pitch problems

[sloan]

I came straight home from the party (DCA->ATL->BHM) - and then had a long rehearsal this pm - but I couldn't resist the urge to try out my new mouthpiece on my 1895 peashooter Eb helicon. It's a definite step in the right direction, but there still remains a serious pitch problem.

It plays fairly well in tune with itself from the F at the bottom of the staff to the top of the staff (perhaps higher...but I wasn't in any kind of shape to test that...) BUT the low Eb (and everything below that) is rougly a half-step flat. Actually, the Eb is very flat when compared to the F, and the D is VERY Flat when compared to the Eb. After that...down to the Bb seems consistent with the D.

Not playing any note below F doesn't seem like a viable alternative, so...what to do? (the 1-2-3 E just below the 1-3 F is, of course, a bit sharp - but "acceptably so")

Inspection shows a very suspect cork in a water key in the main tuning slide (before the valves). AND...a sharp, deep crease in the tubing (about 1 full circle from the bell - the bottom edge of the bell, the crease, and the mouthpiece are all roughly at the same position around the circle). It looks like damage done by a heavy music stand, or perhaps the edge of someone else's bell - something straight and sharp hit the tubing HARD. There are no significant dents anywhere else - I'm guessing whoever did the rehab took out lots of dents and decided that this one was too tough to tackle.

According to my back-of-the-envelope calculations (which are so suspect as to be nearly meaningless), this crease *might* be the culprit.

Are there any tests I can perform to determine if there's a good chance that taking out the crease would improve the lower register pitch problems? The crease is in LARGE tubing - about 360 degrees from the bell opening. I think it's in the THIRD section of tubing (counting from the bell backwards).

I recall a similar problem in a school-owned euphonium that my son had one year. At the time, my recollection is that many people said "yeah, they all do that - all you can do is try to lip those notes up". It wasn't as big a problem for the euph (at that time) because he didn't have all that many notes in the 2nd partial (did I get that right?). But, with the Eb helicon, it seems to me that you really need all those notes, all the way down to the low Bb (I'll give you the low A - but the low Eb and the low Bb must surely be necessary, no?)

So...could it be the crease (and if so, can I test that before committing to disassembly)? Or, is this flat 2nd partial simply what's expected from a 125yo horn? In which case...do I simply never venture below the staff, or (heaven forfend) do I give up on the Eb and the Bb and use alternate fingerings for the notes from B to D.

(and, no...it's not the case that the 1-3 F is sharp - I have the 3rd valve slide set so that the F is acceptably in tune with the notes ABOVE it. ALL the notes above the F are self-consistent - and so are all the notes BELOW the F...they are just not consistent with each other!)

[Art Hovey]

Your old pea-shooter may have been a high-pitch instrument. I have a old high-pitch euphonium which developed a similar problem when I lengthened the main tuning slide to bring it down to 440.

[sloan]

bloke: my new mouthpiece *is* a "very small" one - a G&W "Kronos". going smaller than that probably requires a custom job.

Art: it's very likely that the pitch was lowered.

Alas, the concensus so far seems to point AWAY from the crease. THAT would have been something that COULD HAVE BEEN fixed, AND I can almost make up a nice story about why a crease THERE would mostly affect those notes.

One more item. I'm suspicious of the gooseneck. It looks to me as if it is larger bore than the original equipment and has been machined to fit. It happily accepts all of my "standard American" shank mouthpieces, which seem to me to be impossibly large for an 1895 Eb helicon. I'm wondering if it might start large and then step down in bore where the (new) gooseneck hits the (old) main tubing. My question is: before I go off and start actually measuring things - is it possible that the new gooseneck is the cause of my 2nd partial woes?

Perhaps I should sleep first...