The restoration

Fortunately, with the exception of the missing bits, the body of the flute was in good condition.  The story of making replacement keys and pads can be found at Broken and Missing keys, Impossible pads.  For reasons that will become apparent, we won't go into the details of the repairs to the head here, but at The Rudall & Rose Patent Head.

Remaining restoration involved freeing up jammed keys, replacing worn cork tenon wrappings and key buffers, and resoldering a loose axle tube on the Eb key.  A replacement insert for hole L2 also had to be devised.  Fortunately, the dimensions of the cavity and ring key pretty much dictated what this had to look like.

With the restoration out of the way, attention could turn to determining how good a flute this was ...

The Patent Head Mystery

The big question of course was "Did the Patent head by Rudall & Rose really belong to this flute?"  Was this normal, an option, a replacement or a mistake?

There were no visual clues apart from the makers' names:

• the timbers matched magnificently

• the tenon diameter suited the barrel socket

• the tenon length matched the socket depth

• the top of bore diameter was within range for the head bore

• the barrel ring was stylistically reflected in the lower foot ring.

Examining the intonation produced by the pair tells another story:

The blue 470 Hz trace is the response with the slide closed, the yellow 440 z response with the slide fully extended (31mm) and the pink 455 Hz trace with the slide set halfway.  

Clearly the fully closed performance is unacceptable:

• C#5 is over a semitone above C#4

• The discontinuity over the C#5-E5 break is unworkable.

With the slide fully extended, the response at 440 Hz is much better, but still not good.  All indications are we need to go still lower.  This is consistent with our understanding of pitch at the time - the options were High Pitch at over 450, or Low Pitch at 430.

Backing up this objective evidence was the performing qualities of the combination.  Although all leakages and other problems had been ruthlessly rooted out, the flute performed very poorly.  The reason for this is clear and significant.  It has to be remembered that, as a Patent Head slide is moved, the stopper is moved at the same time in a pre-determined relationship.  If the head isn't right for the flute, it's extremely unlikely that stopper and slide will ever be in the right relationship.  A wrongly set stopper gives very unfocussed performance - just what this flute-head combination displayed.

The flute, but with a more normal head

With that experience behind us, the flute was fitted to a McGee flute head and barrel combination.  These results were recorded:

Obviously the exact slide extensions needed to produce the pitches above will probably not reflect those of the original.  But we can see clearly that the best response comes around the 430 to 435Hz mark, as evidenced by:

• a flat lower octave response

• a second octave response well centred on the first octave average pitch

• minimal discontinuity over the C#5 to E5 break

How this is determined is the subject of Determining Best Pitch.

The 430-435 pitch range seems perfectly credible.  British Low Pitch was 430Hz, with 435Hz the standard on the Continent.  

The Third Octave

Once a likely pitch and slide extension for the lower octaves had been obtained, attention could be given to the response of the third octave. This set of fingerings produced the best result:

Illustrating the deviations graphically ...

This is indeed a fabulous result for the period.  Notes up to the bottom of the fourth octave could be easily achieved, with one exception.  A6 (third octave A) is notoriously hard to control on late conical flutes.  It was achievable, but not easily.

So, the Verdict?

In a nutshell, a very fine flute indeed.  Clinton has kept the main feature that endears us to the English 8-key - the dark, focussed, powerful tone.  And, although his new mechanism is more complex than the collection of keys on an 8-key, it is not greatly so.  There remain few interactions between the keys, and so little to cause difficulties in construction and maintenance.

Clinton has also dealt with every one of the failings of the common 8-key flute listed above, and dealt with them successfully.  The flute is capable of playing accurately and responsively from low C4 to C7, using the familiar 8-key fingerings, with only a few notes more than 10 cents off ideal pitch.  Only one note, A6, proves hard to play and this it has in common with all the later conical designs.

So how did he do it?

Looking first at the power issue, compare these bore dimensions:

We can see that while Boehm, no doubt obeying his German sensibilities, adopted a bore smaller than those in general use in England, Clinton went to the other extreme.  Indeed his bore is bigger than any of the other flutes we have so far examined, including the mighty Prattens (not yet invented).

Now let's review the list of weaknesses that Clinton had to overcome, assigning his solutions to the problems:

• E notes weak, veiled and unstable in pitch

Hole 6 moved down to its acoustically desirable position, and increased in diameter to equal that of other holes

• F# notes flat, require opening F keys

Hole 5 moved up to its acoustically desirable position

• A notes weak, veiled, tending sharp

Hole 3 moved down to its acoustically desirable position, and increased in diameter to equal that of other holes

• C# notes flat, require opening C key

C# is normally flat because of poor venting.  To combat this, holes L1 and L2 are made very large.  Further assistance comes from the introduction of the unusual hole 3, also very large.

• C notes veiled and tending sharp

Closing hole L2 is more than usually effective in flattening C# because of its large diameter.  Further, the ring-key link that closes the lower plate of hole L1 assists the operation by reducing the effective size of L1.  This would normally make the C very veiled.  C is kept clear-sounding by the added venting provided by hole 3.

• D' sometimes unstable or unclear

In 8-key flutes, the top hole is a compromise between C, C# and D.  In this design, the size of the D vent is reduced by the lower perforated plate on L1.

• Limited 3rd octave response

The large, well-distributed holes used throughout the flute (compared to its tapering conical bore) provides the venting needed to give an adequate third octave response.

• Difficult stretch between L2 and L3

Overcome by the extension on L3

• Difficult stretch between R2 & R3

Overcome by the extensions on R1 and R2

• Very flat foot notes

Flat-footedness seems to be an issue that slowly disappears as we approach the 1860's.  Whether Clinton has made any particular strides here will need to be reviewed as more flutes are studied in the way this flute has been.  In any case, it is noteworthy that the bottom C is not flat at 430Hz compared with the body notes.  C# and Eb remain about 20 cents flat, with D about -10 cents.  These are not hard degrees of flatness to lip up.

Other points of interest