TubeNet

So I was taught by my teachers growing up that my EEb was the 4 valve tuba (that I eventually got), my Eb (single) being the 3 valve one (that I started on).
To that end, I was told this applies to all tubas (3 valve is single, 4+ valve is double)

Am I correct in thinking this, as it has been a point of contention in a couple of conversations recently.

All the best

The key of the instrument (F, Eb, CC, BBb) has nothing to do with the number of valves it has; 6 valves F tubas arent FFFFFF tubas after all. It relates to where the bottom note in the instruments harmonic series lays on the piano. Additional valves won't change that

As posted by wyschnei 8 years ago.....

Other than the nomenclature semantics between "BBb" and "Bb", there are literally no differences between the two. They refer to exactly the same tuba. There were/are two main methods to refer to specific pitches, the Helmholtz notation and American Standard Pitch Notation. These two systems use different notation to refer to the same note. For example

In ASP notation, middle C is referred to as C4. +1 for going up an octave (e.g. C5, C6, etc.) and -1 for going down an octave. So you have C4, D4, E4...A4, B4, C5, D5, and so on.

In Helmholtz notation, middle C is just referred to as c'. Use an additional apostrophe to go up an octave (e.g. c'', c''', referred to as "c double prime", "c triple prime," etc.) and a comma to go down an octave. You'd end up with something like this if you ordered the pitches from bottom to top:

C,, C, C c c' c''

American variations of the Helmholtz system use extra letters instead. So instead of referring to a tuba pitched in C as C,,, traditionally it's been referred to as a "CC tuba," although you still call it a C tuba. Same idea applies to Bb tubas.

It's becoming increasingly uncommon to refer to pitches (and instruments) by Helmholtz, as it's seen as less scientific and more confusing than ASP notation.

F and Eb tubas are occasionally referred to as bass tubas, and C and Bb tubas as contrabass tubas. A shorthand way of writing this is F, Eb, CC, and BBb.

This terminology is not universally used, and there is no precise commonly agreed upon meaning of BBb.

Hup

"Double" Eb can be used to denote the bore and bell size to distinguish from the old narrow bore instruments. The huge old USA York etc Eb should perhaps deserve that name although they seem mostly to have had only three valves.

Written on etude books dating back to William Bell: (Eb or BBb Bass). There is no question what those two instruments are supposed to be.

I want to say thank you to all those who commented

In my experience, it seems that Eb vs EEb (etc) was used as a matter of arbitrary discretion, with people having differing criteria.
I'm glad, as I never have to call a tuba BBb again, now. I can us Bb without feeling like in out of the loop. The downside of being taught the tuba by a euph player!

All the best everyone, thanks for your help