Locust wood D flute 6 key

[barna]

Dear Fluteplayers

Finaly I finished my owen 6 keyed flute in locust wood. I realy like to challange with "alternative" woods and materials for flute making becide blackwood and mopane.This time I tried out the locust wood for a six keyed.I also have an F in locust wood. Somehow the tone of this wood reminds me the sound of bamboo.
Here is a short video wih my new flute.
Thanks for watching:)

https://youtu.be/uJZGqqysOxI

[TxWhistler]

Very nice!

Would love to see some pictures of it too!

Thanks!

[Nanohedron]

Sounds very good. How is locust for moisture absorption?

[barna]

How can I post picture here?
Very nice!

Would love to see some pictures of it too!

Thanks!
[/quote]

[barna]

Sounds very good. How is locust for moisture absorption?

Im playing on it since a while and it seems to me very stable. I used it before as a keyless till I get some time to put on the keys. I treated it with linseed oil and its fine. Ones I had to rereame the bore but after that didn't change anything.

[TxWhistler]

How can I post picture here?
Thanks!

There may be other posts that are better in describing what to do but here is one I found that describes how you can post an image to this forum.

viewtopic.php?f=5&t=108635

[Nanohedron]

Sounds very good. How is locust for moisture absorption?

Im playing on it since a while and it seems to me very stable. I used it before as a keyless till I get some time to put on the keys. I treated it with linseed oil and its fine. Ones I had to rereame the bore but after that didn't change anything.

While that's helpful information, my question had more to do with tenons swelling. I once had a dogwood flute - hard as nails - but as dogwood isn't resinous, the tenons would swell so quickly and so tightly, I had to wrap the tenons for a loose fit so the tenons would swell to just the right snugness, or I couldn't get the flute apart for a couple of hours. A bit scary, and too bad, because I liked that flute otherwise. All the oiling in the world didn't make a difference when it came to the swelling tenons.

[barna]

Sounds very good. How is locust for moisture absorption?

Im playing on it since a while and it seems to me very stable. I used it before as a keyless till I get some time to put on the keys. I treated it with linseed oil and its fine. Ones I had to rereame the bore but after that didn't change anything.

While that's helpful information, my question had more to do with tenons swelling. I once had a dogwood flute - hard as nails - but as dogwood isn't resinous, the tenons would swell so quickly and so tightly, I had to wrap the tenons for a loose fit so the tenons would swell to just the right snugness, or I couldn't get the flute apart for a couple of hours. A bit scary, and too bad, because I liked that flute otherwise. All the oiling in the world didn't make a difference when it came to the swelling tenons.

Yes the upper tenon can swell a bit after a long playing. Mopane and blackwood can swell as well but not that much. Iportant to use cork grease and it helps to take it a part after a long playing. Im greasing the uper tenon on this flute and the boudy part never stucked in to the barrel.
Ones I tried out the costello boxwood for a keyless. That wood is mooving a lot I will never use it again.

[paddler]

While that's helpful information, my question had more to do with tenons swelling. I once had a dogwood flute - hard as nails - but as dogwood isn't resinous, the tenons would swell so quickly and so tightly, I had to wrap the tenons for a loose fit so the tenons would swell to just the right snugness, or I couldn't get the flute apart for a couple of hours. A bit scary, and too bad, because I liked that flute otherwise. All the oiling in the world didn't make a difference when it came to the swelling tenons.

I have some experience that might be relevant to Nanohedron's question. I've experimented with stabilizing (using vacuum resin infusion) various woods, including dogwood, black locust, various fruit woods, walnut, maple etc. I found that while black locust is not resinous, it also does not absorb much resin during infusion. Nowhere near as much as other woods I tried, in fact. So I suspect that tenons probably won't change shape with humidity changes like those of an unstabilized dogwood flute. Black locust is a very common tree here in Oregon, so it is easy to come by supplies of wood (for free). It is known for making really good fence posts. Supposedly, it can survive untreated in the ground for a century. In fact, I seem to remember Casey Burns describing a flute he made from an old Eastern Oregon fence post!

One reason I did not pursue this wood much further is because, while it is dense and hard, it is also relatively coarse grained compared to most flute hardwoods, and even compared to common fruit woods like pear, plum, hawthorn etc. This means that it won't hold such fine detail in turning, nor enable a highly polished bore without some kind of filling. Also, the black locust wood I have seen is relatively mundane in appearance. It is not ugly, per se, just not as pretty as many other woods. It is not black in color, by the way. It is more of a light tan color. Now, I'm not sure if Barna's flute is made from the same species as the Black Locust wood that I have. Some close-up pictures may shed some light on that.

Anyway, thank you for sharing your experiences Barna. I have been wondering what a Locust wood flute would sound like for quite a while now. I thought yours sounded good!