Flute How to make a flute with your own hands

If you want to learn to play the flute, but you do not have the opportunity to purchase the instrument itself, we suggest that you make it yourself from ordinary PVC pipes. You can learn detailed instructions for making a Bansuri transverse flute from the training video “How to make a flute with your own hands.” The presenter of the video will share his secrets with you, and will also tell you in detail and clearly how to turn an ordinary plastic pipe into a musical instrument.

How to make a flute with your own hands

A general name for a number of musical wind instruments from the woodwind group. It is one of the most ancient musical instruments in origin. Unlike other wind instruments, the flute produces sounds by cutting the air stream against an edge, instead of using a reed.

Origin, history of the flute. In Greek mythology, the inventor of the flute is considered to be the son Hephaestus Ardal. The oldest form of flute appears to be the whistle. Gradually, finger holes began to be cut into the whistle tubes, turning a simple whistle into a whistle flute, on which musical works could be performed.

The longitudinal flute was known in Egypt five thousand years ago, and it remains the main wind instrument throughout the Middle East. A longitudinal flute, which has 5-6 finger holes and is capable of octave blowing, provides a complete musical scale, individual intervals within which can change, forming different modes by crossing the fingers, closing the holes halfway, as well as changing the direction and force of breathing.

The transverse flute with 5-6 finger holes was known in China at least 3 thousand years ago, and in India and Japan more than two thousand years ago. In Europe during the Middle Ages, mainly simple whistle-type instruments (predecessors of the recorder and flageolet) were common, as well as the transverse flute, which penetrated into Central Europe from the East through the Balkans, where it still remains the most widespread folk instrument.

By the end of the 17th century, the transverse flute was improved by French masters, among whom Otteter stands out, who, in particular, added valves to the six finger holes to perform the full chromatic scale. Possessing a more expressive sound and high technical capabilities, the transverse flute soon replaced the longitudinal flute (recorder) and by the end of the 18th century it took a strong place in the symphony orchestra and instrumental ensembles.

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Svirel (pipe)- an ancient musical instrument. It was usually done by shepherds to entertain themselves during monotonous work. A pipe (pipe) was usually made from reeds, reeds or other hollow material. In order to make such a pipe, you will need some kind of hollow tube approx. 30cm. with inner diameter approx. 1 cm. This is a reed stalk (it grows along river banks or in wetlands) or a PVC tube. You will also need a tuner or some kind of musical instrument for tuning the sound, a hacksaw, a wood burner, a sharp knife, “Moment” glue, a needle file, sandpaper and a piece of wood for the whistle.

Progress of work on making a pipe (pipe) from reeds

First, you need to saw off the tube to length (mine is 27cm), align the edges and remove the internal partitions (if any) with a knife:

Then we clean the internal channel using sandpaper wound on a stick:

Now it is necessary at a distance of approx. 2cm. Cut the whistle hole from the edge. It has a rectangular shape. Its width is 0.7 cm, length 0.5 cm. This is approximate. It can be finalized with adjustments. Mark the hole with a pencil and cut it:

Now we use a file to form the corner of the whistle hole (on the side closer to the exit). It should be at an angle of 45 degrees. This angle is very important because... it is directly involved in the formation of sound, cutting the air stream.

Now you need to make a wad from a piece of wood and adjust it to the diameter of the internal channel (the diagram of its structure is below). It should reach the near edge of the whistle hole.

You can tie the edge of the pipe with a thread so that the reed does not crack:

insert the wad into the pipe, first trying it on:

We saw off the excess, leveling the edge:

Coat the wad with glue and insert it into the pipe. When it dries, we form a bevel of the edge of the pipe for ease of playing:

Now, using a tuner, we check the tonality (first sound) of our flute. I got "D". Next you need to burn the first hole. First, we burn a hole of small diameter, check with a tuner and adjust the holes, widening it. The wider and higher the hole is to the whistle, the higher the note. The tuning of the pipe is diatonic, i.e. major or minor scale. With all the holes closed, the note “D” is obtained, which means the first hole will correspond to the note “E”, the second to the note “F sharp”, the third to “G”, the fourth to “A”, the fifth to “B”, the sixth to “C sharp”, and lower "D". This is a major key. Below I will post a diagram with hole measurements and the whistle device.

