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Received a VEB B&S model 90 F in the mail today straight from Deutschland as a result of a trade. After playing a Yamaha 621 F copy for a year, it's nice to play an F tuba with a beautiful, singing upper register. I'd love to get this ironed out a bit and install a fifth valve down the road.
These users thanked the author arpthark for the post (total 3):
Cool! I wonder where you’ll put the 5th valve since the 1st rotor’s mouthpipe port isn’t pointing straight up. To my brain swapping the first rotor out to make the 5th valve more traditional in its placement would make sense.
Will you be changing out some valves on here, or playing it as a 4-banger for a while?
I’ll bet some magnet work will do this tuba nicely
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Sousaswag wrote: ↑Sat Apr 06, 2024 3:14 pm
Cool! I wonder where you’ll put the 5th valve since the 1st rotor’s mouthpipe port isn’t pointing straight up. To my brain swapping the first rotor out to make the 5th valve more traditional in its placement would make sense.
Will you be changing out some valves on here, or playing it as a 4-banger for a while?
I’ll bet some magnet work will do this tuba nicely
You can see examples on the blog post of tubas like this that have the fifth valve installed in the straightest part of the mouthpipe that hugs the upper bow.
But I'll definitely be playing it as a four-banger for a while. 124 low Bb is fine, and the false tones 12 G and 23 Gb are actually very resonant. It's not as if I am playing much acrobatic/academic F tuba stuff these days... mostly gigs with a strolling band and in my tuba ensemble.
The pic doesn't reveal everything, as there is some pretty gnarly denting on the bottom bow wherein the guard and the bow are sort of sandwiched together.
Patched a pinhole on the 1st valve tubing last night.
Interesting that the four valves are all a straight, non-graduated 17mm (.669) bore, same as the fifth (first in the bugle) valve on the B&S Symphonie, if I'm not mistaken.
The more I play this, the more I realize that I could really make do with about 95% of my playing on a four-valve F tuba if I really had to. But I ain't gonna!
These users thanked the author arpthark for the post:
Just by chance I have a model 90 on the workbench today.
The bore of the tubing may be 17mm but the valves themselves are 1mm larger and most B&S tubas follow suit.
I've installed a number of 5th and 6th valves on these tubas over the years and perhaps the best spot is after the main tuning slide on the larger side. Not only is the feeling more "open" it allows for a direct thumb linkage.
Congrats on the new tuba:)
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These users thanked the author TheBerlinerTuba for the post:
