Kurath — Am I Finallyl Finished?

[MikeS]

...seven busy fingers on a tuba...??

pfft.

Every finger has a job on a woodwind, and even the R.H. thumb has a gig (holding everything up).

That’s why I don’t play woodwinds, and wax nostalgic for the King K-90 G bugle I played in VK

“I know my limits”

And that’s why I am in awe of organists, who use every finger of both hands plus both their feet. By the time Wade’s horn looks like this, I will be in awe that he can lift it. I am guessing, though, that 8-22-31-34 will yield a near perfect low Aflat.

[the elephant]

...seven busy fingers on a tuba...??

pfft.

Every finger has a job on a woodwind, and even the R.H. thumb has a gig (holding everything up).

That’s why I don’t play woodwinds, and wax nostalgic for the King K-90 G bugle I played in VK

“I know my limits”

And that’s why I am in awe of organists, who use every finger of both hands plus both their feet. By the time Wade’s horn looks like this, I will be in awe that he can lift it. I am guessing, though, that 8-22-31-34 will yield a near perfect low Aflat.

[arpthark]

That's an oldie! That pic is definitely at least 16 years old. I remember seeing it on TN when I first joined up in 2008.

[bloke]

Yeah...
My 5-valve B-flats both have one slide (#1, obviously) which is moved often...basically between "just about all the in" and "roughly an inch pull", so that probably should count as a "6th valve" and one of them is set up to pull #4 (seldom) and the other is set up to push in #3 (with my left wrist, which is handy) fairly often, so those alternate positions of those slides (yes?) count as 7th valves.

Trumpets are mostly only outfitted with 3 valves, but they move their 1st and 3rd slides...so defacto 5 valves...even though they don't play very deeply into the 2nd partial.





https://i.imgur.com/GjQ1PqT.png

[MikeS]

Trumpets are mostly only outfitted with 3 valves, but they move their 1st and 3rd slides...so defacto 5 valves...even though they don't play very deeply into the 2nd partial.

https://i.imgur.com/GjQ1PqT.png

The Arban trumpet book does give trumpeters some opportunities to hit that low concert Eflat, 1-2-3 with both slides extended. I have seen that note a few times in brass band third cornet parts. As @bloke notes, it’s not a common occurrence in day-to-day trumpet life.

[MiBrassFS]

I am remaking the linkage rods, and I finally got to try out my old DDR Commie laboratory lathe. It is a sweet, little machine!

Clearly, the work you’re doing is super cool and equally interesting.

But, I keep looking at, and coveting, your sweet, sweet, little Präzi Lab lathe. I’ve had my commie-of-different-color lathe for some time now, and it’s a better than average one (souped up brushless motor, blah, blah…), no complaints, I scored for a good deal, but, man that Präzi is cool!

[the elephant]

They are super rare in the US, branded as the Präzi SD300. They are more common (but with different voltage motors and all metric leadscrews) in Europe and the UK as the Hobbymat MD65.

To help me with their rarity I have two of them. The older, "commie" one is in the photo. It is the better made of the two. The newer one (missing some parts and currently being rebuilt/restored) was made in 1990 (post-reunification), using German-made (versus Soviet-made) parts that cost them more to source, so the prices went up a lot, causing them to enact some rather desperate cost-cutting measures, lowering quality, eventually running them out of business. Mine is still pretty good, but (for instance) the base of the one in the photo is of a very thick and heavily cast aluminum, and the newer, cheaper one has a base of 8 mm steel plate. The old one weighs about 120 pounds (at just under three feet in length) and the newer one is about 20 pounds less, so all that weight came from *somewhere*. Being a lathe, weight is an indicator of rigidity, and, therefore, accuracy/rigidity.

Both are excellent, but the older one is just "nicer".

The DDR had some typically communist names for their state-owned businesses. This one was just as unimaginative:

VEB Präzisionsdrehmaschinen

"VEB" stands for "Volkseigener Betrieb" which means "Publicly Owned Enterprise".

"Präzi" comes from "präzisions" (precision).

The rest of the compound word that is the company name is "dreh" (turning) from "Drehbank" (lathe) and "Maschinen" (machines).

(Some of you may recognize VEB from some old DDR-made tuba brands.)

I have seen their domestic-use nameplates and prefer the actual company name and address to what is stenciled onto their export model machines (Hobbymat and Präzi, amongst others) so I had an industrial sticker maker run off a test sticker for my machines. I still need to match the font they used, but the size and layout will be what is in the photo. I am testing the durability of the sticker on my big, red, tool cart, and it has been there for almost two years now. I cannot scrape it off, it has not faded, and I occasionally spray it with solvents and stuff like WD-40. This company makes nameplates and safety placards for industrial machines that are made to live outdoors and be abused with chemicals, heat, cold, rain, and chemicals. And I must say, this thing appears to be bombproof.

