The "Stand In"

We stopped by the finishing department this week and saw something particularly interesting at flute finisher Matt Keller's bench.  It looked like a metal flute body with extra ribs going in odd directions. It was also on a flute peg right next to a grenadilla Custom flute that Matt was finishing, so we had to had ask, "What's this?"

Well, it turns out that this ribbed metal "body" is actually a "stand in" to polish the ribs that go on the grenadilla flute.  Matt needed to polish the ribs as part of the finishing process, but he could not polish them on the wooden body.  Definitely not.  If you think about it, metal flutes have ribs that are soldered onto the body. Since the body is also metal, the body and ribs are polished together on a wheel that is spinning very, very quickly.  Although the image below is a photo and not a video, it helps in visualizing the polishing process for metal flutes:

With the wheel spinning so quickly, it's certainly not a good idea to have the wooden body anywhere close...  Also, the ribs are screwed on to the body of the grenadilla flute, so they can be screwed onto the metal "stand in" body, polished, unscrewed, and then screwed onto the wooden body.  Matt and our Repair Technician, Rachel Baker, tell us that once the ribs are screwed onto a grenadilla flute or piccolo, they have to stay!  Why?  Well, taking them on and off again and again can really weaken the wood and lead to more problems.

Matt told us that all of the ribs for the grenadilla body and footjoint are all on the "stand in."  So, the "stand in" might look a bit odd, but it truly is helpful for polishing the ribs that go on a grenadilla flute!

Close-up of the wooden flute body (which is upside down),
footjoint, and the "stand in."

Wooden Flute and C# Trill

We had a customer ask why our wooden flutes are not available with a C# trill, so we went straight to our Wood Instrument Shop Manager, Tim Burnett, to find out!

It turns out that there are a few reasons why a C# trill is not an option.  Tim told us that a C# trill tone hole would be in a bad spot of the wood -- where the wood can be unstable and weak.  Also, there really is no room for another tone hole in that particular area of the flute body.  As you can see from the photo to the right, and from our previous post on forming tone holes in wooden flutes, the tone holes are rather large because of the way they are carved from the wood (especially the area around the tone hole that provides clearance for the key cup).  You can read the previous post on forming wooden tone holes by clicking here. 

So, it's pretty clear that tone holes on a wooden flute take up quite a lot of space, but it may be hard to visualize exactly how there would be a lack of space for the C# trill -- so we thought a photo refresher comparing metal flutes with and without the C# trill might be helpful.  In the photo below, we see the two flutes next to each other.  There is a yellow arrow pointing to the key cup with the C# trill. 

Now, looking at the photo below of the back of a wooden flute, it definitely becomes clearer.  The C# trill tone hole and key cup would simply be too close to the thumb keys (because it would be in the same place it is on a metal flute). 

So, there you have it!  The reason why there is no option for a C# trill is because of space and location -- not enough room for the C# trill tone hole and key cup, and definitely not a good spot on the wood for this, either.