Solid silver

[Thunderlily]

Hey
I bought a lot of flutes on ebay (4 together in one buy). I just bought them to take apart, clean and fix minor things, and see if I can make them be nice again and play
Anyways, one of the flutes was a beautiful Gemeinhardt, open hole, straight line. It was a bit dirty and when I took it up, I noticed awful dings in it (I knew there would be some body damage, said so in the description) and it just broke my heart to look at those dings. So I put it aside for later. Just recently I opened it up again and decided to polish it a bit and see if I could get those dings out (just gentle tapping). Sooo...

Now I can see that just under the place where headjoint and body join (where it says what brand the flute is) it says (almost not noticable) SOLID SILVER. Does that mean that the headjoint is solid, or the whole flute?
Now I've started to think about asking a professional to get those dings out and use it myself. What would you do?


TL;DR: What does Solid silver really mean? What would you do with a dingy flute?



(P.S. the dings were like someone slashed the flute against a table corner several times.. there are about 7 dings on the body and 3-4 on the lip plate)

[Thunderlily]

OH!
And the serial number is
M3S 603271
And I've tried looking it up in Gemeinhardt database of serial numbers, but couldn't find it.

[Kaylyn]

I would think that if the body itself is marked that means that the whole thing is sold silver (the mechanism may still be plated). Usually if just the headjoint is silver that's where it is marked. At least that's the way it is on my Yamaha, but I don't know anything about Gemeinhardts. GOOD LUCK with fixing it if that's what you decide to do!

[cflutist]

If you do a Google search on M3S, it says solid silver body, plated keys/mechanism.

"body" meaning headjoint, body, and foot joint. In other words, the "tube".

[Thunderlily]

Hey, I saw that it also says "solid silver" on the headjoint and foot.
It kind of also needs new springs (they are bent and ugly), I hope to fix it up real nice.
I love tinkering with flutes, taking them apart and making them shine and play again. I don't work on my own instruments, just some I bought from ebay that were very cheap.

Anyone know how much these are worth? (I kind of want to keep it for myself though, haha).

[fluttiegurl]

It is very possible that the M3 you have has a solid silver head and foot (tube only) if it is not marked on the body and plated mechanisms.

These flutes were available in the 1960's and 70's. They are compared to today's 3SH and 3S flutes that Gemeinhardt produces. Unfortunately, they are not worth much unless you were to sell to someone who has sentimental attachment. It is a factory made, basic step up flute prior to corrections that flute makers made in scale. I would think you could possibly bring about $200 if it were completely professionally overhauled, but I have seen these sell for under $100 in playing condition. I have had students come into my studio with them before, but they tended to be stuffy and out of tune, so an upgrade was necessary fairly quickly.

As for silver content, I am not sure. You may be able to find out that information from the company.

[JButky]

Model First Last Year
3S 603075 605209 1972

According to my list from Gemeinhardt it was made in 1972. Solid Silver tube "Solid" not sterling usually was coin silver. 90% rather than 92.5% sterling

Ditto to what Fluttiegurl said...