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Pick up a little dinner bell at the dollar store. Ring it. Coat it with some thick, epoxy lacquer. Ring it again. You will have your answer young grasshopper. DLH

This has been done to death. Bottom line: while some believe the finish has an effect, and no one can prove they are wrong, the vast majority consider finish to be, at most, an insignificant difference compared to all the other variations between any two instruments, even two that are supposed to be the same.

But there are those -- myself among them -- that find a particular finish inspires a particular sound. When I see my bare-brass trombone with dark tarnish on it, I hear a dark sound in my head -- and that sound is more inclined to make its way to my bell. I don't for a moment believe that the finish causes the difference in the sense that it changes the physical response of the horn; it just changes my brain's ability to put a certain signal INTO it.

Of course, it's also possible that the dark look might also change my PERCEPTION of the sound coming out of the bell, after-the-fact.
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Joe Baker, who has tried to fairly represent viewpoints expressed in prior discussions.

Paul M wrote:The only guy I've heard play a raw brass horn had a very gross sound to put it lightly.

Hmm. The only tuba player I ever knew named 'Paul' had the same kind of sound.
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Joe Baker, making a tongue-in-cheek observation about the importance of sample size.

My observations and recalling comments regarding lacquer vs. no lacquer from listening to many players is that the tone doesn't really change, but the player has a different perception, perhaps a feeling of a quicker response. The audience doesn't hear any difference. O K guys, go to it.

I will take the sound of a Miraphone 186 over a Besson or a King any day Tell those two other guys they need to modify their horns so they will sound like you

Paul M wrote:

Joe Baker wrote: Hmm. The only tuba player I ever knew named 'Paul' had the same kind of sound.

Relax dude, I meant no offense by that comment. He just wasn't that great of a player. I wasn't blaming the horn.

There's the problem with text. I was using the to indicate that I was kidding around, just pointing out that the one guy you heard is insufficient data upon which to form any impression of raw brass, just as the (fictitious) one guy named Paul tells me nothing of the overall quality of tubists named Paul (the very point you made in your subsequent post).

I'll take the blame for the misunderstanding.
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Joe Baker, who, owning only one tuba -- which is lacquered -- was not offended and meant no offense.

FWIW, check the pic below. There is lacquered rose brass, unlaquered (mostly) yellow brass, and lacquered (mostly) yellow brass. The horns were purchased based on sound, playability, and price. A minor change in mouthpiece produces a more dramatic difference than the finish would.
FWIW, my wife wants me to have a silver tuba but does not want me to spend the extra money for one

Does painting one's car red make it go faster? Red primer? ....Hmmm

Same diff. with tubas.

Daniel C. Oberloh

Oberloh Woodwind and Brass Works
Saving the world, one horn at a time...

Stock cars, aircraft, and even Navy ships are painted with special paints to reduce wind, or water, resistance.

Hey, that´s neat. There are these special bionic coatings that resemble a shark´s skin. (Microscopic structure).
Among other things, these will repell any dirt, so you won´t have to polish the surface, just rinse it off.
It´s not used on cars because these must look shiny in order to sell. Used internally on a tuba, the speed of moisture coming out when you do the "king spin" will increase greatly !!! .

If you take the laquer off of the horn, it will have a slightly brighter sound, because the laquer will dampen the vibrations a tiny bit. This difference is very small though, so small that many people don't notice it and would say it makes no difference. I would say that if you're trying to brighten your sound, it's not going to be worth it to take the laquer out. Too much work for what could make 0-2% difference.

Ryan_Beucke wrote:If you take the laquer off of the horn, it will have a slightly brighter sound, because the laquer will dampen the vibrations a tiny bit. This difference is very small though, so small that many people don't notice it and would say it makes no difference. I would say that if you're trying to brighten your sound, it's not going to be worth it to take the laquer out. Too much work for what could make 0-2% difference.

And you can prove this? How?

Even if you found a way to quantify the "brightness" of the sound, the only way you could make the comparison would be to play an instrument with lacquer, then strip the lacquer, then play it again. How could you guarantee that the quality of the buzz isn't off by "0-2%"?

I'm not trying to be a jerk know-it-all (I make NO claim to know very much of "it", let alone ALL of "it"), and I'm sorry that I probably come across as one; but you have made some very bold statements of fact. This is an issue that tuba players are very concerned about, and it is important that we separate fact from opinion or theory. It is one of those areas where there's a big difference between "it is" and "it might be" or "I would think there would be". If you have the data to support your claim, I'm sure a great many of us would like to see it; otherwise, I would very respectfully suggest that you clarify your language to assert as theory, rather than state as fact, that lacquer dampens vibrations.
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Joe Baker, who asserts as theory that any difference actually caused by lacquer must be very small indeed -- VERY FAR below 2% -- but cautions that this is only a theory.

Well I'm sortof lumping fact and opinion together for this one...

It would be incredibly hard to perform an experiment and measure the tiny differences in sound between one instrument laquered and unlaquered, so that's out of the question. However, there are tons of little variables that factor into the end result sound. It's not just dimensions of the tubing. If you add mass, no matter how small, no matter where it is, it's going to have some type of affect on the sound. You have to go to extremes to proves this.

Think about bell material and thickness. Not many people will argue that a paper-thin bell made out of aluminum is going to sound somewhat different than the same bell made out of 1/4" brass. Or mouthpieces, I'm sure everyone can notice a difference when playing the same MP heavyweight vs. ultra-lightweight.

Those are extreme differences, but it doesn't mean that if you have a slight difference it won't make a change. There is no black and white in physics, it's a continual spectrum.

