Ft. Collins CL: Miraphone F

[hrender]

https://fortcollins.craigslist.org/msg/ ... 91285.html

[LeMark]

lot of money for a 3 valve F Tuba

[bort2.0]

I guess at some point, all 3v F tubas were new and cost a decent amount of money.

[the elephant]

A three-valved 180 F is a horn to avoid. (It is NOT a 185, which is a contrabass slightly smaller than a 186.)

[Kirley]

I like the marching euphonium that snuck into those pics.
Tricky devil!

[the elephant]

Twice, no less. What a sneaky, little horn…

[bloke]

I don’t recall ever seeing a three valve 80-F in the USA. The instrument appears to be a bit tall to me, though it’s a 2D picture - which is more difficult to interpret than simply looking at an instrument straight on.
I have seen some model 83 E-flat tubas floating around, though also rare. Could it be an E-flat?

[LargeTuba]

not from the cute blonde who answers the phone at Guitar Center.

For that price It should



Would adding two valves yield a nice and semi-economic German F tuba?

[the elephant]

These are the horns people are talking about when they speak of F tuba "low C" issues. They are a challenge to play well. I did the Vaughan Williams on a highly modified one and then sold it. They are also VERY LOUD tubas. These horns project so well as to be offensive to viola and double reed players. It is like a small anti-aircraft gun, heh, heh.

Honestly, adding in two valves involves buying many parts, and many hours of highly skilled labor, including a lot of custom cut tubing and hours of soldering and cleanup work that, priced out quite fairly for the many hours needed to do the work above the level of rank "redneck hackery", would come to about $2500 in my shop.

If I were a layman I would pass on this rather hard. However, if *I* wanted it so I could hotrod the thing the price would need to be very, very low as all those parts from Miraphone would probably cost me over a grand. The end result would not be worth the expense. Plus, I believe this is silver plated, and that will become fairly scarred up from all the torch work. This horn is like a modern Mac laptop with soldered-to-the-logic-board-RAM: buy it preconfigured as you want it. Never buy the base model and then try to upgrade it on your own. This tuba is not worth the cost and time to upgrade it to four or five valves. It is a nice-looking horn that will never play well enough to merit the price of the tuba and all the upgrade work.

Of course, this is just one man's opinion. But I owned an excellent example of one of these and still felt compelled to do massive improvement work to it. Then I still sold it. And my excellent example five-banger cost me $550 less than this little guy. Realistically, you're looking at dropping $5000 total (horn, parts, and work) on what is really a $1500 horn (as it is right now).

That ought to tell you something.

[bort2.0]

This tuba is a paradox -- a silver plated Miraphone signifies that it's something a special/fancy/out of the ordinary... but 3 valves signifies that it's a student horn (especially for an F tuba).

Eine Tuba für ein wohlhabendes deutsches Kind?

[bloke]

I'm still having trouble convincing myself that it is an F tuba.
Here's a picture of a model 80 F tuba next to the for-sale tuba picture - and as proportionally the same as I could manage quickly:
I've SEEN some model 83 3-valve E-flats...I've NEVER seen a model 80 3-valve F.



SIDEBAR:
F tuba low D-flat/C/B issues, etc, etc...

I was discussing an analogous issue with a very fine trumpet player (who - sometimes - moves over to rotary trumpets).
They (even when "the best" and "crazy-expensive") also tend to play VERY differently from the classic "French Besson style" (typically American-played) piston trumpets (Bach, etc...). Certain ranges seem nebulous on those trumpets...UNLESS and UNTIL a player dedicates themselves to playing them REGULARLY (rather than as a "hey...I'm going to dust this off, and use it in this piece" trumpet). ...The SAME is true with the viewed-by-so-many as nebulous range on F tubas. Play such an instrument every day, and "that range" ceases being nebulous.
The issue with EITHER the rotary trumpet OR the so-called "German" F tuba:
attempting to play them AS IF they are something other than what they are
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Otm4RusESNU

[the elephant]

I was thinking it was a 183 too, but I figured I must be wrong because the seller couldn't get BOTH the model AND the key incorrect… RIGHT?

I guess I was wrong in that, too. Sheesh…

[bloke]

As/assuming a 3-valve E-flat (and a model of which I'm not fond), it would be difficult for me to put much of any sort of value on it (even with some sort of idea of flipping it).

oh yeah: silver...so - WOW !!!