The Forestry Forum

My girlfriends dad wanted a steam whistle and I said why don't you build one? He said aww you can't build something like that. So all day in the shop today I cut hammered and soldered some copper into a whistle. Just a small one for now till can re scale it and go bigger. It is LOUD and high pitched. Who says I can't build something like that. pics as soon as I can.

GREAT!!!

Looking forward to the pics.  Have you considered a dual (two-tone) whistle like the old train whistles?  They seem to have a somewhat melodic sound as opposed to the screech of a single.

I build a four note whistle out of a block of aluminum that was about 1.5" x 4" x 8".  I drilled the holes 1/2" dial and placed plugs at different depths to get the notes as I wanted them.  I used a fly cutter to cut the angled slots.  We used it on a 30" dia. BBQ pit that we built to look like a steam train.  It sounded great and was very loud.  Two discarded freon tanks filled with compressed air would blow the whistle a few times and we'd pump them backup for the next use. 

I bought some plans on ebay for building 1, 2 & 4 chime whistles out of PVC and powered by compressed air. The example sounds on the site were very convincing, I just haven't had time to build one yet. Try and buy a real one on ebay! about a grand for a steam engine whistle.