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So I have two horns.. one old Yamaha with pistons and then a new horn with rotary valves. The tone on the new one is much better, but the I can play much faster on the Yamaha. I've put a lot of oil on the new one.. is there anything I can do, or are rotary valves always going to be slower than pistons? Thanks!

It's a store brand horn from Dillon's Music in NJ... about a year old and I use rotor oil bought in the store (though I used valve oil for a month before I realized they were two different things).

otismoe wrote:It's a store brand horn from Dillon's Music in NJ... about a year old and I use rotor oil bought in the store (though I used valve oil for a month before I realized they were two different things).

There is a slight difference between rotors and pistons, and between the throw/action of all tuba's in general.

It could be that you aren't oiling the rotors properly. How are you oiling them?

If you used piston oil and then threw on some rotor oil without cleaning the horn, that could have created some slight gummi-ness as well.

These threads have a lot of good info.

viewtopic.php?f=2&t=2393&start=0&hilit= ... ary+valves" target="_blank

viewtopic.php?f=2&t=36972&start=0&hilit ... ary+valves" target="_blank

It IS just you. Give up the tuba and take up the viola.

Some rotary-valve tubas feel sluggish when you try to do fast fingering because the rotors are solid bronze (heavy) and pistons are hollow and light. Adding to that is the fact that rotary valve linkages are often designed for "short action", meaning that the paddle only needs to move a short distance to complete the stroke. That makes them hard to move rapidly; it's like trying to pedal a bicycle from a standing start in high gear. Shifting to a lower gear makes pedaling easier, so you can accelerate more quickly. You can shift your rotary valves to a "lower gear" in three ways:
(a) by lengthening the paddles,
(b) by shortening the part of the linkage that goes down from the axle to the first ball-joint, or
(c) by increasing the distance between the rotor axis and the second ball-joint.

The first method is easiest to do and also easiest to undo.
The third method will actually result in less wear and tear on the rotor bearings.

If you make the stroke length equal to that of a piston tuba you will find that the rotary valves feel just about as fast as pistons. Not everyone will agree, but for me the longer stroke length does not cause any loss speed; I can wag my fingers an inch and a half just as rapidly as I can half an inch.

There are some rotary tubas out there that don't feel sluggish at all, but they are rather expensive.

Some rotary valves need "valve oil" IN the valve. My (french) horns have always been this way....I put blue juice or al cass right down the slide into the valve. If they get gummy, I run lighter fluid in there and really clean them out, then follow with the other stuff. Oiling the bearings is different from oiling the valves, and the only rotary instrument I know that doesn't take valve oil IN the valves is Finke horns with plastic rotors. Valve oil will trash them.

If it's not just slugglish valves, there is the concept of what I call valve-air-embouchure timing, which is really different between pistons and rotors; even between two french horns, the timing is different. It gets really precise with rotors....I had to "time" the air/chops change to the exact moment when my finger hit bottom (or top) of the stroke on the valve paddle. It just feels different, and I had to slow down and figure it out.

MA