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So, a year ago, I finished subbing on a tour with Chicago the Musical for three months with my Conn 12J. The horn is so great for that kind of music, that I was loathe to get rid of it. Decided to ship the valves out for an overhaul for a really great price. They're finally on their way back, and I'm going to have the horn reassembled next week.

Besides the piston/casing replating, they also disassembled every solder joint, realigned all the sides, reassembled, and added a brushed brass lacquer to it. It's probably going to look better than the body ever will.

I love my 5/4 Kanstul, but it's overkill for about 75% of the stuff I do. And it's about thrice the weight.

Can't wait to have this guy back!

It's nice to see one of those in good shape! Usually the bells are wrinkled/creased/torn/patched/etc, the bodies are smashed, tubing is out of whack, braces are bent/broken. I look forward to seeing finished photo!

Well, this was an old high school horn. The bell has been rolled out a number of times that it's really thin, there were numerous dents pulled after I got it, and the reason the valve block was sent off is because some of the slides were so out of alignment it needed a full overhaul just so the 3rd slide could be pulled. The 3rd valve stem popped out of the threading right in the middle of a dress rehearsal with the official Chicago musical, making me play the tuba parts for the rest of the act on my bass until I could figure out what happened.The stem did it a couple more times during the tour, but I knew how to pop it back into the piston. Pistons would hang if I held them down longer than a whole note, and no amount of valve oil or baths was helping. I'm pretty sure he dismantled just about anything that was fastened in any manner on that block, then reassembled it.

That being said, it's been a great player for certain gigs, and I can't wait to see how much better it plays. Like a local friend said, my Kanstul is like an upright bass, and the Conn is like an electric bass.

You can probably get rid of that wiped solder (around the bottom bow joints) using (progressively) 250 - 600 - 1000 (probably good enough, but then if you choose) - 1500 grit sandpaper. Squirt valve oil on the instrument - when using the 1000/1500.

Happy Campers! That's what I like. 3v horns are good for lots of purposes.

And, "Hip, hip, hurrah" for light weight!

bloke wrote: ↑Sun Mar 17, 2024 9:14 am You can probably get rid of that wiped solder (around the bottom bow joints) using (progressively) 250 - 600 - 1000 (probably good enough, but then if you choose) - 1500 grit sandpaper. Squirt valve oil on the instrument - when using the 1000/1500.

I ended up with another round of aircraft paint stripper, which got the last remnants, but utterly destroyed the patina.

At least, I think the last pieces of the lacquer are gone, or maybe some parts are just not coming off with the stuff...I really can't tell because either way, it's still shiny there.

As for physical stripping, the bell is like paper thin now, and it sucks because there's not a lot of bell replacement options for the Conn 5/12J series, unless I want to drop like $900 on it for a Chinese bell copy. It's recommended I don't take much more of the actual brass off if I can help it.

The Big Ben wrote: ↑Sun Mar 17, 2024 12:38 pm Happy Campers! That's what I like. 3v horns are good for lots of purposes.

And, "Hip, hip, hurrah" for light weight!

Absolutely! I did a lot of polka gigs where I played a couple of baritone solos on tuba, and really didn't want to stand with them. I bulked up my left arm because I held my 30+ pound Kanstul. But I still couldn't move very much while playing with that. The Conn is maybe FIFTEEN pounds? And if I'm feeling lazy, it has strap rings on it. I didn't want to add that to my concert tuba.