plastic version of Alex dbl. hn.

[bloke]

https://www.facebook.com/reel/1042946470573057

[Mary Ann]

Interesting that she can even get that out of a plastic instrument.

[bloke]

vessel containing/defining a column of air

[peterbas]

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[Mary Ann]

I have a P-bone and it is not a trombone in terms of sound or playability. A fun toy or something you leave on the picnic table at the campground.

[iiipopes]

I have a P-trumpet and P-cornet. Good for novelty, playing outdoors in inclement weather, etc. Decent intonation, except for the expected notes, including C# & D below the treble clef. I wouldn't start a beginning band player on one, because of needing to learn about how a conventional brass instrument works.

[the elephant]

I have plastic instruments that I used as a part of my teaching program (before COVID killed it off) and they sound as legitimate as a fiberglass sousaphone if you play them right. When I play them I do not hear any of the differences that others claim to hear when they play them. I have an issue with projection when playing plastic instruments. But sound quality? No.

My geef with plastic instruments was with the valves, and with the steel liners and pistons or rotors we now see, I view these as valuable beginner instruments in places like Mississippi where even a craptastic, used Chinese horn costs a lot to a local family. These cost very little in comparison to a full metal instrument — even a very cheap one.

I watch how these develop with eagerness. I hope they make them as mechanically viable as "real" instruments, though some are already as good as the worst of the Chinese horns, and ought to surpass them in another decade as plastics evolve and the valves are improved while keeping them as inexpensive as possible.

So far, in the classroom, I have witnessed the "rotten" kids treating them even worse than they treat real instruments as they are perceived as being toys. The band directors who are too weak to teach instrument respect and care/maintenance will fail in the same manner with these instruments, But these are the same band directors who should be selling Avon rather than teaching, and simply do not care about them. Figure it out: go work in an office.

I am reading a lot of silly bias in some of these posts. It's okay to like something radical that you are not supposed to like. It is okay to have your own opinion rather than parroting those of others. For those of you who *want* to say they like these but are afraid of being laughed at, quote me. I like them a lot and would gladly put them into the hands of the many children here who do not get to take band due to the cost.

I want to find one of these plastic 103s. Does anyone have a link?

[peterbas]

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[Mary Ann]

A P-bone is a toy and I don't think it was ever thought of as anything else. A carbon fiber "real instrument" isn't something you would have thought of as a toy, and you wouldn't give it to your five year old to play with either.
I got my red P-bone to use when we piled in a car and went around at Christmas time in terrible weather surprising people by playing carols on their front porches. It sounds "ok" if you blow hard, and not if you don't. The slide requires effort.

[bloke]

Most presentations that we see of carbon fiber relies on mixing it with plastic.

The difference between a toy and an instrument is the price, if they both work.

[peterbas]

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[peterbas]

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[bloke]

I'm sidestepping the issue of all of that hysteria, gas lighting, and all of the nonsensical things that have been done which waste so much money and actually farts more carbon into our atmosphere in the doing all of those silly things, but I might be able to be coaxed into playing a plastic or thin fiberglass or carbon fiber bodied instrument, as long as the vessel shape is acoustically sublime, and as long as the valves aren't crappy - as are the valves found on most of the plastic made instruments today.
I'd probably also want any metal to plastic attachments to be well thought out, and for there to be easy and effective ways to affect repairs.

[peterbas]

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[UncleBeer]

I was at the ZO plant last summer, and they dared me to try to break their plastic tuba (no kidding!). So I did. Didn't take much trying. I've been a tech for awhile, and don't know how I'd go about repairing/replacing this.

Zo1_1_11zon.jpg (131.79 KiB) Viewed 547 times

And here's the owner of ZO, goodnaturedly mugging with the broken part and a bell on his head.

zo2_2_11zon.jpg (171.98 KiB) Viewed 547 times

[bloke]

Some plastics - even if they aren't PVC - seem to melt together pretty well with PVC glue, but I don't know enough about plastics to be able to predict which ones are held back together strongly with plumbing cement. I have found that plumbing cement works pretty well on plastic bell flares on old sousaphones which crack, but a negative factor is that the plastic is so thin that the repair is also thin.

I've only discovered that PVC glue works on some not-PVC plastics by trying it, and not by any sort of knowledge.

Our longtime semi-celebrity friend, fairly recently, demonstrated one of the hazards of cementing carbon fiber plastic to brass when - in a show - they begin joking around with their instrument and their carbon fiber/plastic bell became unglued from the brass. It's more trouble, but perhaps putting some threads in the insertion end of the carbon fiber and into the brass and combining threading with gluing would prove to be secure enough.

[peterbas]

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[bloke]

Are those graphs from recordings of John Allred, or a fifth grade beginner the day after Labor Day?

[peterbas]

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[bloke]

I certainly didn't, because if human variation is a factor in charts and graphs which are only supposed to only measure instruments, I can't imagine those charts and graphs offering any useful information.

I can imagine them being interesting to one person who is trying out several instruments, but I suspect that they too would glance at their own graphs and - 99.9% - choose on things other than the graphs.

reasonable possibility:
If someone can sound this good on my tiny phone speaker playing a cheap plastic French horn, then it seems possible that plastic French horns in the future can be made which might possibly be sublime.