i asked this over at sotw...but i thought id get somewhere asking it on a flute forum

quoted from my post over there
"basically, a song we're playing after this upcomming concert in my youth orchestra has a bass flute part. And the orchestra manager told the flutes to look for a bass...and basically....i get the part..being piccolo/auxiliary flute.

Where can i rent one from?
i live like 30 mins south of orlando."

I tried to rent a bass flute about three years ago.
I found absolutely NObody would do this. There was one outfit who told me that they don't rent bass or alto flutes anymore.

I think you are going to have to:
1)find someone (probably a flutist or flute teacher) who does have a bass flute to lend or rent to you
or 2)buy a bass flute. I know the Jupiter bass flute is not fancy, but in most cases adequate, and not exorbitantly expensive.

Here you go,

http://www.fluterentals.com/

I'm not sure if I'm reading that website correctly... but if I am it looks like you're have to pay for 6 months of rental up front + a refundable deposit which equals 1070.65 (you would get some of that back at the end obviously).

Not to mention it's a "DC Pro Bass Flute" - I'd never heard of them, but found a post on ebay

"I have designed it myself and it is made for me with my specs. DC Pro is my own brand that I designed myself and had made for me, with my specs. I learned flute-making while working for William S. Haynes Flute Company in Boston. They make flutes that start at $8,500. My job was to solder the tone holes on these flutes, which was a very critical job and had to be perfect to guarantee perfect intonation. I was very fortunate to have first-hand experience in flute-making while working there. So I decided to make my own bass flute since there was such a need for a low-cost bass flute on the market."

Buying that flute new on ebay would run you 1,492.80 (a difference of 422.15)

That being said - I would never buy that flute, period. I don't even think Haynes offers a bass flute... I may be wrong, but that just screams to me "Hi, this crap company in China sells flutes and I can have them stamped with whatever name I decide to come up with."

I would contact the local colleges and universities and ask the flute people if they have any leads on a bass flute you could rent locally. I'm fortunate enough that my area has a flute society that has quite a few large flutes available for rental, but if I didn't that's the route I would take.

Jupiter makes a very good, reasonably priced bass...

Agreed Patrick. The bass I'm currently playing is a Jupiter - it does have some response issues (or maybe it's just me) but it does what I need it to do! )

I rented one of the bass flutes from www.FluteRentals.com
I only needed it for a month, but for the price, I still rented it and just sent it back early. I got my deposit back, the flute played decent. Its not Gemeinhardt but who has $5k for one of those. I can understand they would nto want to prep and ship an expensive instrument to make $50 on a one month rental.
It worked out well.

Jupiter has corrected some probs with the older bass flutes, I have one of the new ones here at home and it has good response