Recently, I began wanting to get my Armstrong in somewhere for an annual COA. I was dreading the time without a flute, so I decided to order up two Jupiter 711 flutes (US$959) and two deMedici head joints from WW&BW on trial. (I had tested several intermediate Yamaha, Gemeinhardt, and Sonare flutes along the way, also.)

My teacher suggested I should also call Cincinnati Fluteworks (CFW) to see what they could offer. Pat North told me US$1342 for a "CFW" 711, and I was reluctant to proceed with a trial. The idea of a recut head joint was intriguing though. If so much of the sound of the flute starts at the head joint, the possibility of a CFW 711 to sound $400 better than a WW&BW 711 seemed to exist. I knew nothing of fraizing at the time. Pat explained that she also performs a very thorough rebuild and setup of the flute after the fraizing.

My plan was to try the three Jupiter 711 flutes and eight head joints to either find a new primary flute or a backup and then get my Armstrong 80B COA'd. Because one last recut head joint had not arrived from CFW, my teacher and I started the test without it. I did not say which flute was the CFW flute, to see if he could hear any difference when I played each flute. After 30 minutes of testing, we had decided that all of the flutes sounded pretty good actually, and began to try the D2 and D3 head joints.

It was looking like there was not enough difference in how I sounded to justify the extra $400 of the CFW flute, but perhaps my teacher would feel a greater difference when he played them all. I still had not told him which flute was from CFW. He played several challenging excerpts on each flute, and found "flute #2" to be a tad better than the others. He was able to feel the difference of the fraizing before being told that flute was the fraized body.

The D3 head joint was a bit of a let down to me. My Armstrong turned out to be the more resistant head joint and flute. The Armstrong 80B has a slightly dark tone, having a thin wall (0.014 inch) head on an 0.018 inch heavy wall body. Listening to my teacher playing each flute from about 20 feet away, the Armstrong was quieter than the Jupiters with the D3.

The door bell rang and an ace in the hole arrived. This was another recut 711 head joint from CFW. When I played it, the difference was astounding. It spoke cleaner and easier, and allowed a very soft pianissimo. It did not crack on forte either. THIS was a head joint to dream of. It was significantly better than the stock 711 head joints, the deMedici head joints, and even the other CFW recut 711 head joint. My teacher played it and confirmed my experience. In fact, I had to pry it out of his fingers to play it again; It seemed he was enjoying playing it so much.

We decided that this recut 711 head joint made the CFW 711 significantly better than the two "stock" WW&BW 711 flutes, and my teacher had chosen the CFW body as being a tad better than the "stock" WW&BW bodies in a blind test.

One negative, I have to say about the Jupiter - they make the case too small. Armstrong's case is wider so that there is no chance of banging the body against the foot in the case. I have to be extremely careful when putting the 711 into the case.

I shipped off some questions to Jupiter and got this response: 1) I read that Jupiter has four factories. What city made my flute? The factory is located about 60 mi outside of Taipei. Chungli Taiwan

2) My flute serial number is Dxxxxx - Is the year of manufacture encoded into the serial?
>Your flute was manufactured in 2002. The letter D is the >key in determining the year it was produced.

3) What year was the 711-II model first introduced? >1998

4) What year was the original 711 model first introduced? >1986

5) What improvements were made in the 711-II model over the 711? >New computerized machinery was introduced in 1998.

6) I have been hearing people rave about the "Jupiter scale." The deMedici brochure speaks of "the diMedici scale". Does the 711-II model have the same scale as the diMedici models? >The 511 - 611 - 711 series flutes are based on the Cooper scale. >The diMedici scale is similar but slightly different based on the placement of the tone holes.

It is interesting that Jen cautioned folks to beware of Jupiter over five years old. That lines up with the change in manufacturing equipment for the 1998 and later models.

Also, I sent some questions off to CFW and received the following answers:

1. Yes your flute is silver plated over the sterling silver.
1a.The thickness of the plating on your flute is 5 mills
2.The wall thickness of the head joint is .016.
3. The thickness of the body and foot is .016.
4. The pads are Pisoni double skins.

As I have continued to play both my Armstrong 80B and the CFW Jupiter 711-II, I keep investigating the various differences. The Armstrong 80B is 16.5 oz while the Jupiter is only 15.5 oz in weight. I think the Jupiter has a slightly sweeter sound, and the Armstrong a slightly stronger low register, but that may only be up close.

Both head joints are quite similar in shape - oval with a very short, 1/8 inch straight blowing edge. The Armstrong has much more over cutting on the left and right sides than the Jupiter head joint, and the Armstrong has gold plating on the lip plate, chimney and inside of the head joint. I think I can see where Pat shaved just a little off the bottom 20% of the front chimney wall of the 711 head joint.

The Armstrong is built like a tank, with heavier body and foot walls, and bigger rods than the Jupiter 711. The Jupiter seems a tad delicate after hefting the Armstrong for so long. Sometimes the Armstrong feels a little stuffy compared to the sweetness of the Jupiter. Of course the new pads of the Jupiter allow a lighter touch, as well.

My teacher remarked that I was not going flat on softer measures, (where the Armstrong pitch seemed to be more sensitive to dynamics).

So that's the scoop. I now have a backup flute...just not sure which one that is!

Headjoint Comparison: DiMedici D2 Jupiter 711 DiMedici D3