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A friend wants to make a tenor recorder from scratch (he is already a gaita maker), and asked me for the technical measures to do it, I searched through the web but couldn't found any complete reference on how to do it, its measures, etc.

So, what are the measures (in inches, cm, mm, whatsoever) of a tenor recorder?

Tim H
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Diosney
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    I think your question isn't on-topic here. I'm not sure about questions about making musical instruments. You might have to spend more time doing web searches and looking for pages like this one: http://members.iinet.net.au/~nickl/tredenick/ Here's a whole list of resources: http://www.recorderhomepage.net/instruments/construction-design/ Here's a detailed diagram for an alto recorder in F: http://members.iinet.net.au/~nickl/inline/rippert_beaudin.jpg?COLLCC=2544051970& – Todd Wilcox Jun 10 '16 at 13:39
  • My first port of call would be to actually obtain one, and play it a bit, whilst trying to understand why it's like it is, and could it be improved/simplified. By then, I'd have all the measurements I need. It's not going to break the bank. – Tim Jun 10 '16 at 14:09
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    Hard to answer: recorders date from an era, where standard pitch was not yet invented. While a=440Hz is obviously easy for playing with a piano tuned according to contemporary standards, it is noticably higher (meaning shorter) than baroque models. – guidot Jun 10 '16 at 14:49
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    Buy a cheap plastic one. They're remarkably good, and will supply all the data required. – Laurence Jun 10 '16 at 14:22
  • I am sorry but I think everybody is a gaita maker. Do you mean gaida? – user52086 Aug 04 '18 at 08:37

1 Answers1

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It seems there is a large recorder making community, with a vast and very useful set of resources here.

There are some links to technical plans, however a lot of them are for alto recorder rather than tenor, and even more still are stored on microfiche in libraries and not accessible online. Having said that:

This PDF has a graph detailing bore diameters of various tenor recorders on p8

Another link to 3 PDF and CAD files, two with plans for soprano and one for alto recorder

A very informative website (in French and English) by a recorder maker, with a discussions on bore size and photographs of making recorders lower down on the home page under 'documents'.

This is a picture of an alto recorder on top of a copy of plans by Thomas Stanesby, a maker of recorders in the 18th century, which might be useful (credit www.buyrecorders.com)

enter image description here

Another copy of Alto plans, this time a French design from c. 1700 (credit J.-F. Beaudin, I found it on the first link, recorderhomepage.net)

http://members.iinet.net.au/~nickl/inline/rippert_beaudin.jpg?COLLCC=1497646579&

ChristopheLynch
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