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Bob, let me clarify.My holton project was a special situation.The holton and the MW 2165 are both rough copies of or inspired by the same York tuba.Due to that fact, the valveset lined up just right and just had to be soldered on and braced up.Don't expect anything to ever be that easy.Contact Albert at Balimore Brass for more details.He did the work on this.[/b]

If there's any way you can get comfy with top-action valves, the Yamaha 321 Eb (4V) would be an excellent horn. I wonder if, after all your expense and effort to change over an older 3V Eb, you might be close to the price of a used 321 Eb? Just a thought.

I talked to Lee Stofer ( www.tubameister.com ) about doing this sort of thing recently with the large King Eb that is/was available at the Dillon site. Lee suggested splicing in a set of Kanstul valves. But the total cost of such a project was more than I was interested in paying, and would have easily exceeded the price of a used YEB-321. (But the result would have been very nice!)

Others suggested just buying the 3V King and practicing the false tones that it provides, which can extend your range down to the pedal Eb and below. Alternate fingerings must be used, and some lip training may be necessary to properly center the pitch. But this can work well, depending on the model of tuba in question.

(If you check out Carl Kleinsteuber's site, http://home.planet.nl/~tubaness/tubas.htm , the 2nd tuba shown started as a 3V H.N. White "King" Eb, which I sold to Carl for this project years ago. It started out as a 5V CC, then he cut it back to Eb again.)

Regards,

In the end, a tuba has only a few basic parts. It has a leadpipe, a valve body, a dogleg, outer branches, and a bell.

Flipping a top-action tuba to front-action requires disassembling the outer branches and reassembling them with the bows on the other side of bell. It's not that hard to do, but there is some effort, and while you have it all apart, it makes not sense to miss the opportunity to overhaul it.

The leadpipe and dogleg will have to be custom-made. The fourth-valve tubing will also usually require custom work. The York design puts all the valve tubing (except the fifth) on the front of the instrument, which makes it easier to provide slide clearance and to avoid valve tubing interference with the outer branches.

In Mike's case, the stock Holton dogleg was already find, given that the 2165 valveset on his instrument was made to fit the same basic outer branche design. Ditto the leadpipe. Usually, though, you have to start over with the dogleg and the leadpipe.

And if the tuba you start with has a tuning slide in the leadpipe, you'll have to fabricate a main tuning slide after the fourth valve.

I would use a valve body from a King 2341. These are fairly easy to find on instruments whose outer branches are beyond repair. But as with the overhaul of the outer branches, it doesn't make sense to go to the trouble of separating the valves from the donor horn and not have them overhauled.

The bore in the .670-.690 range will be fine for a bass tuba. That's the bore used by Yamaha in the 621, which is a small instrument, and by King in the 2341, which (if it was a bass tuba) is pretty large.

Another option is a valve body from a four-valve Eb sousaphone, if you an find one.

And don't discount Art Hovey's very clever addition of a rotary fourth valve in a three-valve instrument, manipulating the linkage design to get the paddle in the pinky position. That's unusual, but it has some real advantages, including a fourth valve branch with a larger bore than the other three. It's also a little easier to design and execute.

Rick "who thinks these projects are often more expensive than finnding something already in the correct form" Denney

'bout anything's possible... given enough time and parts. Looky here at a fun little project I finished a couple of weeks ago:

http://thevillagetinker.com/pan_america ... ersion.htm

Old Pan Am Eb on the left... Marzan BBb on the right:



Ingredients: One Old Pan American Eb top-action tuba, two Conn 14K/36K sousa valvesets, and about 32 hours labor.

Bob1062 wrote:I understand the dissasembling/assembling of the branches, but I'm afraid I have no idea what the dogleg is. Is that the tubing that goes after the valves to the tuning slide?

Actually, it's after the tuning slide. Look on Dan's picture, and downstream from the main tuning slide there is an S-curve in the tubing to make the tuning slide line up with the first of the tapered branches. That's the dogleg. Because you can't predict where the output of the tuning slide and the input of the outer branches will be in relation to each other, you generally have to custom-make a dogleg to get them to fit together.

Here's Art's "Frugalhorn" where he used a rotary to make a fourth valve.

http://www.galvanizedjazz.com/tuba/frugalhorn.html

Rick "noting that the economy of Art's project depended on a good junk pile" Denney

I'd like to add that my holton was originally a 3 valve FRONT action,not top.This also added to the ease of the new valves.

From the King website:

King® Model 2341 Tuba
Legend‚ BBb‚ full-size‚ bell up.
Features:
BBb‚ 4 front action valves‚ .687" (17.45mm) bore‚ 20" (508mm) upright bell‚
hand-adjustable 1st valve slide‚ lacquer finish‚ 18 mouthpiece. Available with
hardshell case as 2341W. A full-size tuba with a centered‚ rich tone. Front
action valves and an easy to reach 1st valve slide allow for fine tuning during
performance. Full warranty.

From the Conn website:

C.G. Conn® Model 56J Tuba
CC professional 5 (4‚1) valve tuba‚ 20" bell.
Features:
CC‚ 5 valve‚ graduated bore: .687" (17.46mm) in first 3 valves‚ .734" (18.65mm)
4th valve‚ .750" (19.05mm) flat wholestep fifth rotor valve‚ top access to all
pull sides. 20" (508mm) bell‚ bright lacquer finish. Deluxe case or carrying
bag available. Professional musicians have helped design what may well be the
best CC professional tuba to come on the market in years! Full warranty.