Printing a Flute?

[daiv]

i have one of these. it is pretty good. if you read at the bottom, it does not have any hand finishing--the company that molded it for him invented a way to make high quality clarinet and sax pieces without hand finishing.

http://www.xaphoon.com/Pocket%20Sax.html

[Darren]

I was reading about that whole thing. Really interesting. I tried to get my son interested as he plays clarinet but he feels he has enough on his plate with piano and clarinet...not to mention Wii.

[G1]

Well, Daiv - I guess that answers that!

Thanks for the Xaphoon link. I had seen the bamboo ones before and gave it a pass (I've had 3 bamboo flutes that did not survive). After I get my new Forbes paid for I'll snag one of these. I haven't had a new reed instrument in years, and this thing looks like fun!

Anyone ever put the challenge of making a simple system flute to these guys?

[Jack Bradshaw]

i have one of these. it is pretty good. if you read at the bottom, it does not have any hand finishing--the company that molded it for him invented a way to make high quality clarinet and sax pieces without hand finishing.

http://www.xaphoon.com/Pocket%20Sax.html

My son has one. The molded finish is as good or better than anything i've seen, and we coat a lot of molded plastic.

Bye the bye, we are starting to see high quality, hi-density, (ie: transparent) molded ALUMINA ceramic out of Japan....I can only imagine what the tooling for that costs!

[fel bautista]

Some how I don't see flutes coming out of alumina ceramic in the near future. I looked at a data sheet and went " wood is looking better all the time".

[Jon C.]

i have one of these. it is pretty good. if you read at the bottom, it does not have any hand finishing--the company that molded it for him invented a way to make high quality clarinet and sax pieces without hand finishing.

http://www.xaphoon.com/Pocket%20Sax.html

My son has one. The molded finish is as good or better than anything i've seen, and we coat a lot of molded plastic.

Bye the bye, we are starting to see high quality, hi-density, (ie: transparent) molded ALUMINA ceramic out of Japan....I can only imagine what the tooling for that costs!

and we still wait for the first concrete flute to emerge from Jack's molds...

[Wormdiet]

The Aulos Baroque flutes also have an insert for the embouchure hole. I'm pretty sure it's CNC-made, but it may be hand-finished.

Injection molding can be pretty damned accurate. I know of one mass-produced, really cheap product that's being used as a reference for positional accuracy. It's really not difficult to mass-produce products with micron-scale accuracy; as has been pointed out, though, it really needs to be mass to be economical. Trying to recoup the likely seven-figure investment in design and molds for a Baroque flute costs a lot per unit when there are maybe a few thousand sold worldwide a year.

We should mount a campaign to have all school children learn the flute rather than the recorder/flotophone/tonette. Then we'd have inexpensive mass-produced flutes.

For some reason, this post reminded me of the scheduling at Swannanoa and other summer schools.

They never, EVER put the beginner whistle classes in the morning slots

[Irishthief]

Does anybody have 3D Model of flute?

I mean an irish flute like this:
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[Doug_Tipple]

I have seen what modern computer-assisted machines can do in the manufacturing process, and I have no doubt that it will be possible to replicate almost any shape in the near future. I have a Susato whistle and a Yamaha flute lying on my computer table. The Yamaha flute is well-finished, and the retail price is less than $10. However, I cannot help but think back with some degree of nostalgia when everything that we used in our daily lives was made by hand. There were many jobs in the local communities for people who made the things that the people needed. I'm not sure how people are going to be employed in the future. The thought of having to work in a big-box store for my working career, selling foreign machine-made items is not a vision that is very appealing to me. If you factor in the fact that the wages paid for these kind of jobs are not enough to maintain a home and support your children, the future scenario is doubly troubling.

[Jack Bradshaw]

In the long run, replication as work for individuals is a dead end. Value reduces to the cost of materials and handling. (think paper clips) At one time, this area was an industrial powerhouse in the manufacture of shoes. (worked in the sweatshop as a lad meself...eayuhp!) Much to my surprise.....it is once more a leader in "handmade custom and fashionable" shoes! Go figga! (My grandfather had a one-man shop doing that 100 yars ago! Made shoes for misshapen feet and arctic expeditions as well as prototypes for the "big" industry)

Anyway, the "printed" fabrication is not at the point where it can do acoustically perfect surfaces (yet).....molding can, but the upfront time and costs are significant.....

[Doug_Tipple]

There was and still is a glass factory (Anchor Hocking) in my home town. Like Jack, as a college student I spent one hot summer working there. I shovelled the raw materials from railroad box cars, loaded trucks of Gerbers baby food jars, as well as a lot of beer bottles. The glass factory is still in the little town, but because of automation of the glass-blowing process, there are now only about one fourth of the employees that once were employed there.

Glass is one of the industries that hasn't been hurt too much by imports, if I am not mistaken. Because of the weight and low cost of the products (glass jars and bottles), it is desirable to manufacture these close to where they are going to be filled with product. However, other more valuable and lighter weight items are now mostly imported, unless, as Jack mentioned, there are people with enough savy to create specialty markets. Small-scale instrument makers is a good example of these specialty markets.

[mutepointe]

A person doesn't need a 3-D printer. A person just needs to be willing to lead a life of crime. Kidnap fel bautista, he has access to a 3-D printer. Hold him for ransom. The ransom would be a flute mailed to everyone of us on the board. Who would bother tracking down every flute? And as long as all of us keep quiet, no one would ever be able to figure out which of us it was. Voila.

[Doug_Tipple]

Can you imagine what those 3-D printing cartridges must cost. Maybe they have kits on ebay where you can refill them yourself like I do with my computer printer.

[Irishthief]

In Moscow that costs 1.20 $ for 1 сubic centimetre.