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I bought this new pre-bent nickel-silver leadpipe from Červený last year (thanks, Buckeye Brass!) but my Piggy was my only functioning tuba for a good while and I didn’t want to screw something up and be out a tuba.

Today I finally got the courage to install it, and it was a pretty seamless procedure. The geometry of the new leadpipe doesn’t adhere to the bell, so I will probably need to put in a small diamond brace or just let it “float.” It is soldered to an inner bow (like the original one) and pretty stable. I had to expand the large end ever so slightly, and the existing receiver-to-bell brace didn’t fit anymore, so I have an ugly stopgap one in place made out of a bent trumpet brace that will at least do the job until I find an alternative (which will likely mean just trimming the original one down with a dremel tool).

Taking the old one off, there was quite a bit of red rot and a patch, so it seems to have been the right choice.

Also rolled out the bell and addressed a few pings and dings that had been bugging me.

Behold:

Good job!

To me, the job looks damn good, but you DO know that the air will go faster through that nickel pipe and everything's going to be sharp, right?
Also, the sound waves will not radiate off of it as effectively, and you're not going to have the resonance that you had before.

I finally finished bracing up the leadpipe by installing a small one-piece brace on the bell, similar to what Miraphone does with their leadpipes.

Looking at the receiver-to-bell brace that I made out of something I pulled off a trumpet, I am declaring it "good enough for now."

I think this tuba will be for sale soon. Since getting comfortable with the Alex 163 and also having a Besson Eb and an Alex F on hand when a smaller tuba is needed, the ol' pig is not seeing a lot of action these days (actually, virtually none since last December).

Geez! The horns that I am seeing people selling lately are just awesome. GLWTS!


It's a shame the average tuba student is going to go after another Chinese York (or something similar) instead of these proven legacy horns. I believe there are several threads on that topic already.