Backbore effect on intonation?

[internalanarchy]

I have read that the backbore size on a mouthpiece can alter the intonation on trumpets . Does this apply to tuba mouthpieces as well? I have used a Elliott 2 backbore and a 5 backbore and couldn't notice any difference they were having on intonation.

What are your experiences with this?

Link: https://www.grmouthpieces.com/category-s/242.htm

[LeMark]

There are some on this board that will tell you that even leadpipe taper has no effect on intonation, but I've experienced it first hand. Changed leadpipes, some notes were wildly different, went back to the old one, and everything went back to the way it was

As far as throat taper, I experimented with going back and forth between a #0 Shank and a #2 Shank on my bloke solo, and I noticed a bit of difference, but nothing that was so dramatic that I could say with certainty that the Shank was the factor

[Grumpikins]

I also have been very curious about backbore and throat diameters on mouthpieces. I intend to do some experimentation this new year. Will post a thread about it when I have made physical progress.

Sent from my SM-S367VL using Tapatalk

[bloke]

These sorts of changes (if subtle, and within a scale of what is considered to be normal) make things easier or more difficult to lip/favor.

The main difference ends up being feel (resistance), and also legitimately observable are resonance/tone differences.

Previously flat/sharp pitches may move closer to pitch, but - nearly always - after warming up, playing for at least an hour, and particularly after coming back the next day and the day after that - it's nearly always found that ALL of the pitches moved in the same direction as the previously-known-to-be sharp or flat pitches moved.

That having been said, a mouthpiece that's inappropriately way too large or way too small will mess up a bunch of stuff, in the same way that putting a small shank tuba mouthpiece into a large shank tenor trombone (which are the same shank size) will goof up all of the overtone relationships. One should expect if they put something like a Warren Deck #1wildly-deep mouthpiece into an F tuba that nothing's going to line up properly (just as another obvious example).

This: from a 45-years working tuba player who - in the past - allowed myself to be self-fooled by inaccurate "magic mouthpiece" observations, who messes around with a lot of mouthpiece dimensions, doesn't claim to know anything, but who makes trial and error observations.

As recently as a few years ago - when learning something about the central European rotary "kaiser bariton", I allowed myself to be fooled in this way with mouthpieces ranging from 12C-sized to the largest bass trombone mouthpieces. After a while, I realized that the entire instrument would drift slightly sharper or flatter (with virtually no intervallic relationship changes), but some of them made some of the out-of-tune pitches easier to move without their tone suffering very much.

Overwhelmingly, tuning characteristics are found in the (not easily aftermarket alterable) bugle portions of instruments, and certainly in the bugle portions of instruments that expand wildly such as tubas and euphoniums. Aftermarket trumpet and horn mouthpipe sellers make all sorts of improved-intonation claims, as do mouthpiece sellers. The easiest place for anyone to experiment with mouthpipe taper effects are at factories, and they're surely going to make every attempt for something (as easy to change as a mouthpipe taper) to be optimum.

[Stryk]

For me, depth and rim size have much more to do with pitch than backbore. Especially depth. The older I get, the more I notice this.

[bloke]

@Stryk yes... and nearly only entire instrument up or entire instrument down
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[Mary Ann]

The backbore on a trumpet mouthpiece is roughly the same length as the one on a tuba mouthpiece. Possibly longer since the cup on a trumpet mouthpiece is so much smaller. However, the leadpipe on a trumpet is 9 to 12 inches long. The leadpipe on a tuba is sometimes that short but often appreciably longer. Adding to that, a trumpet is roughly 4.5 feet long for Bb as opposed to 18 feet for a Bb contrabass tuba.

Basically, the impact a backbore on a trumpet mouthpiece could have on intonation is proportionally larger than on a tuba since it comprises a good bit more of the length of the instrument.

[russiantuba]

It might have an effect on intonation, but in my experience, it has much more of an impact on control and centering the pitch. I find on a standard to larger sized tuba, having too big of a backbore makes it harder to control.

I will open this can of worms, but I am a firm believer that “the gap” has a greater effect than the mouthpiece throat

[bloke]

It might have an effect on intonation, but in my experience, it has much more of an impact on control and centering the pitch. I find on a standard to larger sized tuba, having too big of a backbore makes it harder to control.

I will open this can of worms, but I am a firm believer that “the gap” has a greater effect than the mouthpiece throat

What people - who play the tuba - are referring to when they use the word "gap" is the reverse taper of a mouthpiece receiver that is exposed when a mouthpiece doesn't go all the way to the end of a receiver. That can also have an effect on the way an instrument responds and feels, as can any shape insert it into an instrument bore at any place.