I like it.

When I have the baseplates of these machines powder-coated these stickers will replace the import labels because the originals are missing or in bad shape and are no longer made, and—frankly—are ugly.

Here is my replacement…



I really like it, but I need to specify that VEB should have no spaces, and I need to upload the correct font. (This one is out of their library, and was the closest, but looks sort of goofy. If you know your fonts, the original is very similar to the 1930s-looking "Futura".)

The black one is the German version and the yellow one is the East German version. I like the black better as it hides the filth that gets all over these machines, so when I re-do them I will likely use black.


These are a bit larger than the currently popular Chinese Sieg lathe that is stenciled all over the world under literally hundreds of brands like Harbor Freight and that are just awful machines. They are very nicely made and were sold at a loss to the West to get dollars with which to buy foreign goods such as grain. This is how B&S tubas were sold for many years. They were a backdoor for the Communists to convert their money to Western currencies to trade for Western goods. Many of these products were remarkably well engineered and made despite how craptastic much of the produce of Communism was.

Joe got a sweet commie tuba via this system, and I got a sweet commie lathe.

Gee, THANKS, COMMUNISM!

[MiBrassFS]

Thanks for that! Terrific info and history.

What I have here is a LMS 5100 (pretty sure… or equivalent there of…). LMS used it at one of their “demo days” or some party-like event (as in I got a deal…). Sounded like most people ignored it and played with the ones with all the dro’s and such. This one is completely manual. I’ve had it a few years and think they’re painted differently now. It has a brushless motor that is at least half again or maybe double the wattage (500 vs 250…) and torque of the littler Seigs and also has Japanese bearings in the headstock. The bed on this one is longer, too, @16 inches. I’m no expert, but it has done everything I’ve thrown at it. Ways and bed are flat and square enough and the run out is plenty satisfactory. It mostly sat until relatively recently. Lately, I’ve been trying to find stuff to use it for just to get to know it better.

LMS was really good to work with. There were a few little requests I made after it landed (swapped out a couple of parts and they even sent me some touch up paint!). The guy I dealt with (can’t remember his name right now) was “Johnny on the spot” getting me stuff, all on them, so no complaints with LMS or the machine.

Sorry for bombing your thread!

[the elephant]

Okay, so I have been gigging all over Kingdom Come (as it's that time of year) and I have had several great workouts on this tuba, including two full-on Christmas recitals in two quintets.

This has given me a lot of feedback on the adjustments needed to finalize the slide lengths.

Remember that both the 2nd and 6th circuits have outer slide legs that are too short. Before changing them out I need to decide the final lengths of the inner slides. The 2nd slide seems to have been nailed down well enough, so I just need to make matching outer legs. I will have to order a tube for that as I am out of that size.

The 6th slide seems to need a small adjustment—perhaps .375" off the inside legs, then a pair of longer outer legs to match.

Interestingly enough, the horn plays like a beast with the MTS out more than halfway (2.5"). I duplicated all the original lengths when I replaced all the old, worn brass slide tubing, and my leadpipe, while skinnier in general than the stock pipe, is also about two inches LONGER, so this is quite a strange discovery. Maybe the horn was always too short? It was a post-prototype/pre-production example that Custom imported to see if they wanted to sell them. It had a lot of funkiness that I do not imagine the production horns had, and Mr. P. himself went after it with a hacksaw to correct some of the slides.

The horn also plays well with the MTS out about an inch, which is where I usually had it set. However, the second-space C was always quite sharp. FOR WHATEVER REASON (and it is not my face, nor a placebo, nor some other easily explained situation) the horn plays very well in tune with the slide way out, and the piggish low range opens up beautifully. Part of this is using the longer and larger bore 6th valve in place of the little 2nd valve, I am sure. That extra valve seems to work wonders for this tuba, which did not have many issues to start with. Now the entire middle octave is very well in tune with the outer octaves. I am slowly discovering the specific slide settings and fingerings I want to use. (It is taking me a lot of time to do this, but the added valve multiplies your options.) I keep futzing with things but after today what worked for me seems to have solidified with what I believe will be my final mouthpiece choice.

Right now I am using 12 for bottom line G and 4 for low C and that seemed to have cleared up the last bit of weirdness for me. I am using zero weird fingerings and can use 12 in all cases rather than 3. In some chords, D on the third line is better if played 3rd. That is it. Low B is a tad flat, but that is why I need to trim the 6th slide a bit.

This is shaping up to be a fine tuba. I am excited about it.