Instructions

You will need reeds or reeds that are fairly dry and intact. The length of the stem should be approximately 30 cm, and its diameter should be 1 cm. Prepare tools - a hacksaw, needle files, sandpaper, a burner, superglue and a sharp knife. Also, pick up a piece of durable material to make a flute.

Saw off the uneven edges from the found tube and sand them with emery cloth. Then use a knife or metal rod to remove the internal partitions of the stem.

Wrap a strip of sandpaper around a stick and, inserting the stick into the channel of the future flute, clean it. Before processing the pipe further, tightly wrap the edges of the reed or reed stem with strong threads to prevent the material from cracking.

Measure 2 cm from the edge of the flute and use a pencil to mark a rectangular outline of the hole for the whistle, 0.7 cm wide and 0.5 cm long. Carefully cut out the hole. After this, use a file to process the whistle of the pipe, giving its angle the correct slope. The whistle should be at a 45 degree angle.

From a separately prepared piece of wood, make an insert for the whistle, corresponding to the size of the diameter of the internal channel of the flute. The length of the insert should be such that the piece of wood starts at the outer hole of the flute and ends just in front of the rectangular hole of the whistle. Insert a piece of wood inside, coat it with super glue, cut off the excess, and then wait until it dries completely.

Turn on the tuner and blow the whistle to determine the tone. After determining the key, take your wood burning tool and burn a small hole where you plan to place the first hole of the flute.

Widen the hole by checking it with a tuner on the diatonic major scale. When the hole is wide enough to build on, move on to forming the next hole. If, when first tuning, the tonality of the pipe turned out to correspond to the note “D”, the first hole closest to the whistle will correspond to the note “E”, and the following holes will correspond to the notes “F-sharp”, “Sol”, “A”, “B”, "C sharp" and "D".

Make another small hole on the back of the flute. After making a complete adjustment of all the holes, clean the inner channel again with sandpaper wrapped around a stick.

Sources:

• Making a Native American Love Flute

Many people dream of learning to play musical instruments, but few people think that you can not only learn to play an instrument, but also create it with your own hands. This is especially true for traditional folk instruments, which, despite their simplicity of design, sound beautiful and clear. An example of such an instrument is a pipe or pipe, the design of which has not changed since ancient times.

You will need

• To make a flute, take a reed or reed 30 cm long with an internal diameter of 1 cm. To tune the finished flute, prepare a tuner, as well as a hacksaw, a needle file, a wood burner, glue, sandpaper, and a sharp knife. Separately, prepare a block of wood for carving the whistle.

Instructions

Align the edges of the tube and use a knife to remove the internal partitions. Clean the inner tube by wrapping sandpaper on a wooden stick. Measure about two centimeters from one edge of the tube, make a mark and cut a rectangular hole for the whistle, 0.7 cm wide and 0.5 cm long.

The diameter of the insert must correspond to the diameter of the internal channel. Before inserting the piece of wood into the tube, wrap the edge tightly with strong thread or string and tie it off. This is necessary to prevent the material from cracking. Insert it inside, covering it with glue. Align the outer edge and saw off the excess. Finish the bevel of the edge of the pipe with a needle file.

Yours is almost ready. Now all that remains is to set it up and make the remaining holes. Blow into the flute in front of the tuner to determine its key. The pipe has a diatonic scale - adjust all its holes accordingly.

If the key of the pipe (its main sound) corresponds to the note “D”, then the subsequent hole should correspond to the note “E”. Use a wood burner to burn a small hole near the whistle hole. Check the sound of the new hole with a tuner and continue to expand it until it produces a clear “E” sound. Adjust the next hole to the note “F sharp”, the third hole to the note “Sol”, the fourth to the note “A”, the fifth to the note “B”, the sixth to the note “C sharp”, and the last hole, located on the reverse side of the flute, tune again to the note "D". Re-sand the inner channel of the flute using sandpaper wrapped around a stick.

Video on the topic

Simple wind instruments exist in absolutely all nationalities, historians say. The more developed the ethnic group, the more complex their instruments, but the basis of almost any wind instrument is the traditional simple pipe. Everything else is just its modifications.

Instructions

The dudka is a reed wind instrument that has been considered a Russian folk instrument since ancient times. The traditional pipe is a cylindrical hollow tube made of wood or reed. In general, deciduous tree species are used to make this instrument, and only pine is used among coniferous trees. Modern masters of making musical instruments use material such as ebonite.