I personally seem to have the best luck with not a whole bunch of the mouthpiece receiver exposed as part of the bore of the instrument. I studied with someone (high profile, as far as two but players are concerned) for a bit who seemed to prefer a whole bunch of it exposed, and told me that I should prefer it as well.

[BRS]

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[bloke]

' nothing here as interesting as the previous post, but 8th partials can tend to sag on tubas - probably mostly due to the way that most of our mouthpieces tend to generally be shaped. OK: Imagine if someone were to attempt to play a trumpet with a nice deep helleberg-shaped cup trumpet-sized mouthpiece), sag less when mouthpieces are shaped less like typical tuba mouthpieces, but then we lose our characteristic sound... or - depending on the taper of the BODY of the instrument - it could be the complete reverse of this.

A whole bunch of really large tubas (particularly older designs) are saggy around the third partial, such as the lower open F or G, but the best of them (and some more recently designed with newer sophisticated computer programs) tend to creep up to pitch as the larger bows of the instrument are warmed up by the player. This problem with really large tubas I suspect is just about the most difficult one to solve. Really accessible intonation is probably the main reason I chose the very large tuba that I own now, as I sort of gave up on really large tubas for several years. I feel sure that acoustical computer programming was used to design the model that I own now. Notice that not very much above that I've discussed mentions magical mouthpipes or mouthpieces.

Getting back to the 8th partial issue - which probably IS tied in with mouthpieces to a fairly large extent, we all know the workaround for that, which is to either "squeeze" or use ninth partial fingerings. Fortunately, 9th partial fingerings involve not much extra tubing.

Being that even conservative size tubas expand wildly, the 8th partial thing is inconsistent, whereby the open one might be sharp, the next couple might be in tune, and - by the time someone gets to 1-2 and 2-3 - those could be flat and might ask that the player play those pitches with 1-3 and 2-4... or the lower eighth partial pitches might well be just fine and those that use less tubing might get flatter and flatter. It probably (likely/surely..??) depends on the taper of the bows of the tuba.

I have to believe that other typical problems - such as a flat fifth partial, a sharp second partial, and a sharp sixth partial - all have to do with the taper of the bows and where those pitches hit on our wildly expanding instruments. These new computer programs can find best compromises and allow manufacturers to play around with bow tapers without having to first build them to simply trial and error them. With my huge B-flat, Miraphone managed to stick the open d just barely below pitch and the sixth partial f just barely above pitch. A really generously wide mouthpiece interior encourages the eighth partial on this instrument to sag just a little bit, but the mouthpiece that I just decided to start using allows the eighth partial to be played without having to coax it higher, which is a little bit of a relief. As one might expect, when I depress the second valve, it throws the taper of the instrument off and the remarkably good open overtone series isn't quite as good, whereby the second valve C-sharp sags whereas the open D does not (and/but I found this same thing to occur with other kaiser B-flat tubas), and a couple of other things aren't quite as good. Obviously, the sine waves in the instrument are bumping against different parts of the taper when I depress the second valve.

It's difficult for us to compare our experiences with each other regarding these things, because tuba tapers vary so wildly. One thing is for sure: Everything is a compromise. Computer programs help a great deal, but the best they can do is to find the most palatable compromises.

As as I admitted above, I made a choice to move to a different mouthpiece. I mostly moved for clarity of sound, but it happened to also not distort the eighth partial downward as much as the one I was using. I've swapped out enough mouthpipes (with tapers about as different as could be managed reasonably) that were different on the same instruments to have only found that they might help or hinder a player in >favoring< tuning characteristics, and really don't do much to change them, but I've already said that in a previous post.

As a poor way to finish a post, I'm going to circle back one last time and discuss my own very large B-flat instrument: Even if I knew exactly what part of this particular instrument would raise or lower a couple of particular pitches, I would not fabricate, bend and swap out new bows (or contract someone else to do so) if it were easy, because I'm pretty astonished at what Miraphone was able to accomplish with this model, and I couldn't imagine a better set of compromises. Also, I don't pretend to know anything about this new era technology for determining best compromises of tapers, but I sure am glad it exists - at least in regards to the instrument that I have here. I suppose - as a better summarizing sentence of a post - I might suggest to someone that - if they feel like they are struggling too much with intonation with a particular tuba - that time might better be spent going tuba shopping, rather than messing with mouthpipe tapers or hoping to stumble across a magic mouthpiece (and I've also personally found that "new model" doesn't necessarily have very much of anything to do with "in tune" model... I've seen some new models from the far east that look to be patched together parts from previous designs. Some of those aren't all that bad, and some of them are humorously bad, at least in my view.)

