Re: So What's Wrong With the Conn 2xJ Bugle?
Posted: Thu Sep 01, 2022 8:32 am
I was not aware that Mark had moved from Mississippi.
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I did credit his name and quoted him in the post….
I have some texts with him so I can confirm that it was mark who lived in chicago. He did mention he moved from somewhere warm, (Chicago Winters) and we also chatted about his history modifying instruments, and his past ownership of a Conn 20j CC.Here's the best photo I could find, Image
^A guy names Mark Howl cut this one awhile back, "I have done one. I used a Nirschl valve section, a rotor from a Miraphone for the 5th valve and a bell from a Miraphone Kaiser. It is a great tuba with one of the best 6/4 sounds have ever heard. Pretty nimble too.... I think I paid around $2,700 for all the parts for my project. It was a lot of fun doing too. I initially cut about an inch off each piece of tubing and put it together with duct tape while telescoping each piece inside the next. This allowed me to experiment with different dimensions until it was "in tune" and in C. If I were to ever do another conversion project I would use the same method."
Mark has been building himself an sort-of off-grid-ish ranch - near Grenada, MS - with his second wife.the elephant wrote: ↑Thu Sep 01, 2022 9:41 am Must be. Mark Howle's FB page says he lives in Oxford. No mention of having moved. Having grown up in Mississippi and having lived here again for the last 28 years I can't imagine him moving up to the Midwest without saying a lot about it in advance. However, Mark has done some unexpected things in the past, so you never know.
This one, if I'm not mistaken, I owned before the conversion. Valves are reproductions based on one of the CSO Yorks made by a guy in Nebraska. Rotary valve was a St Pete or something similar. As I understood it from the owner, if this is the tuba I'm thinking of, he wasn't too happy with the outcome and overall quality/time that Norm did. A very similar experience as I had with my old King Jumbo valve addition that had such wonky fourth valve tubing (the pictures I was sent before it was shipped back to me were carefully selected so as to hide all of the tubing out of alignment, excess solder, various sizes of tubing, etc.).
That sort of crap bugs me to no end. I work really hard to make stuff line up correctly. I guess I expect others to be like this, too. But sadly, this is not the case. I actually take photos at odd angles to allow me to locate stuff that I am not catching in three-dimensional space. The only issue with that is when you take a really nice photo, but due to some weird lens effect what is perfectly aligned looks wonky in the photo. That *also* bugs me to no end. HAHAHA!!!Mithosphere wrote: ↑Sun Sep 11, 2022 1:41 pm… tubing out of alignment, excess solder, various sizes of tubing…