TubaForum.net

For more on the subject of the Conn Helleberg, see The Conn Helleberg, from better days in the tuba online bulletin board scene.

I don't have a real Conn 120S, just a 7b and a FAXX 120S copy. They're probably not as sharp as the sharpest ever Hellebergs, but the rim is more than average flat and with a sharper edge. That's what Helleberg rim means, though it apparently was less so before the 7b and 120S models came along.

On this point, I think the first advice you got here was right -- there's no guarantee at all, that features you like on a trumpet mouthpiece will serve you the same on a tuba mouthpiece.

For your amusement, a cross section overlay from James New, who copied these mouthpieces. All three are from Conn; HELLEBERG is presumably an old one from before the Conn Precision "Conn 2" era, GEIB is a non-Helleberg model, and CONN 1 is from the Precision series but with a much more rounded rim than the Conn 2 (and a very different cup profile - it's a great mouthpiece for contrabass tuba, but unobtainable.)

Robson wrote: ↑Thu Apr 10, 2025 4:06 pm

iiipopes wrote: ↑Thu Apr 10, 2025 3:09 pm

Robson wrote: ↑Thu Apr 10, 2025 11:20 am

Thank you for this information! I didn't know about it....

Sharp rim? It depends on the year of manufacture. My Conn Helleberg 120S has a rim that is more like a Wick rim, slightly rounded and not sharp at all. I have played the sharp rims, but mine is not one of them.

Is your Helleberg mouthpiece new or vintage?

I don't know. I bought it used from a person here on the forum a few years ago, and it was a few years old then.

iiipopes wrote: ↑Fri Apr 11, 2025 8:22 am

Robson wrote: ↑Thu Apr 10, 2025 4:06 pm

iiipopes wrote: ↑Thu Apr 10, 2025 3:09 pm
Sharp rim? It depends on the year of manufacture. My Conn Helleberg 120S has a rim that is more like a Wick rim, slightly rounded and not sharp at all. I have played the sharp rims, but mine is not one of them.

Is your Helleberg mouthpiece new or vintage?

I don't know. I bought it used from a person here on the forum a few years ago, and it was a few years old then.

If it's the 120 model you mentioned earlier, it's the modern Helleberg, however old it actually may be. Grossly simplified, there were Helleberg mouthpieces of various parameters before WWII, there was the '50s/'60s Conn Precision / New Precision Conn 2, and there was the modern 7b / 120S. The Helleberg rim is a feature of the modern 7b / 120, though as recounted by Paul Sidey and others, it wasn't real consistent - from the sorely missed Haugan in the thread I linked above,

the ones with a "bite" to the rim were produced by DEG music of Lake Geneva, Wisconsin for a time when Conn was "underway" to Abiline, Texas.

The doorstop-condition ones (whereby people bid them up to $500 on eBay, etc.) don't feature particularly sharp-corner interior rim edges...
They are more like a (later vintage...Schilke-made?) Conn 2.

Yes, the cross-section diagram HELLEBERG is presumably prior to the Precision Conn 2, and I think it would be fair to say that the edge is rounded about the same as the CONN 1, just rotated slightly inward because the cup profile is less conical at the top than the CONN 1. That geometrical factor is probably enough to also account for the HELLEBERG's wider rim surface. The Conn 2 seems to me more like this HELLEBERG, but as I think the diagram illustrates, these are fairly subtle differences.

Just for curious, is there a mouthpiece comparator for tuba, like we have for trumpet? It's a incredible tool!!

https://trumpet.cloud/mpc/

Mouthpiece comparison charts and cross section diagrams are interesting, but I've never found them to be helpful, in regards to me choosing a mouthpiece.

At least to me, the proof is in the playing.

Robson wrote: ↑Sat Apr 12, 2025 12:31 pm Just for curious, is there a mouthpiece comparator for tuba, like we have for trumpet? It's a incredible tool!!

No. Do you know where the data for that comes from? I could see a big tuba studio possibly might be interested in a task like this, but there are an awful lot of mouthpieces out there. (For an incomplete list with incomplete data parameters, see David Werden's tuba mouthpiece chart.)

I don't know how hard it is to get set up to make the data file, maybe if it's easier than I think, there's potential to crowd source" it. I see the site has a fairly extensive legal page. And there are other mouthpieces there besides trumpet, so maybe you could just start sending them tuba mouthpieces scans.

