TubaForum.net

I just got my hands on a YBB-103, and am floored at the valve block design. The pistons are universal, in that you can swap them out and the horn still works. I assume that means that the casings are universal, too?

The horn plays amazingly well for as tiny as it is. It has its idiosyncrasies like any instrument, but this is going to work very well for my polka gigs, as I stand the entire time in one band, and the other one I run out into the crowd and play feature solos. The low end "pops" easier than any horn I've played, but the high register sounds a bit muddy...though I bet there's some weak solder joints that need to be fixed; I'll be bringing it to the shop soon for some fixes.

I'm just curious, especially in the case of student horns, why wouldn't universal valves be more common? It seems like it would be much cheaper to manufacture, and bring down the cost of replacement valves. And this instrument was discontinued before Yamaha moved their student manufacturing to China, so I imagine there was some reason it wasn't successful.

I could imagine that even a 4v instrument could be made similarly, though it would take even more creative wrap design. I'm sure 5v/compensating designs would be too much of a headache, though. Also, I've played this horn for hours, and the only places that catch water seems to be the main tuning slide, and the first bow of the main bugle. Haven't had to mess with valve slides yet.

It requires doing a lot of twisty turny things coming out of the valves to get the circuits out of each others' ways, so there's a trade off.

Rotors are mostly universal, particularly these days.

Ah, that makes sense. Yeah, there's a ton of strange bends in this horn, but it kinda helps the tone that I want. Also, kids probably don't need the most free-blowing horn to start with, and some resistance would help, I'd guess.

But that's fascinating about rotors; and it's probably for the same reason.

Can't wait to get the work done on this horn. I wanted something that resembled a baritone visually and sonically (mainly because the gig requires tuba in the show while baritone would sound better), and I think this is the best horn for that.

Americans reject them - because they are top action, but those tiny little Besson tubes that were made back in the '80s and '90s and engraved Boosey and Hawkes were little powerhouses.
I think the bell diameter was a scant 13 inches. They look like little E-flat tubas but they were B-flat. The bore was the same as a King full size tuba, so they could really produce a lot of punch.

You mean the 2-20? I had one that was made by besson, but for some reason it was labeled Holton. Fun little tuba, very small bell

yes...The very last issue of those were stamped B&H and probably (??) called "Regent II" or some such.
Were the B&H stamped ones called 682 ?

Correction! It was labeled Buescher, not Holton. Did a search through my old emails for the word besson, sold it for $300 10 years ago

The 0's in $300...
Are those universal?

I don't know.

Why aren't interchangeable pistons more common?

humBell wrote: Mon Mar 23, 2026 4:03 pm I don't know.

Why aren't interchangeable pistons more common?

I think that Bloke gave the star (high quality) answer near the start of the thread (It requires doing a lot of twisty turny things coming out of the valves to get the circuits out of each others' ways, so there's a trade off).

The first and third pistons in my top action Bessons’ seem to be identical.

I'm holding out for intrachangeable valves.

One of my horns has interchangeable pistons, well, almost.
When I bought my Courtois 166 Saxhorn Basse (3+2 pistons) second hand from a dealer in France it arrived in the condition showed in the pictures of his webpage. And it played as expected, except when using 4th valve. There (and only there!) the sound was weak and pitch need attention so I started to look for leaks and checked the valve alignement. After fiddling around for two days I compared all pistons for layout and saw that 4 and 5 are looking the same. So I tried swapping them and voilá everything sounded great. Interesting is that the wrong piston for 5th did work, I couldn't find a difference in playing between the two pistons. The wrong one in 4 was perfect when not pressed, only in use there must been something slightly out of tolerance. When I told the seller about this he refunded me some for my efforts, very nice!
Other example is my very special Courtois French C Tuba, made from parts in 1940 (under German occupation) for (German) troops entertainment. This was built out of older parts lying around in the workshop and it got a unique layout with two identical valve blocks for right and left hand. There are 1 and 4, 2 and 5, 3 amd 6 interchangeable. Only this layout gives bad ergonomics, tube-wise it looks clever made.