TubeNet

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Schiller-Americ ... SwdGFYrJ3S" target="_blank
Looks cheap.
I thought this model was said to be bad...
Half the price of Mack Brass/Wessex F tubas
Interesting

58mark wrote:correct me if I am wrong, but isn't that the model that are so horribly Out Of Tune that when people sell them for cheap, the people that end up buying them usually just use them for parts?

That's what it looks like to me. Those sound ok, but the one I had (just stamped JinBao) didn't have any octaves that lined up.

That's what I thought. Thanks.

If I find that a certain tuba's octaves don't line up, I automatically wonder if the mouthpiece is wrong for that horn. An example from my very limited experience with these problems: I bought a Cerveny C/Bb 4 rotor upright euphonium and the octaves did not line up. At first I thought it was me causing the problem. Then the problem was instantly cured when I replaced the Cerveny 11C mouthpiece with a generic 3G.

Ace

So if I was to throw the valveset on a different bugle....
Probably not worth the risk

But if you bide your time, they can be had for something in the neighborhood of half that.

I think the culprit IS the valve cluster, but along with the main slide. The real Firebird starts at .770, if I remember correctly, and expands through the valves. On the Chinese version, it is .748 all the way through, including the small leg of the main slide which then expands to about twice the size of the big side of the Martin mammoth main slide JUST in the main slide bend. The taper after the slide isn't too crazy to my eye. The large leg of the mts is huge.

I took one of these and switched out the bell with something with more pancake, switched the valves and replaced everything until after the large leg of the main slide with tubing so it would taper more slowly throughout and the pitch consistency improved a lot, but the sound was just dead...so it went back to the parts pile.