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When I saw the new photo of DP's finished Holton 345 CC I saw some curious differences with my Holton 345 BBb. Both completely restored by Dan Oberloh. Luckily Dan took finished photos of both from the sam viewpoint, so I have placed them side-by-side for comparison. It should be noted that Dale's Holton is a rare factory original CC and not a BBb that has been cut to CC.

Besides the obvious diffence in the 2nd and 3rd bows, what caught my eye was the valves! Dale's valves have a sharper bend in the angle of the 1st valve. Note the brace from the 1st valve tuning slide to the second valve tubing is longer on the CC horn. The valves are also mounted much lower on the body of the horn with the leadpipe also much lower on the bell. Did the CC & BBb Holton used different valve sets or were changes made to the valve configuration during the production run? Did Dan alter DP's valve configuration?



Too bad Dan didn't take photos showing the back side of the tubas. It would be nice to compare the bows better.

These restorations are just gorgeous.

bloke wrote:The differences are just as noticeable from one 345 to the next (same key) as they are from a BBb to a CC 345...

...and, frankly, from one M-W 2X65 to the next, as well.

But the valve set is the one part I would have thought would stay consistant? Aren't they constructed using jigs to hold the parts in position when they are soldered/brazed? I have heard all the stories about some Holton's being 4 inches shorter or tall than eachother coming off the production line. Even the 2 CSO Yorks are not the same height.

bloke wrote:Admittedly, they come to me somewhat distressed, but I've never seen a Holton 345 walk into my shop with close-to-acceptable slide tube alignment...Perhaps those jigs were made of rubber?

I wasn't really talking about the slide alignment, but I know what you mean. I'm talking about the angle of deflection at the first valve. If you draw a line through the 4th through 2nd valve caps they are "almost" a straight line and the 1st valve angles (deflects) towards the bell. But then maybe CC players just have shorter index fingers than BBb players.

I just looked through the dozens of photos that Dan sent me over the restoration process ( 5 years), including both my and Dale's Holtons, with before and after shots. I found that the valves blocks are very different in geometry. On close inspection the valve block on my BBb is not straight at all, but slightly rounded. There is no straight line from the 4th to the 2nd valve, the 3rd valve is slightly extended (further away on your reach). And the 1st valve angle is not as pronounced as Dale's. Dale's 4th to 2nd valve alighmnet is straight as an arrow, no extended reach for the 3rd valve like mine has. But the 1st valve angle is much more pronounced. So it seems that either they created a new valve jig everytime they built a few horns or maybe they changed the design slightly over time. My Holton was built in 1966, Dale says his was delivered to Arnold Jacobs in 1972, so maybe they changed the valve set design in between those years.

Dan told me that Holton would only build horns when they received enough orders, at least 7 or 8 Dan thought. When they started the run, which ever technician was available would get the job of assembly. So they almost always had a different tech building the horns each time. This was the main reason for so many variations in production finish. With most of the parts being hand made, they didn't always fit properly. And the tech didn't always try very hard to solve the fit issues, and would just shove them together. Dan found on my Holton that the bottom bow was too short on the smaller end and he had to add on an extra half inch of material to that end to make it fit correctly. Basically, they were lucky that they had some play well as they came off the line.