenflute is used semi-humorously, semi-disparagingly among fluters to describe a flute cobbled together out of visually clashing bits. We could do with a similar term to describe whistles like my tapered bore abomination. Something starting with "w" would be nice....

[Terry McGee]

Hmmm, and thinking about it some more, what would we be seeking to achieve recording notes on the blowing machine that we couldn't achieve by recording them mouth-blown? Steady-state notes are pretty boring - a lot of the interest in a sound is tied up with the starting transients. Go on like this and we're going to need an adjustable Chiffing Valve and a calibrated Chiffometer!

Having said that, however, it would be interesting to in compare the spectra made by say:
- tapered tube whistle vs cylindrical tube whistle (eg the Clarke Sweetone soon to come vs say a recent Feadog?)
- fat-walled whistle vs thin-walled whistle (my tapered tube pic-whistle vs the Clarke Sweetone?) Or should that wait until I've made a wooden head for mine?
- curved windway vs flat windway. Sigh, would we need to do that on both tapered and cylindrical bodies?
- what else?

And I'm interested in the chaos zone between the first and second regimes (but not in the later regime switches which all seem to involve hysteresis.) This seems to be very narrow or non-existent on the bottom end notes, but become wider and more chaotic as you come up the tube. Some whistles display it much more than others. I'm guessing it's a voicing issue, but maybe larger bores exhibit it more than smaller bores? So it would be good to be able to know where it's more likely to show up, and what can be done to reduce it.

Sigh. No rest for the wicked....

[trill]

. . . what would we be seeking to achieve recording notes on the blowing machine that we couldn't achieve by recording them mouth-blown? . . .

Quantitatively equal conditions (known pressure+flow), allowing equal-basis comparisons.

Also, measurements to back up predictions for pitch-balance between the 2 octaves.

Also, fipple design guidleines for:

1. designs that emphasize max volume.
2. designs that emphasize "voice" or "timber" (e.g. full, rich, sweet, or thin)
3. designs that emphasize "air-efficiency": the most dB-per-watt of breath-flow.

. . . - fat-walled whistle vs thin-walled whistle

I read here at C&F that "undercutting" tone holes "toward or away from the window" will preferentially alter the "octave-balance" tuning between the registers.

. . . I'm interested in the chaos zone between the first and second regimes . . .

Reminds me of a class I had many years ago. A system can have multiple "nodes": in our case (perhaps . . . speculatively), two stable nodes separated by an unstable "saddle". If the stable nodes are "shallow", it doesn't take much energy to knock the system out of a stable oscillation. That means that tiny little butterfly-flaps (like turbulence) can trigger migration between the two.

. . . adjustable Chiffing Valve and a calibrated Chiffometer! . . . No rest for the wicked....

There you go again, inventing words !

[trill]

. . . I was thinking more about how to measure the actual physical aspects of the voicing. Eg how does the windway line up with the bottom of the ramp. Without a methodology here we are working a bit in the dark.

Well, silly me . . . I totally misunderstood. (I confess, I'm totally mind-biased toward analysis + data-reduction!)

But, honestly, since understanding your meaning, I've been daydreaming about an "adjustable fipple". It would include screw-adjustable slides for:

a) windway height
b) winday floor-to-blade elevation
c) floor portrusion/prestrusion
d) (perhaps) floor-to-blade angle.

Also, slip-in optional inserts for:

a) different chamfers: curved (radius), flat-bevel
b) different ceiling+floor profiles (flat, tapered, head-knocker (borrowing/learning from the recorders+organ-pipes))
c) different blade geometries (e.g. blunt, sharp, stepped)

It would only require 2 (maybe up to 4) slides. My dad (a machinist) would make such fixtures routinely. The first 2 would be easy, rectangular geometries.

Honestly, imagine having a rig where you could hand-adjust the screws and listen to how the voice changes . . . very tempting indeed !

Sketches when I have time . . .

[Terry McGee]

Woah, I'll take three. They do come in different colours, right?

I was sitting playing my new Frankenwhistle and my previous favourite the Highly Tweaked Soodlums Mellow D and musing on the issue of how to compare tapered and cylindrical whistles fairly, when a strange thought crept into my mind. Could I attach the large Bb head to the smaller Mellow D tube? And the answer was yes. It was a loose fit, but I could play that combination. And although I could hear some notes a bit out-of-tune, the pair played OK-ish, just a bit quieter.

So then the mind rambled (you can see what I'm up against) to the opposing notion - what happens if I attach the smaller diameter Mellow D head to the larger diameter top end of the pic-whistle? So I went down to the workshop to knock up an adapter. Another piece of solid brass rod, bored right through at Mellow D bore, and turned down at one end to accept the Mellow D head, and turned down less at the other end to fit into the Pic-whistle Delrin barrel. Plugged it all in, played it and fell about laughing. It was diabolical!

I guess we can see why. In the first case we were coming down from a bigger head to the tubing in use. But in the second case, we had to start smaller and come down even further through the adapter, before blossoming out into the larger barrel diameter.

So, the challenge remains. How do we fairly compare tapered and cylinder whistles as we won't be able to use the same heads! I guess we'll just have to use whatever heads that bring out the best in the two instruments and judge them as pairs.

[Tunborough]

I wonder would one of these work as a universal whistle coupler? https://www.leevalley.com/en-ca/shop/to ... em=03J6109

2 1/2" maximum diameter would be overkill, but it does say it goes down to 1/4".

[trill]

. . . They do come in different colours, right? . . .

Order now and get a free pony !

. . . - what happens if I attach the smaller diameter Mellow D head to the larger diameter top end of the pic-whistle?

I did something very similar once.

I had just found the Shakuhachi auto-tuner and was looking at PSDs. I got the crazy idea to swap heads (Gen + Susato). My big takeaway: the timber/voice followed the head.

. . . How do we fairly compare tapered and cylinder whistles . . .

One proposal: use the same head on both straight + tapered "test-tubes". The goal: isolate the effects of tapered vs. straight.

[trill]

I wonder would one of these work as a universal whistle coupler? https://www.leevalley.com/en-ca/shop/to ... em=03J6109

Very cool design !