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I took a chance on a Boosey "Solbron" Class A I found used in rural Canada, I got it very cheap. It is in rough shape but it plays. The valves seem to be re-plated with copper, but I sense to compression isn't perfect. I plan on trying very heavy valve oil to see if It helps compression. My main issue is the lead pipe, I have attached photos. I have a hose attachment and ran water through it, there seems to maybe be a little leak at the joint of the lead pipe and first valve, then once the water gets to the first valve lots comes out the bottom the the first valve.

I cleaned it up, and tried to play it with the mouthpiece that came with it a Herco "Professional Eb" with lots of plating wear on the rim. Even the small shank mouthpiece sticks out quite far. The horn played roughly 30 cents flat on all partials.

Where could I get a lead pipe for this? Where does one get blank lead pipes? and are they crazy expensive? I have decent enough repair people in my area but they have no clue on info for this horn or tubas in general.
I tried Wessex already... they have yet to get back to me. I think this is what the Bombino is modelled after, but I suspect the Bombino has enough changes that the lead pipe won't work, which is okay if that is the case. But a drop in option would be great.

Any other info people can offer me I would gladly appreciate it.
I would like a compact gig bag for it but cheap, I don''t want to spend more on a case then I spent on the whole horn. What design style of mouthpiece will work for this size of horn? I don't like the Herco, and I hope that a new lead pipe would be standard shank(American).

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/ ... sp=sharing" target="_blank" target="_blank

Thank you,

Ray

I sort of like my Herco Eb Professional mouthpiece plated with rhodium (currently twice as expensive as gold), but my Dennis Wick 3 (not 3"L") works fine also in my Eb horn. It sounds like the horn has the standard British tuba shank, you might want to keep the leadpipe.
https://www.deniswick.com/wp-content/up ... -Chart.pdf

Makes me wonder if there could be a business recovering rhodium plating off of old Herco mouthpieces...

You may want to have your brass tech/music store order a Yamaha 201/321 Eb tuba leadpipe/receiver put on that horn. It should be pretty close, and have a standard 'American' receiver.

I have a 1914 Boosey which I might do something with one day. Only a few years ago The "New" Besson I was using in a Brass band needed an extra long tuning slide as some bloody idiot had tried to do a "Fletcher cut" on it and turned it into "high pitch". Virtually any part was interchangeable between the two, except for the newer one having a larger bell.

What I am getting at is, a Jin Boa or Wessex lead pipe and receiver should be a straight exchange fit. Looking at your pics I'd say somebody has played with the lead pipe and receiver. THAT is the easy part! The valves are another matter. The way water comes out the valve bottoms indicates a lot of clearance. A full valve refit would be need at a cost of several hundred $$$$$$. Before going too far, make sure it doesn't have "HP" (high pitch) stamped on the valve casings or near the serial number as that will mean more $$$,

When I first came to Australia almost 50 years ago, I did a lot of repairs, overhauls and pitch conversions on those old horns, including valve refitting. They CAN be very nice players.

Good luck and have fun.