[bloke]

oh...
I forgot to use the word, "volumetric". Using that word surely would have impressed someone...(??)

[Stryk]

oh...
I forgot to use the word, "volumetric". Using that word surely would have impressed someone...(??)

That's a good $10 word! What mouthpiece are you using in your horn. I seem to have moved to shallower mouthpieces with a smaller rim. Right now, I'm using your Solo cup with a MO 32mm rim. Too narrow? With that cup it does what I need it to do - low notes really pop and it makes life much easier. Of course, I'm not backup up an 80 piece orchestra, either. Like you said - compromise!

[bloke]

oh...
I forgot to use the word, "volumetric". Using that word surely would have impressed someone...(??)

That's a good $10 word! What mouthpiece are you using in your horn. I seem to have moved to shallower mouthpieces with a smaller rim. Right now, I'm using your Solo cup with a MO 32mm rim. Too narrow? With that cup it does what I need it to do - low notes really pop and it makes life much easier. Of course, I'm not backup up an 80 piece orchestra, either. Like you said - compromise!

As just confessed to in the other thread (about learning to play the model 98 tuba), I'm using an Imperial (medium depth funnel) cup with a tall rim.
This morning, I picked up the tuba (with that mouthpiece already inserted), made a couple of disappointingly uncharacteristic sounds, then REMEMBERED that it was a different mouthpiece, barely changed my approach, and (immediately) got the sound that I ended up getting last night (which prompted me to switch).

Imperial-Profundo.png (1.57 KiB) Viewed 475 times

It's not shallow. Though odd-shaped, it's roughly the same depth as a Helleberg 120.
With very "round/dark/you-pick-the-inadequate-word"-sounding big tubas (which also tend to NOT naturally offer a lot of "front"), this config always seems to fix both of those things...more defined sound, and more defined "front" (articulation/beginning/whatever). I had (simply) forgotten, and it works with this tuba. I've sold this config to PT6-P owners, etc. (having used it myself, when messing around with a Wisemann 900 for a few months, years ago).
The only "shallow" mouthpieces I use are my Solo cup (with the F tuba) and that new (one-piece brass) extremely-shallow and small-throat (yet still wider than a typical contrabass trombone mouthpiece) "Shallowberger" thing that I recently developed (cimbasso)...and it's made my (really good-playing) cimbasso even easier to play, as well as helping out the very high range of the cimbasso (when I'm covering 3rd trombone parts - which can sneak up to B-flats, and even - sometimes - C's).

-----------------------
for just a moment...back to "hoping for some small thing to having a large beneficial effect"
Look at clarinet discussion lists and facebook pages...They talk about various ligatures (which are clamps that hold reeds onto mouthpieces) being panaceas which (with extremely subtle differences in effects) can solve big problems.

[BRS]

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[Grumpikins]

I'm not looking for a magic mp. I just want to see how what differences in certain features affect my horns and me. Buying mps to do this is way too expensive. I have the luxury of being employed in a machine shop (cnc) where I can experiment at material cost. Also, I now own tubas with three different receiver sizes.

Sent from my SM-S367VL using Tapatalk

[bloke]

The most basic guideline (were someone to goad me into offering one up) with mouthpieces would be to compare a bass tuba to an alto sax, and a contrabass tuba to a tenor sax. "Stick with alto sax sized mouthpieces when playing an alto sax, and stick with tenor sax sized mouthpieces when playing a tenor sax"...

...but people break that super-general/super-liberally-worded rule as well, and plenty of tuba players do the same... The really great thing about any of that: It ain't me, and I'm fine with others doing whatever with their stuff.

[Stryk]

I seem to have moved to shallower mouthpieces with a smaller rim. Right now, I'm using your Solo cup with a MO 32mm rim.

Hey @Stryk just poking my nose in for a second… Is that MO (Mouthpiece Ordinance? ) 32mm rim this:

https://housermouthpiece.net/shop/m-o-s ... nner-bite/

I’m trying to get an idea of what they might sell for used.

Thanks for any help.

Yep, Mouthpiece Ordinance - I got it in a "bulk" buy I made one time. I chunked it aside for several years, then tried it when I was trying to find a stainless Bach equivalent. It works well for me.

[kingrob76]

I have a LOT of modular stuff - rims, cups, shanks. I have not found intonation changes from one shank to another if they are the same outside taper. Response and clarity, yes. Pitch? No. I HAVE found pitch tendencies between various cups, but, nothing notable. Response and clarity, along with color of sound, are more important to me and drive my choices.

I've had a LOT of work done on a Getzen I bought in September and that has been an interesting case study in changes to an instrument. Lee Stofer's modifications are legitimate improvements, without question.

[BRS]

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