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My god, you do good work!

Do you have any before pics?

Eric B wrote:Do you have any before pics?

I would imagine something similar to this.

This is beauttiful work Joe. You are an ARTIST!

The are always my favorite post from you. Wish you had time to take pictures during differnt phases of the repair job and post them too .

bloke wrote: ' just another "economy" overhaul (of a completely trashed Miraphone 186 BBb) for a local school



bloke "glad to be through with this one...huge shelves of summer repairs looming..."

Bloke,

Wasn't it cheaper for the school to buy a nice second-hand 186, than to have you (wonderfully) repair the thrashed one? Just curious.
I have a kaiser (remember the pics?) with a wrinkled bell and a top bow with a big ding, the valves are still ok, no dents in the smaller tubes. It would (according to my repair tech, a good one) cost me 2000-3000 EUR to repair the wrinkles and the ding (take apart the horn, repair the protection plates, repair the bow, repair the bell garland, repair the bell, put together again...). It's not worth it for the moment, because for that money, there are already very nice horns on the market. Your opinion?

Wim

Nice work, Bloke. I hope they appreciate it. And at a price they can afford, too. This will be a better horn than a new Chinese horn and at a cheaper price.

You're a heck of a guy, no matter what anyone else says....

Just curious- why not leave it in raw brass?

Jeff "ignorant of what HS bands need" Benedict

I woulda said mallet, but same general concept

toothpaste

Oh wait, can I change my answer?

your hands

bloke wrote:
QUIZ:

Today, someone brought their Miraphone "Firebird" F tuba in for repair. It had fallen over. The sixth rotor was slow and the fifth rotor was totally jammed.

What did I use to lap the rotors back into their casings?

bloke "Sometimes, it's just better to stop and figure out a way to put things back the way they were, rather than diving head-first into some so-called textbook repair procedures."

I totally agree with this....when I bought my trashed 186 off fleabay, the listing said that the first valve was 'stuck'. when I got it and looked closely, and fiddled a bit.....it was really just 'sticky'. A good soap and water wash, and a 1/2 hr in some vinegar, rinse, dry, oil, reassemble, look closely at the alingnment of the action, and it's fine. Now the remainder of the horn needed more work than i can do, and i had some done. not to make it pretty, but to make it playable.

I figured out that method years ago. I taught marching band, the trumpet and mellophone players would get carried away and slam their horns into their chest when they went to "at-ease." They would then come to me complaining that their 2nd valves were hanging up. Simple fix... take your thumb and lightly push the 2nd valve tuning slide assembly towards the bell. Distortion removed... the valve moves freely again. Then I tell them how to go to at-ease without screwing up their horn.