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I've taken the plunge into Kaiser land. Still doing some research on the horn. Looks like a Cerveny Model 1026, circa 1905 (or so). Walzenventile are a little rackety, but it plays easily and fairly in tune with an American shank mouthpiece. Similar horn is documented here.







EDIT: Pic from a 1925 catalog. Will have to figure out if there's a way to date the horn. I don't see any serial numbers anywhere.

the link doesn't work for me, but I wish it did!

I like the "zipper seams" look.

Pix should work now. Nickel plate overall. Bell is narrower (43cm) than in the catalog. Height with keel is dead on. Dents throughout, but thin brass, and pretty light in weight.

I wish you great joy and fabulous luck with your acquisition. It's nickel silver, yes?

I own a high-pitch ancient 4-rotor Bohemian oval baritone with that 90-degrees rotor/linkage (as well as gear-adjustable spring tension) set-up...The spatulas are very fancy (engraving).
The tuning is as high as with bagpipes (a FULL semitone higher than A=440), and the LONG mouthpipe features a LONG portion of it with an open seam...so Mrs. bloke decorates the great-room's wall with it.

Hey...It DOES feature - though - I nice braided rope - for marching.

Gorgeous horn. Thank you for sharing. Always great to see these land in the hands of people who will play them!

Thank you for the kind wishes. This one plays in tune (to my ear), but I've only had a few minutes to blow on it. All slides are top pull except for #2 which has the largest pull ring I've ever seen on a slide.

The horn was owned by a now semi-retired musician who used it as one of several types of instruments he played. He purchased it 50 years ago while on tour in Europe and had it tuned up at the Miraphone factory, or so he recalled. It's not pretty, but it sounds great. I don't detect any leaks while playing it, and I've hit no bad notes so far. My range isn't great, but it plays clearly from above the staff to well below. Pedal tones are quite accessible. Of the three horns I have, it's probably the easiest playing horn of all of them.

Walzen valves are interesting. Valve caps seem to control pressure on the valve cylinders, so you can't over-tighten them or the valves will bind. It reminds me of adjusting an old cup-and-cone hub on a bike wheel. There seem to be plastic cylinders that cushion the valve actuator yoke (or whatever it is called). You can see them in the pic below. The ones in there now are what seems to cause the racket when the valves are pressed. I have no idea what they originally used in that space or what might be a quieter alternative.

That is quite the kranz on the bell! It covers almost the entire flare!

Yeah, the kranz is not delicate. The whole thing has an industrial look. I think it’s nickel-plated, not nickel silver, but I don’t really know. It’s more grayish than I would expect. I’ll try a bit of simichrome on a small section to see what happens.

I'm not sure where you found this, but I hope it was a Craigslist ad you found and kept for yourself, instead of passing it along to us.

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I love this tuba. If it ever needs to be adopted, call me. I will feed it, buy it nice, warm clothes, and give it a comfy bed and a yard in which to play.

tofu wrote: ↑Thu Dec 09, 2021 2:40 am How cool is that thing?! Those valves are fantastic looking. What does HK stand for?

Hradec Králové -- the Czech city where Cerveny is located.

bort2.0 wrote: ↑Thu Dec 09, 2021 7:26 am

tofu wrote: ↑Thu Dec 09, 2021 2:40 am How cool is that thing?! Those valves are fantastic looking. What does HK stand for?

Hradec Králové -- the Czech city where Cerveny is located.

This was my assumption as well. It looks like Königgrätz (on the large shield) became Hradec Králové (HK on the small shield) when that part of Bohemia (Böhmen) became Czechoslovakia after WWI. This would put the date of origin of the horn as pre-/mid-WWI and the application of the small shield to the horn as post-WWI, possibly when the horn was serviced.

bort2.0 wrote: ↑Wed Dec 08, 2021 11:27 pm I'm not sure where you found this, but I hope it was a Craigslist ad you found and kept for yourself, instead of passing it along to us.

Ebay, but yeah. Pics on the ad looked like stills from a hostage video, but I recognized it as same type of horn as the one from the blog entry I linked in the top post.

hrender wrote: ↑Wed Dec 08, 2021 10:47 pm I think it’s nickel-plated, not nickel silver, but I don’t really know. It’s more grayish than I would expect. I’ll try a bit of simichrome on a small section to see what happens.

You might try polishing the edge of a yellow spot, like around the thumb ring. At first glance I saw yellow and thought brass shining through grey plate, but the yellow doesn't seem to really show up in obvious wear spots, so I wonder if it's something like a low temperature brass brazing rod, on top of the grey metal. If so, the yellow spot would get smaller where polished.

I picked a spot on the bell on which to try the simichrome, and it turned out most of the gray is accumulated schmutz. It shines up pretty well and may indeed be nickel silver (ref.@bloke).