But the dang thing is heavy now. Adding that single valve and its very short slide did more than I thought it would to the perceived weight in the lap. Oh, well… poor me…

A few guys here and on FB have asked me to repeat what the adjusted bores are. Remember that this horn was 18/18/18/19/20 mm (the rotor being 20) and I wanted to use Miraphone nickel silver slide tubes. These do not match up with the industrial-generic sizes used by Herr Kurath on this horn. All the knuckles on the piston set had to be tweaked a bit so things would fit, but the internal tunnels are just crimped enough that this did not affect anything negatively. I did this to the Holton 345 as well with similar good results.



So, the bad news: I have to order a tube from Miraphone to replace the too-short 2nd outer tubes. This may not happen for some time because I do not want to pay international shipping for a single tube, and I do not need anything else from them for the time being, so as weird as it looks, I think things will stay this way with the 2nd slide circuit.

The good news: I have plenty of the tubing needed for the same operation on the 6th slide.

And now the very good news: I happen to have *exactly* the lengths needed for the four slide tube sizes used in the MTS, which is why I do not need anything else from Miraphone right now. I have like one inch more of one tube than I need, so it was pretty close, there. The other three have an excess of about two inches each. And the very good news is not only about the lack of need but also the savings, as the two large tubes (over 1" each in ID!!!) are very expensive and can only be bought in 250 mm lengths, so they are pretty short for the price! BUT I DON'T NEED ANY OF THAT STUFF! WHOOP-WHOOP!



This was taken today. I suppose I need to polish it.

Or silver plate…? NAAAAAAAHHHHH!!!



After Christmas, I need to order some additional .125" thick nickel silver plate. I need to remake the lever plate, lever rack, and levers, now that I finally know the exact space they have to live in, and how the angles of what I have affect my hand's painful joints. I already have my templates drawn, so once the metal arrives I can get to work hacking the parts into existence and sliver soldering some of the pieces together.

Ought to be a lot of laughs, let me tell you.

Later, folks…

[the elephant]

Oh, in the photo of the horn, you should note the twine holding the MTS in. The slide is aligned so well that when pulled out that far (look at the left leg to see how short it is right now) the weight of the slide causes it to slowly slide out over time. I switched over to my abusively-stiff-when-cold "Guppy Lube" and it did not help. The slide has never done this in the past, but with it now out so far there is not enough surface contact between the inner and outer slide legs to keep it in place. Once it has been retubed with longer stuff it ought to be fine. But having to tie that slide down today was a real pisser. Note: It does not slip out like this when dry. It moves very well and does not leak, and I have decided to wipe everything down with mineral spirits and leave it as is until after Christmas. It works well, so long as it is not greased.

This is a new one for me. I have seen it a lot, but never on one of my horns.

[Schlitzz]

It doesn't have an adult beverage cup holder.

[the elephant]

It doesn't have an adult beverage cup holder… that you can see…

[the elephant]

QUESTION OF THE DAY

Why does my brand new Miraphone Rose Solo not fit my brand new Miraphone receiver?

These are things that make you say, "Hmm…"

[bloke]

What key is your solo written in, and is your receiver transistor or digital?

I don't think I'd worry too much, because there will probably only be about 7 to 9 people there. After all, it's a tuba recital.

[the elephant]

… 7 to 9 people…

I *love* 7 of 9! I'd be tickled if she showed up to my recital.

"Resistance is futile." You bet your sweet bippy it is, baby…

[bloke]

That's why they made Corvettes shaped like that in the '70s. They weren't dumb.

[the elephant]

It doesn't have an adult beverage cup holder.

Et voila! Adult beverage holder — if your adult beverage of choice is water.

[bloke]

' must have been a long-@$$ church rehearsal if there's actually a break in the middle of it...

' glad to see that it's stuck together enough to play.

[the elephant]

Four hours, with three breaks including excellent food. About 150 singers (most not visible in the pic, of course) and a 45-piece selection of players from the MSO. We do big church gigs around these parts.

[the elephant]

I played this on the Kurath yesterday, at three services. I had zero problems with response, intonation, or projection. I fumbled a few fingerings at the first service (and the day before at the rehearsal) but that was it. We played several much harder, very much CC pieces last night, but until I got home I had not really thought about what a personal victory it was to be able to blow the snot out of this with no troubles — on an F tuba — and have the low range come out this well. The obvious Cc pieces were all low for an F tuba, with a lot of technique and facility needed, and I did the appropriate amount of practice to render the parts accurately, but when the church's MD asked me to play this congregational hymn down an octave and then handed me this part to read, and THEN told the brass to play as loudly as we could because he wanted 6 and 7 to bury the huge congregation (said somewhat tongue-in-cheek, but not completely) I was sweating it as this is LOW to be honking that loudly on an F tuba.

All I can say is: MISSION ACCOMPLISHED!

BAHAHAHA!!!