"stuffy"

[peterbas]

.

[iiipopes]

Something, whether a leak, misplaced brace, too tight a tubing turn, occluded valve port, etc., interfering with an anti-node.

[bort2.0]

So you will buy a brand-new car and the first thing you do is to go to a local garage to pinpoint the faults on your brand-new car.
Then you pay the local repair guy and hope the car seller will chip in to pay for the repairs.

Maybe you should read over what you have written

Bloke's commentary is strangely missing

New cars are totally different... They come with warranties for manufacturing defects, and the process of buying a car is much more hands-on with the buyer and seller together. There are even lemon laws, to protect you if it's brand new but just a total piece of junk.

New tubas... You're on your own. Might as well be a used tuba.

[dp]

With a little shame I found that on tpin there were lots of posts with some sound scientifical arguments. We, tuba community are miles behind the trumpets in this regard.

speak for yourself

[bloke]

@dp
When I post crap like that, I'm trolling.
When he does, he's actually serious.

I'm thinking of ALL the trumpet players around here - hundreds of 'em - and how such a VERY small percentage - in spite of all their weighted caps, replacement pipes, "alignment" jobs, freezing procedures, and all that sort of $h!t - who do NOT suck (like only a couple dozen).

bloke "Let's all be as mad as Hell !!! about tuba crap!"




and even more commentary:

[Rick Denney]

I'm with MA on this one.

Warranty, by law, covers defects in materials and workmanship. It does not cover faulty design or the variations within the tolerances claimed by the maker. Even though all warranties state that there is no implied warranty of fitness for a particular purpose, most states outlaw that provision for items sold new.

The agreement for auditioning an instrument that places the cost of shipping on the customer depends on the assumption that one is auditioning the design, or at least defect-free variations in construction that conform to the design. Any customer agreeing to such should be able to assume that the instrument in question has no defects in materials and workmanship or damage outside the hands of the customer.

Several possibilities:

1. MA is acting in bad faith, and just rejected the tuba because she didn't like it and sought to blame it on a defect to try to get the shipping money back. This is refuted by the fact that she then paid another company to provide another example of the same instrument, demonstrating commitment to the assessment that there was a defect.

2. MA is incompetent to evaluate instruments. Then why notice the significant difference in its replacement? Why assume that without being sure?

3. MA is acting in good faith, and is competent to evaluate instruments.

Hornguys should treat the third of these as the most likely until they have evidence otherwise--only that would be consistent with their rhetoric, and with express and implied warranties.

Two possible responses:

1. Assume that the instrument is just as Miraphone intended it and MA just didn't like the design. This is not a fair assumption in that they have made no comparison with other examples nor put in a good-faith search for a defect. Surely had they done either of those things, they would have said so.

2. Assume that the instrument has a defect, and search for it until they find it or satisfy themselves that it does not. Defects like this should be obvious and easy to find. Can they pass a dent ball that is maybe .020 smaller than the bore through the valve branch? That will find a solder blob big enough to cause a problem this noticeable. Did they pressurize the branch to make sure there were no leaks? I bought a tuba that had already been on the demo circuit that had a gap in a solder joint in the second-valve branch. I felt the breeze on my right hand. It played better after I fixed it, too, even though I had only been playing a year after a long hiatus. Did they inspect every brace to ensure the instrument had not been tweaked in shipping? A band-mate bought a new-style King 2341 some years ago, and it was just not good at all. Inspection revealed that a couple of the braces were depressed into the bows they were soldered to, indicating the instrument had received a big shock at some point. That probably filled the instrument with all sorts of residual stresses, like having to wind the instrument up to assemble it instead of working the parts so it fit together properly. We were sure that releasing some of those solder joints would have made a lot of noise. It's replacement was altogether better (it was covered under warranty by the company selling it).

And if the instrument has a defect, they should return MA the shipping money, because the arrangement for buying on approval wasn't to troubleshoot defects, but to evaluate designs, or normal variations that conform to the designs. And then they should work with Miraphone to make them whole, if the defect was from the factory. My suspicion is that the entrance of instruments from you-know-where in the market have made it difficult to press warranty claims back to the factories, just as it was with the Czech-made instrument (from back in the Communist days) that had the leak in the second valve branch. And the retailer in that case didn't even profess friendship-based customer relationships. And it was just as easy to fix it as to try to send it back. But premier companies can't get away with the prices they charge if they expect their customers (both wholesale and retail) to provide their quality control.

