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Dear Tubaplayers,
I have now after a year of waiting, received my restored and rebuilt german 5/4 B-Tuba. The maker is Schediwy from Ludwigsburg in Germany.
Does someone of you know this manufacturer? The tuba has a wonderful orchestral sound and has almost perfect intonation.
I guess the instrument is made between 1910 and 1930. I use it an a band playing original manuscript arrangements only, written for over 100 years ago.
I really feel the history inside when playing this instrument. If you have anything about Schediwy, please shout!
Pictures can be posted by request!

Photos always are fine for documentation.

Schediwy obviously is the German spelling of a Czech name.

Possibly a widow or daughter was behind the Schediwa company of Odessa/Ukraine company taking an 1885 patent on the helicon variant they named Herkulesophone.

The Ludwigsburg company used to be a supplier for the local court, which helps dating instruments in pre- and post-1918.

A somewhat odd Wikipedia article has a reference to Bergen, but also tells of the Ludwigsburg Schediwy:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ferdinand_ ... i_Schediwy

Klaus Smedegaard Bjerre

Yes please, toss up some pictures!!

Here you can see some before and after pictures of the tuba, as well as some picture taken during the restore process.
All the best from frosty Oslo!

Very nice Petter! How big is the Kaiser? What bell diameter?

What does the engraving say exactly?

K

Dear Tubaplayers,
as most very old tubas, the bell has a large throat but small bell. The bell is 42 cm / 16,55".

The engraving says:
F. Schediwy
Ludwigsburg

congratulations on that kaiser !
It looks probably better now than when it was new...

You will probably not post this in public, but would you mind sending me a pm with what you payed for the restoration? (I am not a tax controller or so...) an approximate estimation would be nice.
Since a have a nice kaiser too, it would be interesting to know what amount of EUR we are talking about, if I would ever want the same work done to mine.

How long did you have to wait until the work was done?
I'd bet it felt like a lifetime, if you wanted to start playing it...

Wim

Wim, please be aware that levels of costs differ quite a bit between even European countries. VAT may add to the differences.

I would wonder, if your country would not have several very competent repairmen. If you are close to the German border, you maybe even could find a workshop there, which is used to working with these oldies.

Klaus

Dear Tubaplayers,
please keep in mind if you want to have your fine instruments lacquered after an overhaul/restoration, very few repair shops in Europe have the machinery to do these jobs in a professional way. Many wonderful repairs have been damaged by bad lacquer jobs!
The large factories do it nice as well as companies as Adams/Holland and Leopold Müller/Germany.

Magnificient!

BigDale wrote:Beautiful. Simply beautiful.

Couldn't have said it better myself. Congrats.

That looks amazing! Apart from the obvious silver plating, how much work had to be done to it? That looks like a ton of fun to play!

imperialbari wrote:Wim, please be aware that levels of costs differ quite a bit between even European countries. VAT may add to the differences.

I would wonder, if your country would not have several very competent repairmen. If you are close to the German border, you maybe even could find a workshop there, which is used to working with these oldies.

Klaus

Klaus,

Thx for the advice. I did not plan to go abroad with this repair.
I left the kaiser last Saturday with a good repair tech here locally. He is making the instruments playable (fix loose parts, tubes and valves free, no difficult dent work).
I will evaluate his skills when I get the tuba back (but his reputation is very good).
I will also ask his opinion about restoring the instrument completely, or doing the dent ork only. It's interesting to know some other prices to be prepared if the repairman puts a price on the complete overhaul.

I'll play it for some time like that when I get it back, if the sound is ok, I can live with the dents until more funds.

Wim

That is a beautiful restoration. Did you finish it in lacquer?

Hi Alex,
I had the tuba lacquered by Leopold Müller GmbH in Germany. They have a very good environmental friendly high quality special lacquer. Some people think that lacquering old beautifully restored instruments is crazy, but since I have restored this instrument for personal use I will rather have it nice and shiny for many years, than brown, stinky and original.
All the best - Petter

holy cow!

Beautiful horn, but every time I see the name it makes me think of:

I know it's an old post but we don't see that many of these. Here's mine start to almost finished. https://photos.app.goo.gl/UhxofseZLkNkCuLd9" target="_blank