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Glad you took on the project Joe. Lots of school music programs are really hurting, nice that a new tuba player will get a chance.

I have been trying to get older horns that need some work and get them playable for student use. I sell them to parents who want a tuba for their kid or the school district for what I have in them. Had a family that drove all the way from Jacksonville for my $400 O-99 for their son. They had been wanting one for him for over a year but couldn't afford one. He was happy as a clam getting his hands on it and really made the old girl sing. (better than I could) "Deals" are hard to come by though. Glad you are getting another horn back in the hands of a budding tuba player.

bloke wrote:
The extra tubing I added (to avoid having to pull this slide out nearly all the way) was from an Olds O-99 junk box. This was an outside #3 slide tube that was slightly curved (i.e. of no use). Something told me not to scrap it, though, and - sure enough, it works perfectly well as cut-in-two-pieces TUBING (as long as it's not SLIDE tubing).

This is actually great advice. I never throw anything away; you never know when you'll find a use for something, that on first evaluation, might seem like junk or garbage. A 1" leftover piece of tubing could someday become a ferrule on another project, etc.

I've got a very large jar of screws that I've been collecting for over 30 years. Whenever I have leftover screws from projects, they go into the barrel. Most of them, I'll probably never use, but on more than one occasion, that jar has saved me an hour of time, and a 20 mile round-trip to the hardware store.

To the joy of my local repair tech, I luckily have an admin that lets me play the game. Meaning, my five tubas and five sousas are all instruments that I just lurked on ebay for. I waited until I would find something that could be good, but needed TLC. My weapon of choice for the MS are Conn 12/15 J's, and 641's for the HS. I have purchased eight of the12's (none over $500). Usually spending about $350-450 on the horn and another 450 to our repair guy to get it working. The only requirement is that the valves be in good shape. Five are players and three are parts horns. The 641's (if you are patient) you can find UGLY but functional ones for 1K-1500. Usually the valves are ok but the bell through the second branch are full of 'school love'.....

The sousas are Kings and I have done the same. As long as the valves are good and we can bang the big dents out or roll the bells, we are good.