Kurath/Willson F Tuba — Adding a 6th Valve

[the elephant]

Requesting more Ginger plz

Here you go…

[bloke]

Wonderful cat. You just reminded me that I need to stick my head out the door and call Covid in for the night.

BAS comin' too...

[the elephant]

Well, it works, but having to bend the hinge rod under the coin out of alignment to fit that stupid acorn nut makes it bind very badly. I will look at fixing that today.

That is — I will if the predicted five hours of "STRONG THUNDERSTORMS" do not prevent me from working. (I have a huge roof leak in the shop…)

I have a sick cat, too. Headed to the vet in about thirty minutes.

More later…

[the elephant]

Here is the solution I will try today, in order to not have to make new levers; well, at least not right now. I can make the lever arm itself much better, but don't want to have to mess with it until this summer. I think this will work well for now.

The blue "T" shape represents the hinge tube "swivel" that screws into the top of the long rod that goes to the valve. The red bit is a free-floating hinge tube spacer to allow me to use a longer hinge rod and still have no slop. The longer hinge rod is to get the nut out from under the coin. I have to do this because I made the stinking lever arm too narrow between the coin and the edge; while the hinge tube works perfectly the thumb nut is TOO BIG. I hate those little brass acorn nuts, but I thought that maybe I could use those and everything would work. I was wrong. So I will be using some of the same thumb nuts I have on all the other hinge rods on the horn (the ones that look just like those used on Bach Strad trumpet 3rd slide stops). These are WAY too big for his things are currently set up.

Today I will cut and thread a pair of longer hinge rods that will allow my levers to work as they are. I can change things up after this symphony season is over and I have tons of spare time.

In the below diagram, you can see that, on the left lever, the nut is too large and forces the hinge rod to bend down at an angle. By extending the hinge rod I can get the nut out from under the coin, leaving the alignment intact and preventing the binding that is currently happening. This will look weird.

And in this case, truly: IDGAF.

[York-aholic]

Cat update?

[bloke]

Cat update?

rrrrrrooowwwrrrr !!!

[the elephant]

Ginger and Mary Ann

[York-aholic]

You said you had a sick cat and were headed to the Vet's office.

That's what I was requesting an update on...

[the elephant]

Oh, sorry. Not Ginger.

Zoe, MA and G's mama, has an incurable rodent virus that has suddenly become wildly aggressive. It is eating her upper lip and nose. They initially thought she had cancer. Instead, they have been treating it with steroid shots and scraping the area, much like you treat impetigo. She has gotten much better. However, her upper lip is now cleft from her nose down. It is really sad. The vet said today that if she continues improving with her scrapings he is certain in a few more months he can open the ends up and stitch her face back together. He has done this in the past with good results. Zoe has suffered from all sorts of odd medical issues due to this virus. Her daughters both have it but have been completely asymptomatic except when they were a few weeks old. But Zoe has been plagued with it. She was abandoned for about two years before shopping up on my doorstep looking for help.

The vet compared this virus to the type of herpes that causes cold sores in humans, but really bad. It has never been this bad, though. The first treatment was in the hopes that his gut feeling that it was not cancer was correct. Facial cancer in cats is not treatable except for chemo, which around here is about five grand per treatment. He treated her for the virus and thankfully she responded well. The shots are keeping it under control and the scrapings expose "fresh" tissue that can then heal.

EDIT: I posted a photo of her face, but it is rather hard to look at, and I don't want that in this thread. Suffice it to say that she looked like she might die when we first took her in, and now she looks like she just has a facial injury. In a few more months she might look normal again.

This cat causes me a lot of stress; I sure do love her, though.

Fingers crossed.

This is Zoe as she normally appears, with a small sore on her upper, right lip.

[the elephant]

My new screws arrived just now. Here is the short arm with the new, smaller-headed screws. These use a 2mm hex wrench. I wanted slotted heads, but this is all they had in this specific size, which is an M3x.5 thread pitch, 4mm thread length, 7mm shoulder length, and a 3mm shoulder OD. The heads are just a smidge wider than the hinge tube, so there's a solid edge to keep the short arm in place.

The knurling looks bad in this photo, but they all have it. They also have this in black oxide finish, in case this ever becomes my Sunday-going-to-town tuba. ;-)

Now I can clean up everything and make it look purty. And I can cut down the stop arm so that it looks <ahem> normal…

[the elephant]

HO-HO-HO! MERRY CHRISTMAS IN FEBRUARY! Those itty-bitty screws I installed on the short arm ALSO solve my lever problem.

Well, son of a gun. Glad I ordered some extras!

[the elephant]

[the elephant]

Dang man. I'm over here putting a barely functional 5th valve lever on a cerveny, and you're creating that magic

putting us to shame, thanks a freaking lot

[the elephant]

Extending the 5th "upstairs" so I can use it on the same hand as with the 6th (a huge logical improvement) should take about two hours. I have decided to do this now, at 8:30 in the evening. Why?

