regarding End Caps and Flute Volume

[Ben Shaffer]

I don't know if its my imagination, but my Flutes seem slightly louder with their End Caps Removed.
throwing that out there... Am I crazy or has anyone else found this to be the Case... I wonder if this hypothesis has even been tested?
I wonder if Terry McGee has investigated this?
That said I wonder if many Players have even removed the Caps, really very little reason to do so except for tuning and Cork adjustment, but don't get me started on that

[Terry McGee]

I'm guessing imagination, Ben, or perhaps perception? Or perhaps it points out a lack of imagination on my part - I'm struggling to think of any mechanism that might make a flute without a cap louder!

Some years back, well known English headjoint maker and flute history researcher, Dr Robert Bigio rather startled the flute-making world by offering special stoppers and crowns (caps) for Boehm flute heads, claiming an improvement over the normal arrangement. Both the stoppers and caps are held in place with a single rubber O-ring and the cap has a small hole drilled through it. Bigio wonders if the lightweight stopper is able to rock slightly in place at the playing frequency, that the cavity between cap and stopper acts as a "vibration chamber" and that the hole in the cap provides an exit for that sound. I find it hard to believe that the "pressure" at what is an "open" end of the flute would achieve much. https://www.bigio.com/stoppersandcrowns.htm

It did cause me to have a play around with stoppers at the time - even drilling small holes through them to communicate some of the sound in the head out to where the left ear might hear it (cap off, of course). I don't remember coming up with any improvements, but I was surprised to find that I could drill a hole 2mm or so in diameter through the stopper without it seeming to make the flute worse. So much for us hyperventilating about barely perceptible stopper leakage through a crumbly cork! I put it down to that lack of pressure at the open end I mentioned above, plus the fact that a small hole still offers high impedance at the frequencies we are dealing with. You can imagine that if I were to blow under pressure into cap end of a flute with a hole in the stopper, you'd hear the hissing of air escaping through the hole. But there isn't much pressure available - the embouchure is an open flow point. And the air column is trying to reverse direction 440 times each second if I play low octave A. It doesn't have time to leak significantly!

I guess it would be interesting to see if others in the room can hear a difference - that might lead us to wonder about perception - is the cap-free state making some change in the near soundfield that only the player can hear? We may demand you go on to standardised double-blind testing to rule out bias on behalf of player and audient!

And of course good to do a suck test on the end without the cap to rule out leakage past the stopper. Even though my results with the 2mm hole seem to suggest a little leakage isn't likely to prove a tragedy!

[david_h]

Balance? Holding it very slightly differently?

[GreenWood]

Anecdotal only. All but one of my flutes are without end cap, but I remember capping ends at times and noticing a small difference. I could not even quantify that one way or another, from memory it seemed to "round" the sound a little (i.e. reduce very highest frequencies).

It's funny, at first I thought end caps were only decoration, then I wondered if they actually served a purpose (beyond tuning gauge), and now I think they are just an unnecessary failsafe of some sort. They needn't be any of those I suppose, maybe they are just "must haves" or "no flute is complete without"s ?

[Terry McGee]

I think flutes do look a bit "unfinished" without them, but I guess that is what I am used to. It seemed enough for the renaissance players.

I do appreciate the cap being the knob for the screw stopper.

The caps in Rudall's day were good in that respect. Essentially cylindrical, to give you a good grip, ornamented on the outer end to look nice, and with an indicator showing where the stopper was set. That would have been particularly important in those days of having to tweak the poor head for best results at Low Pitch and High Pitch.

Siccama (or perhaps Hudson, who actually made Siccama's flutes), and Pratten following after, replaced the cylinder with a dome, which probably looked a bit more modern and streamlined to their eyes, but didn't give you much to twist if the stopper had glued itself into place.

I fall between the two, with a cylindrical bit to grip, and a simple flat cone end. It does serve as the knob to adjust stopper location, but without the indicator to show where the stopper is set. I have done such indicators, but there isn't much need for them, as we have standardised pitch. Note the modern Boehm flute doesn't have an indicator either. A mark on the cleaning rod is all you need.

[GreenWood]

Rennaisance flutes to me represent a kind of practical simplicity, a technical refinement of earlier more rudimentary offerings.



They tend to be one piece, no tuning, and are very complete like that, just the flute itself and a cork. I like that, because it is a straight connect with the instrument as something that provides sound, without any distraction.

I suppose tuning brought in the need to work with the top end more, and embellishments worked their way in as part of join design, and so a new total or uniform presentation of all of that would be needed or else the flute would seem unbalanced somehow.

To be honest, playing with cork position is something I leave for moments I feel like being finicky about something, or very occasionally if a flute is too difficult in some way. I find adjusting with cleaning rod a little tedious when it is not fun... often it is a game of trying to make sure the cork doesn't just jump to a previous position. No cap gives straight access to both sides of the cork. The idea of a smooth, geared, and measured response is tempting but seems a little bit of an over-measure and unnecessary... though I understand that would suit certain players or circumstance, for example for frequent tuning.

I suppose for fully domed caps a chisel could be used to pry them open, or grip wrench might just hold if it had very sharp teeth.

[GreenWood]

That reminded me, and along similar lines, of the slide on corked decorative rings I placed on the Rudall flute. The highest one dampened the tone so I decided to leave it off. Also on metal flutes I was just reading Boehm favoured brass for sound but found it too hard to work.

These are things a player notices, but probably an audience not so much, at least not beyond any improvement in how the player plays because of those sort of details, or if not then via a perception they aren't conscious of or don't know how to differentiate. For some flutes the sound is there, while for others they are flutes as flutes are.

Also, I find most if not all flutes do have sweet spots in terms of embouchure style and placement, meaning that they really perform if those are found. The difference is how difficult or playable those styles are, and if they suit the sound or style of playing any player is looking for.

So I think the flute anyone chooses really does teach them, in a sense set, a lot of the embouchure style they will then consider "standard". Personally this is one thing I much enjoy with making new flutes, that of spending a few weeks then learning to play them, searching out kinds of embouchure and air that suit. Often those are very different from any I have learned before. That sort of learning is not for everyone though, and there is much to be said for "finding your flute" and becoming familiar and at ease with all of its nuance and character.