Several holes are drilled on the surface of the pipe to regulate the flow of blown air; the number of holes can be varied and depends on its length. To obtain a through hole along the entire length of the pipe, it is drilled or burned out.

There are types of musical instruments that you can make yourself at home. One of these instruments is the flute. This is a great DIY option for those who like to make functional and crafty things.

To make a flute you will need:
- pencil;
- electrical tape;
- machine;
- rubber tape;
- vice;
- hacksaw;
- PVC pipe (length 38 cm, internal diameter 2 cm. Another length you can take a pipe such as the length of a person’s arm together with the forearm);
- cap for PVC (depending on the diameter of the pipe).

Flute making process

Step one. Creating a blank
The main material for creating a flute with your own hands will be a PVC tube. You need to cut a piece of suitable length. After this, you need to make markings where the holes will be located. This is the most important moment in making a flute, since its sound will depend on this parameter. It is also important to consider the diameter of the hole for the thumb; it should be larger than the others.

Step two. Drilling holes
Holes should be drilled using a machine. Thus, maximum operating accuracy is achieved. After this, the flute can be tested to see if it will sound. A plug for PVC pipes of a suitable size is installed on the other side of the pipe.

Step three. Flute coloring
For these purposes, you can use electrical tape of different colors or paint.

If you want to create several more flutes, then it is not necessary to use a template for these purposes. You can stretch a rubber band next to the flute and mark all the holes.

That's all, the flute is ready. It works very simply. When air enters the pipe, it is pushed away from the walls and exits through small holes. The resulting turbulence produces sound. And by closing certain holes, the player changes the tonality of the sound and this is how music is born.
To test the tube, you can play a test melody. Which specific holes to close and in what sequence are marked in the picture.

Reading time: 3 minutes. Published 06/05/2013

It would seem that pipes are surprisingly simple and uncomplicated products. However, you can make an incredible number of practical, useful and high-quality items and devices from simple pipes.
For example, to develop physically from pipes, you can make a horizontal bar with your own hands, and to develop your personality aesthetically, you can make a magnificent flute from PVC.

To create such a flute, you will need PVC pipes with a diameter of about 16-17 millimeters, which you can find in any specialized store. You should choose the size that is most comfortable for you, the length of your forearm or depending on the length of your fingers and palm. Next, you should make holes in the tube exactly in the center of the pipe, that is, measure half the diameter and make a center line.

In the future, it is along this line that you will need to make holes. In the proposed version, holes are made for the flute in the key of F major. Although, if you yourself have experience in sound production and understand the correspondence of the magnitude of sound frequencies to certain notes, you can experiment with your own determination of the size and distance of the holes.

To make a flute in the key of F major, use the proposed diagram.

The first hole has a diameter of four millimeters, then the holes have sizes of ten and eight millimeters. The most important is the hole, slightly off-center. This hole shifts towards your leading hand, since such a flute is held not forward, but to the side. It is into this hole that you will blow to produce sound. The first drilled hole (four millimeters in diameter) is not used for playing music, but is a resonator.

To avoid making additional defects on the back side of your flute, during the drilling process, insert a stick or something similar into the PVC pipe so that the drill does not damage the surface. In addition, after drilling, you should sand the surface a little to smooth out various roughness, and burn the edges of the flute a little with fire to make them pleasant to the mouth and fingers. To obtain more accurate holes, you need to pre-core the drilling position and only then use the drill.

When you have made all the holes, you need to put a plug to create pressure in the flute. The cork is made of porous rubber about eight centimeters thick, which is not difficult to find in a specialized store. A piece of rubber needs to be cut exactly to the diameter of the PVC pipe, but take another half a millimeter extra for tightness.

Place the plug hermetically in the hole on the side of the hole for sound production so that the surface of the plug is a couple of millimeters from this hole. Afterwards, your flute will begin to sound pleasant. You can practice using it and with the appropriate position of your mouth, a pleasant and melodious sound will appear.

Additionally, it should be noted the relative importance of the sound hole, which is located at the far edge of the flute. If you don't have the longest fingers, then you don't need it that much.

If you can make this magnificent instrument, you can complement your own music playing with an excellent swing made from pipes, information about the creation of which can be found on our website. In addition, you can make such a swing for your children and fill their joyful pastime with the melodic sounds of a flute you made yourself.

We assure you that children will remember such a “melodic” swing for the rest of their lives, and the story about the inventor will pass through the centuries!