I normally don't like litigating these issues online, because we never can be sure we know the whole story. That's why I showed possibilities that can be verified if the parties involved want to verify it.

Rick "noting that MA's long public presence and contributions on tuba forums has established some level of bona fides that should be respected by respectable retailers" Denney

[peterbas]

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[peterbas]

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[peterbas]

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[donn]

I normally don't like litigating these issues online, because we never can be sure we know the whole story.

I think you can be pretty sure about it, really - it's a given. Ferguson would be a fool to wade in here. The general term for this kind of litigation is "kangaroo court."

[bloke]

I wasn't even suggesting that it wasn't checked over prior to being shipped. Packing material can migrate and end up in the bell, even when packing pebbles are put in trash bags and sealed up. Those things can end up getting holes in them and leaking...They're not very thick.

Somebody at the store is going to play it. This may not be the end of this little saga. (??)

also...
Maybe something was lost in the translation, but my main point was that:

Over the decades, I haven't had very good luck buying "new/mail order".

also:

I've never bought new/mail order without having previously spent some time playing a same-model tuba.


bloke "I'm beginning to understand central European mentality just a little bit more, as there's an American humorist (who posts 'reels' [short videos] on one of those platforms) who does a great job of satirizing it."

[Mary Ann]

The last thing I said to Steve via email was that since he had never played another of these models, that I suggest he go find one and play it since he may not know how they are supposed to play; and not having any other example, quite possibly he thought that is just how they are. But I will repeat -- if that one had played as well as the one that is now mine, it would not be going back and forth to different people to try it out, and it would have disappeared off the floor very, very quickly.

No I don't think it was Steve's initial intention to rip me off, but his first reply to me indicated that he simply disregarded my comment that there was a problem with that tuba. That is when I got pissed off. If it hadn't been my money AND my time AND my angst over whether I was the problem or the tuba was the problem -- and the borrowing of the VMI to find out -- I put a lot of time and effort and emotional energy into trying to figure out what was going on here.

I don't think I'm going to say anything else. The TFFJ continue as it will.

[peterbas]

.

[bloke]

Only the most gullible Americans (though - sadly - they are legion) think of themselves as "we".. What I laugh (and weep) at the groupthink.

Speaking in a broad sense, over the last decade or more, there has been a fascistic and group-thinky top-down tendency for all of us to be told to listen to "The Science". Rather than that, I believe we should probably be listening more to > the silenced <.
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As far as relationships between the United States and Europe,, I think the worst thing that ever happened to Europe was for the United States to act as it's military protector. I'm not saying that a whole bunch of Americans don't think like children, but for one country to act as the protector and caretaker for a whole bunch of other countries necessarily causes a huge percentage of the adults in all those countries to become childlike in their thinking/attitudes. That's obviously not healthy, and not to even mention that the United States is absolutely bankrupt, and the money going for that parental protection is nothing more than printed paper, which will bring forth a worldwide economic collapse extremely soon.
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I don't get (??) the Miraphone comment. I continue to express that it's difficult for me to imagine that instrument having left their manufacturing facility not playing well, but how can I know for sure?
If there's no packing material that has found its way down into the instrument discussed above, the other thing I wonder about is a rotor that's not rotating all the way to one end of the rotation or the other, but feels like there's a stopping place that is not the right place.
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I can hook you up with that American guy's reels. He's hilarious.

[peterbas]

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[Rick Denney]

I normally don't like litigating these issues online, because we never can be sure we know the whole story.

I think you can be pretty sure about it, really - it's a given. Ferguson would be a fool to wade in here. The general term for this kind of litigation is "kangaroo court."

I agree that Ferguson entering this thread on the forum does nothing to improve the chances of an appropriate outcome. This isn't a kangaroo court, because it isn't a court at all. There is no mechanism for introducing or reviewing evidence beyond verbal claims, for example. And there is no judge to preserve distinctions of law.

But that doesn't mean we can't suggest strategies by which the parties may evaluate the situation to arrive at a fair solution. That was my hope.

Rick "not thinking the current outcome attains that standard, and hoping Ferguson takes the need to search for the flaw to heart" Denney