Care Instructions for Wooden Flutes, by Casey Burns

Cases and Storing

Wooden flutes may be stored in a simple cloth roll or case. Old socks make excellent cases. In any circumstance, the flute should never be stored in direct sunlight, near a heat source, and should be protected from extreme dryness. Leaving a flute in a car will result in damage! The use of a Damp-it is highly recommended. Generally, the sections should be stored separately. When you are done playing the instrument, disassemble and shake out any standing moisture - but do not dry out the flute excessively! The point is to retard the drying rate.

Breaking in a New or Old Wooden Flute

When new, or when an antique instrument is to be played upon for the first time in recent years, it should be played only a few minutes at a time up to a cumulative amount of an hour a day. Also, an antique instrument will probably require careful oiling to precondition the instrument for use - the wood is usually quite brittle if the instrument hasn't been played on for years. After a month, the instrument can be played gradually more. The wood needs to get used to the cycle of wetting and drying. The flute should be oiled every 5 to 10 hours of playing time with Bore Oil, available from woodwind shops. Both the insides and outside of the flute should be oiled.

Oiling and Cracks

Cracks, unfortunately, are common with wooden wind instruments - but are usually not fatal to the playability, structure and cosmetics of the instrument. The woods that are commonly selected for tone have the drawback of being naturally brittle and therefore prone to checking. However, careful oiling of the instrument renders the wood more supple - wood is like leather. When it gets wet and dry, it becomes brittle - but keep it oiled, and it can remain flexible forever. Most cracks are due to not breaking the instrument in combined with a lack of oiling, and not paying attention to the tightness of the thread wrapped joints.

Fortunately, cracks can be easily repaired by sealing them with a low viscosity cyanoacrylate adhesive. Commonly, metal lined headjoints will crack. Be sure to separate the headjoint from the tuning barrel before attempting to glue up a crack, or you will unfortunately glue the two together with sometimes disastrous results. After gluing, the glued area can be carefully refinished with 320 and 600 grit sandpaper followed by microfinishing abrasives, sometimes available at woodworking stores.

Woodwind Bore Oil can be quite expensive. A good substitute is Artists Raw Linseed Oil. NEVER use the regular paint store variety - it's poisonous as well as inappropriate - it has driers which accelerate its polymerization, and can burn your house down if the rags used aren't burned immediately (a single paper towel soaked with this will self ignite within a few minutes!). However, the artistic oil, available at art supply houses such as Daniel Smith's in Seattle, dries very slowly and does not go rancid with time. Almond oil can be used, but should be mixed with water and decanted to remove water soluble impurities. A little vitamin E added helps keep the oil from going rancid. Finally, avoid oiling the keys or their pads or you will end up with sticky keys. Brown paper can be used to soak up any oil that gets on these.

The Socket-Tenon Joint

I like to wrap the tenons with a good stout Linen or synthetic thread, such as #00 Reedmaking Thread (available from Forrests Music in Berkeley), and lubricate the thread with Red Ski Wax. This substance is the best thread grease that I have tried and is available everywhere. Never replace threaded wrappings with cork or wrap them with teflon tape! The use of cork wrapping stems mostly from ignorance and laziness! This material is appropriate on a metal reinforced instrument (both inside and outside of both parts should be metal lined) only. Check periodically for tightness at the joints. If the joint gets too tight, pull it apart and unwrap a few turns of the thread. If the joints are too loose, they may be rewrapped, or a few turns of thread added - waxed dental floss works well fore this purpose.
Casey Burns