BECAUSE I WANT THIS NIGHTMARE TO END!



If I get it done I will post about it. But I suppose y'all could figure that one out for yourselves. Sorry I post so often… <snicker>

[the elephant]

[bloke]

almost on topic (but not quite...and then I really stray towards the end...)

My #2 slide trigger on my cimbasso benefits from a "helper" (will eventually be a) coil spring...which lines up with the slide (in addition to the typical one found on a lever).

I haven't ever stopped to install a legitimate (coil) spring, and have been using a rubber band...ref: BMB.

I had a ton of F#'s and B's last week, and the aged-out rubber band broke.

Oddly, the action (after it broke) continued to be positive/reliable, even though "not quite so" prior to installing the rubber band - and didn't oil it even once.

' not counting on it...and will install a coil spring.

bloke "again: luckily a damn nice horn...top-of-staff A and A-flat ask for 1-2 and 2/3 and F#/B need to be a triggered 2-4 (as 5-2-3 is too low for either)...but that's it - other than mashing buttons and blowing into it - as all the others I've tried out (at various tuba shindigs - and from $4K to $20K) have shown themselves to be wretched."

[the elephant]

I am finishing up the initial setup of the 5th valve "upstairs" lever and doing some needed work on the 2nd slide.

The slide is too long. I am hacking off 10 mm per side of the slide itself and will pull, cut, and reinstall the outer tubes on Wednesday when I have a day off.

Also, my long pull ring on the 2nd crook broke sometime shortly after I installed it. I used a brace socket that fit the rod I wanted to use. And the first time I used it the socket cracked away from the base. (Thank you, King.) Today I made a new socket that reuses the ugly-but-strong base flange and a much thicker tube for the socket. I tried to make it look less like a thick brass tube from Ace hardware by filing in some figuration at the ends. I used an old St. Pete thumb ring because my sausage-like fingers fit it nicely. I also made the extension rod about an inch or so longer to make it easier to find the ring without looking.

I will come back with photos of the slide and the linkage once they have been cleaned up and installed. Here is where I am right now…

I silver-brazed a little tab to the underside of the "Z" rod. This allows the "upstairs" lever to tie into it to push the valve from that corner, which is directly in line with the valve's stop arm, so it is a straight push from that location, and ought not to have any binding issues.


I will sort of round off the edges with the buffer so that it looks "nice"…


This is the entire "Z" rod.


Here is the 2nd slide, marked up to have 10 mm trimmed from the ends of the slide tubes.


The "new and improved" 2nd slide pull ring with the first one I built below it. Note the cheesy figurations at the ends of the socket to the ring. The one to the flange has the same figuration, but only at the open end. The end that was brazed to the flange is plain. I probably should have left the end at the ring plain, too. Oh, well…

[bloke]

slide marking for cuts:

I wonder what you think of this idea...

I lock the calipers at the amount that I have decided to cut,
run one of the jaws around the end of the tube and scratch a line with the tip of the other jaw.

Obviously, if this end of the tube is chipped or not cut straight, I do something else.

[the elephant]

I have a fully playable 5/6-valved tuba. I have a lot of stuff to tinker around with, and a ton of cleanup work ahead of me, but THIS THING WORKS, NOW! (*finally*)

Setting up the 5th and 6th valves to work this way works so well that it is actually much easier to play in the low range, fingering-wise. It just makes sense, period.

The old system made little sense and was mainly an attempt to find fingerings that were the least out of tune and then learn to make them come out in tune. This tuba's low range was so good in so many ways, but it was always somewhat squirrelly, both in response and intonation.

The system I have now gives me pitches that are no compromises or that will take extra mental effort to correct. I can concentrate solely on the response issues, which, by the way, have *also* been improved in many ways.

I learned to play it this evening and will use this tuba all week in the orchestra. We are doing New World, and I use my own part that includes me in the two outer movements. There are a ton of low-range A, B, G#, F#, etc. notes and I will have the active 6th valve under control by tomorrow evening's rehearsal. We are also playing Nicholas Payton's piece with his group, and the tuba part has some stuff that will give the 6th a little bit of a workout.

I think this week is going to be pretty fun…

[the elephant]

To Joe —

You might laugh at me, but the thumb lever really is in the way now. I get set up to play with the left hand on the levers and I end up hooking my right thumb into the ring rather than on the lever, so when I press the left index finger I pinch the nail of my right thumb. REPEATEDLY.

I may axe the whole thumb lever system now. I don't think I will need it anymore. It will stay in place until the end of the season, perhaps until after Christmas, but most certainly the thumb lever will become more of a nuisance as time goes on and my sightreading with the left hand on the 5th (and the added 6th) becomes more natural.

To "The Room" —

Here are some pics of the new 2nd slide. I will remove and shorten the outer tubes on Wednesday, but the slide itself is finished.