Miraphone 183 Eb Questions

[Tubajug]

Greetings,

A friend of mine loaned me a detachable recording-bell Miraphone 183 Eb with four (clockspring) rotary valves just for kicks. I haven't really had a chance to sit down with it for any length of time, but so far I've noticed that the F in the staff is horribly flat, in fact when I put it with a tuner, just about every combination involving the first valve was flat. The fourth valve, however seemed really sharp! When pulled all the way out, I could get the low Bb pretty well in tune. The Eb octaves were wonky too. Eb in the staff had to be lipped way up to get it in tune compared to first ledger line Eb.

The horn has had the small receiver swapped for one that accepts standard shank mouthpieces (I was using a Helleberg 7B on it). Could this be the source of the intonation woes or is the 183 just not that great to begin with? Or is this just a "dog" among usually good examples of this model?

What have been your experiences with these horns? Thanks!

[Dan Schultz]

I've owned a couple of those horns and found all of them to be lightweights in terms of both intonation an range.... with almost no register below a D below the staff.

The best use I could find for one was to use the valve section on my cimbasso... where I extended the valve circuits from Eb to BBb.

Also... the rotors are useful for adding fifth valves to .688" bore Kings.

[1895King]

A friend of mine (now deceased) had a rotary Eb and he said every rotary Eb he had ever played had the same problems, no matter what manufacturer.