Mike Finn sawed his mouthpieces in half and posted pictures, that's the state of the art in the tuba world. (Actually not mouthpieces, which I don't think would work because the thin parts like the shank would deform, but metal bored out as the mouthpiece models are.)

(Apparently this site won't display the image, maybe because of some problem with secure connection, http://www.tubascott.com/images/Accesso ... ---web.jpg .)

I don't like mouthpiece charts, for a very simple reason: usually it's just a collection of data from the manufacturers. The problem is that every manufacture measure the mouthpiece in a different way.

That's why I love the mouthpiece comparator! It's much more precise and much more realistic

@bloke is absolutely right here: the proof is always playing, but I use the mouthpiece comparator as a filter, eliminating options that I'm pretty sure are not going to work for me (I'm talking about trumpet mouthpieces).

donn wrote: ↑Sat Apr 12, 2025 2:23 pmDo you know where the data for that comes from? I could see a big tuba studio possibly might be interested in a task like this, but there are an awful lot of mouthpieces out there.

All the mouthpieces were measured on a Coordinate Measuring Machine (Mitutoyo is a very famous brand of this kind of machine). I don't know who collected these data...

donn wrote: ↑Sat Apr 12, 2025 2:23 pmMike Finn sawed his mouthpieces in half and posted pictures, that's the state of the art in the tuba world. (Actually not mouthpieces, which I don't think would work because the thin parts like the shank would deform, but metal bored out as the mouthpiece models are.)

(Apparently this site won't display the image, maybe because of some problem with secure connection, http://www.tubascott.com/images/Accesso ... ---web.jpg .)

That's awesome!!!

I clicked "thank" for the part that you disagreed with and clarified, and not because you partially agreed with me.

bloke wrote: ↑Sat Apr 12, 2025 6:31 pm I clicked "thank" for the part that you disagreed with and clarified, and not because you partially agreed with me.

donn wrote: ↑Fri Apr 11, 2025 12:47 pm

iiipopes wrote: ↑Fri Apr 11, 2025 8:22 am

Robson wrote: ↑Thu Apr 10, 2025 4:06 pm

Is your Helleberg mouthpiece new or vintage?

I don't know. I bought it used from a person here on the forum a few years ago, and it was a few years old then.

If it's the 120 model you mentioned earlier, it's the modern Helleberg, however old it actually may be. Grossly simplified, there were Helleberg mouthpieces of various parameters before WWII, there was the '50s/'60s Conn Precision / New Precision Conn 2, and there was the modern 7b / 120S. The Helleberg rim is a feature of the modern 7b / 120, though as recounted by Paul Sidey and others, it wasn't real consistent - from the sorely missed Haugan in the thread I linked above,

the ones with a "bite" to the rim were produced by DEG music of Lake Geneva, Wisconsin for a time when Conn was "underway" to Abiline, Texas.

Yes. I know all that. I played several before I got the one I wanted with the particular rim contour and slightly oversize cup diameter at 1.28 inch /32.5 mm. Of course it is a modern Conn Helleberg 120S. I never said it was anything else. That is what "a few years old" means. Yes, I have played a Conn 2. Yes, I have played a 7B. No, Hellebergs, for most of history, being made-by-hand mouthpieces, never were, and I would say still never are, consistent. That's why I tried several different 120's to get the one that fits my embouchure. And every manufacturer who tries to claim they make a copy of a "Real" Helleberg is only copying one mouthpiece in the universe of inconsistency.

People are tired of reading posts by me saying this, but I've never encountered any of the random shapes of Helleberg mouthpieces that I really like playing.

The specific Helleberg cup shape that has come to be known as Helleberg 2 or 30 or whatever - which seems to be the most popular of the Helleberg family... I superimposed a throat size/contour, back-bore and rim on that cup to see if I can make it palatable to myself. I made it at tolerable to myself and I think some people who bought them from me like them a lot, but I won't be playing it. I'm perfectly willing to make some more batches of them. I'm not saying that the various Helleberg cups are bad. I'm just saying that I don't personally like any of them - believing that I've probably encountered all of them... and yes, I could play a gig on the one that I put together and have sold (particularly as I made it just about as palatable to myself as I could manage), but wouldn't choose it.