Students and power tools: Lessons learned from building recorders in a Physics of Music class

Abstract

In my divisional (general education) course “The Physics of Music,” my students each design and build a simple recorder using PVC pipe. The process is borrowed from “Flute Design” and “Flute Construction” labs by Peter Hoekje at Baldwin-Wallace University, as well as Pete Kosel’s flute hole calculator. The lab has been modified slightly to fit the constraints of our class, and is done over the course of two lab periods. We have tried several variations on the process and made plenty of mistakes. Typically, our students have little to no experience using power tools or shop equipment. Consequently, this tends to be one of the most adventurous labs of the term. In this talk, I describe some of the practical things I’ve learned and mistakes I’ve made while watching and helping my students build recorders. Among these are difficulties in creating fipples and knife edges, adventures in hole-drilling, finding reasonable finger hole positions, and student reaction to the finished product.