How many "original" York CC tubas do we have now?

[Daniel C. Oberloh]

From my own experience,

I know of a hand full of original York CC tubas scattered around the US. They vary in condition and operational states.

pigman wrote:98% of the instruments York made were crap.

York instruments across the board were well made. The designs of the trumpets, cornets and trombones were okay but for the most part, rather pedestrian. However, they did make some very fine examples of trumpets and cornets such as the the Feather Touch, Monarch and the highly collectable Air Flow models of the 1930s. York made saxophones that were of cutting edge design and construction but those are quite rare and were not able to compete with the likes of Conn, Martin or the sax manufacturing giant Buescher. They offed French horn models that were from a design stand point, simply copies of instruments offered by other manufacturers like C.F. Schmidt (King and Conn did the same and still do).
Their low brass models were the flagship of J.W. York. Their tubas, euphoniums and baritones were well designed but like ALL low brass of that period, York's had some minor intonation issues to some degree that were quite manageable, All suffer to some extent the ravages of time so to to critically state that they have build quality issues is a bit of a stretch when talking about eighty-plus year old horns.

I have personally rebuilt numerous York valve assemblies and find them to have very good construction and clearly thought out designs that quite neatly lend themselves to future repair and rebuild. The materials used thru out were top shelf and the plating was of the highest quality. The branches, bows, crooks and drawn tubing are as good as any other manufacturer of the period, if not better. The machined components were consistent, well designed and accurately executed as was there bell spinning and stack-bow extrusion. Pre WWII York instrument build quality was fantastic and to state the contrary, in my view shows a truly limited knowledge of this topic. I have rebuilt numerous York instruments and have several waiting in the wings, including one early 30s CC recording model. They are not easy projects by any stretch of the imagination but in my opinion, all are a worthwhile effort.



Daniel C. Oberloh
Oberloh Woodwind and Brass Works
http://www.oberloh.com

[scottw]

[quote="Tim Jackson"]
The horn plays at A440 with the donut disengaged.

This is a new one on me: What donut is engaged? What is it, tuba-wise?

[Paul Maybery]

Just as a side bar:
The donut was an extra loop at the narrow end of the MTS.
With it in place the horn would be pitched at LP or low pitch,This was often considerably lower that A 440. More like 439
On several of these York Eb Monsters the LP was below 440 and so the donut could not be used
With it in, you guessed it the horn was in HP or high pitch.
I did discover that in the high pitch configuration there was enough slide left to get down to 440.
Also scribed on the tuning slides were marks to indicate LP.
I've seen these on pretty much all the lower York horns up to the Eb altos.