So adding laquer to a tuba should add a little non-vibrating mass, therefor darkening the sound a tiny bit

Does this mean you will hear a difference? Probably not. Would I purchase a laquer vs. unlaquered horn? probably unlaquered because then you don't have to worry about it falling off.

And it's very possible that the player, knowing he/she is playing a laquered horn, might play with a different sound in their head, which would produce a result completely different than anything laquer could do or not do.

All I'm saying is that the laquer will make a difference, even if that difference can't be heard by anyone. It just seems like once people hear that, they think that if they aren't playing a laquered/unlaquered/silver/gold horn, they're making a big mistake!

I wrote the following (the part in blue) as Ryan was writing and posting his clarified remarks. Ryan, that is SO much more useful. Thanks for explaining your comments better and more precisely.

I tend to agree that any change at all in an analog transmission medium is going to change the output in some way; but when we refer to "sound" we're referring to it as a practical matter. In other words, if I can perceive no difference in the sound, as a practical matter it isn't changed. The fact that a particular frequency is attenuated 0.00001 dB does technically make it different; but as a practical matter, it's the same. It certainly doesn't warrant the selection of one finish over another, and it pales in comparison to the differences introduced by a mouthpiece or a chemclean. Of course, I offer no proof that lacquer vs. bare brass makes such a miniscule difference; I only observe that no one has yet been able to quantify WHAT the difference is.

Thanks, Ryan. This moves the discussion forward in ways your first post did not.
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I tried to be very precise in my wording. I AM challenging Ryan to offer proof to back up his statements of fact, because that's what you do with fact. Go back and check, you'll see a lot of people offering their opinions and explaining why they believe them to be true, and being very careful to distinguish between what they 'believe' and what they 'know'. As to whether people can judge for themselves the veracity of claims made, I'd ask how that's possible when we don't know upon what the claim is based.

FWIW, I don't at all rule out the possibility that finish might have an effect. A lot of great players are on both sides of the debate -- including the bass bone players, and tuba players, and trumpet players and french horn players who have purposely stripped their instruments. Before someone else does this -- quite likely with no benefit whatsoever to the instrument -- isn't it worth being cautious about what we claim to know as fact? That's all I'm attempting to do.
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Joe Baker, who bears no ill-will toward Ryan or tubafreaks7, but who thinks when you're claiming a 0-2% change you invite close examination and bear a responsibility for precision.

I didn't see any hostility in Joe's response, I expect it to be challenged because this IS a forum after all.

I want to be clear about my standing on it though. I think that it is pointless to actually strip an instrument for "sonic benefits". Once again, I don't think you would really hear anything. (that 0-2% was not intended to be exact, I'm just saying that logically it has to make a difference above 0%. Maybe .00000001% is better?)

To use an analogy (because I love analogies), it's like a drag racer spitting out his gum before a race so he will go faster. The weight in the car will a couple grams less, so he will be able to accelerate faster, right? Well technically, with everything else equal, yes. However that will NEVER actually make a difference in the real world.

Color??? Air resistance??? hmmmm.....

Golf balls are dimpled to reduce air resistance and turbulence. I just wonder how many dents I need to put in my horn to make it play better

IowegianStar wrote:... or how many dents you need to put in your horn to get it to fly farther

My CC goes a GOOD 6' further than it used to with the same effort...

tubafreaks7 wrote:Why do some tubists and bass bone players choose to remove the laquer from their instruments?

Well, I was one of those people who was convinced it should make a difference, stripped the paint off of my horn, and tried to keep it fairly shiny so's not to build up too much mass with oxidation.

And these good people have convinced me that while it may have made some difference, it may also have been

Joe Baker wrote:pointless to actually strip an instrument for "sonic benefits"

On the other hand, it made a difference in my head, and for performance of any kind, you just can't buy confidence.

Ryan_Beucke wrote:it's very possible that the player, knowing he/she is playing a laquered horn, might play with a different sound in their head, which would produce a result completely different than anything laquer could do or not do

So wheather or not it makes any discernable difference, if it does to you, than it may be worth it!

tubafreaks7 wrote:Perhaps a more appropriate question for me to have asked would have been:
Why do some tubists and bass bone players choose to remove the laquer from their instruments?

Certainly they do so with the hope or even expectation that it will improve their sound; that is no evidence that it was successful.

Even if their testimonials are that the sound improved, that's no evidence that the sound really changed. It could be wishful thinking on their part (our minds don't like to admit that something we did was a bad idea), or it might be, as I've suggested before, that something happens INSIDE THEIR HEAD that causes them to play differently. If the bare brass causes a good mental change, that may be reason enough to do it; but we need to be careful about stating as fact that the instrument itself plays differently.

But to be sure, the fact that people undertake an action with a desired effect doesn't prove that the action will actually bring about the desired effect!
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Joe Baker, who is always suspicious of claims when proof is lacking, but who prefers the way his bare brass Benge 190 trombone plays compared to his son's very-similar-but-lacquered Benge 165.

harold wrote:
A study could be performed, but would require several tubas, several tuba players and a large dark room.

Well, a scientific study was done once. Walter Lawson, a custom horn maker, took a horn (that he made) that was as yet unlacquered, and played it into expensive sampling equipment and got the frequency spectrum of it. Then he lacquered that horn and redid the frequency spectrum. The reslts? A lessening of about 5% in the high frequencies that were produced, after the lacquering. On a french horn, right hand postion can change the spectrum a lot more than that. I "presume" he did the test hand-out-of-bell...and in good lab conditions; he is a very respected maker with a scientific / mathematical bent.
MA

MaryAnn wrote:A lessening of about 5% in the high frequencies that were produced, after the lacquering

Thanks MA, maybe I wasn't crazy after all. Now as to if you could hear the difference out in the hall...