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It is possible to find various types of helicons.

The older Buescher types had a large tuning slide on top of the valve slides. A fact, which Joe Sellmansberger made good use of, when he converted a BBb sample to CC.

The later Conn types had the exact same airpath in the body as had/have Conn sousaphones.

Last year the Russian Herculesophone was mentioned in a thread. It is a helicon with the bulk of the tubing sitting in front of the player.

That type may be found in Germany also and especially in Czechia.

I just found a photo illustrating how the smaller of the back bows takes the airpath counter-clockwise. I don’t remember ever having seen that on a piston helicon.


Klaus Smedegaard Bjerre

Boy! Those old Europeans sure must've been skinny! I certainly couldn't get my fat *** into that one!

TubaTinker wrote:Boy! Those old Europeans sure must've been skinny! I certainly couldn't get my fat *** into that one!

LOL - exactly what I thought when I saw the picture.

Well, I believe one actually enters head first, if that makes any difference.

I have no influence on the quality of of the electronic photos, which I present.

My original point was a reference to an older thread about combining a Conn 22K valve block (they are not too hard to find) with a GDR-made helicon body. There the differing air direction of some German, Czech, or Russian helicons came up.

I just chose one photo, which illustrated that implicit reference.

Due to the angle of the shot the access-area/body-volume matter came up.

The ratio is not as bad as one would expect:


The instrument is not in Germany, but in Boston yet still not in the USA. I wasn’t aware until now, that there is a Boston in the UK.

Klaus Smedegaard Bjerre

imperialbari wrote:I have no influence on the quality of of the electronic photos, which I present.

My original point was a reference to an older thread about combining a Conn 22K valve block (they are not too hard to find) with a GDR-made helicon body. There the differing air direction of some German, Czech, or Russian helicons came up.

I just chose one photo, which illustrated that implicit reference.

Due to the angle of the shot the access-area/body-volume matter came up.

The ratio is not as bad as one would expect:


The instrument is not in Germany, but in Boston yet still not in the USA. I wasn’t aware until now, that there is a Boston in the UK.

Klaus Smedegaard Bjerre

It would be very interesting to see apicture of that instrument being played or "worn" as it were.


ken k