2nd slide kicker

[pulseczar]

Hi, does anybody have pictures of a kicker/lever type mechanism for the second slide? I'm thinking of putting one on my tuba and would like to see examples of how it's done. Thanks.

[bttmbow]

If it's a rotary horn, there are pictures out there, but if it's a piston horn the only example I can think of is a Meinl Weston 45SLP F tuba. (I am NOT the person to post these pictures)
...otherwise, if it is ipiston, you could use a long puller-type thing like on Walter Nirschl's York copies or his 4/4 CC(also Besson 995).

Have fun!

(thanks to the potential picture-posters!)

CJH

[tubafatness]

I should be able to get you some pictures of my Rudy 4/4 within the next day or so.

[iiipopes]

In the meantime, just go to the Rudy site:
http://www.rudolf-meinl.com
or the enthusiasts' site:
http://www.rudolfmeinl.com

The 2nd valve kicker is pretty clear here:

[imperialbari]

An interesting solution, , which I never saw before.

The only solution I saw until now was shaped like a standard valve paddle, which had its action arm attached to a push rod. The push rod then was mounted with a hinge on the bow of the 2nd slide. The paddle itself was mounted opposite the regular 2nd paddle.

That solution would not have worked on an instrument so large as the shown RM. The left hand and write would be strained too much.

Klaus Smedegaard Bjerre

[Thomas Maurice Booth]

I don't know how to post pictures, but my (and many others) MW 45-slp has a 2nd valve slide kicker. You can check out some photos of that for help.

TMB

[imperialbari]

The discussion about whether to lip or to apply kickers/triggers mostly is about approaches and att

As a sample:

This board hold a lot of highly competent professionals. If only their mouthpiece will fit the receiver of any given grossly abused 3-banger, they will play it as if was the dream-horn-of-a-lifetime. They can lip, they can re-finger, they compensate for odd and uneven response issues.

Yet it is among exactly this category of players, you find the highest level of privately owned and possibly also duty-provided instruments.

Players at that level have to deliver on time, and they are met wwith no mercy, if they do not perform and behave professionally. NO instrument is perfect, but professional players have to minimize the risks rooted in the equipment side of the equation.

As a teacher and a band director I have moved in many circles. I am quite acquainted with most brass instruments. I at once can tell, when amateurs have set up their slide pulling in a counterproductive way. When I suggest better solutions, the amateurs invariably tell me, that they will lip their way through any intonation problems. The fact is, that very, very few of them actually are able to do so. I can come up with very specific samples. Not in form of person names, but in form of critical tonal constellations.

Those deriding conscious players for optimising their equipment, do not necessarily have a deeper understanding of the demands in the pro-business.

Personally I have modified the ergonomics of some of smaller brasses, because my hands are too big for using the 3rd slide throw-ring. I also have modified the handgrip area of some of my trombones. My comp euph has become a main tuning slide trigger, because I wanted to play the same low range scale routines as on my bassbones (and just as well in tune).

I do not deride a player wanting a trigger for his 2nd valve. Only I have to tell, that it is a quite costly option. Especially if the installation is an after-market procedure.

Klaus Smedegaard Bjerre

[pulseczar]

Thank you for the pictures and suggestions. They're really appreciated.

The reason I'm choosing to install a kicker is because my tone color changes too drastically when I lip the note and it's one hell of a ride to try to center that note and get it in tune with the rest of the ensemble.

[imperialbari]

The reason I'm choosing to install a kicker is because my tone color changes too drastically when I lip the note and it's one hell of a ride to try to center that note and get it in tune with the rest of the ensemble.

I may have missed something, as I do not know, what instrument you play. If it by chance happens to be a 5 valve instrument with a long whole step in the 5th valve, there may be a workaround for the vulnerable (sharpish) 2+4 fingering.

Try 2+3+5, and hear, if that one helps you out.

Klaus Smedegaard Bjerre

[pulseczar]

I play a pt6 and I'm not worried about the 2+4 fingering.

It's the 1+2 and 2 fingerings. My E is incredibly sharp so I pull both the second slide and first slide out and then lip from there to keep it in tune. For "A"s I push in the first slide all the way and the A would be closer in tune, but whenever I have to play a B it's a big pain and really hard to push in the second slide while playing. That's the same situation for 2+3.

Any other suggestions to help this problem would be great.

[ASTuba]

I play a pt6 and I'm not worried about the 2+4 fingering.

It's the 1+2 and 2 fingerings. My E is incredibly sharp so I pull both the second slide and first slide out and then lip from there to keep it in tune. For "A"s I push in the first slide all the way and the A would be closer in tune, but whenever I have to play a B it's a big pain and really hard to push in the second slide while playing. That's the same situation for 2+3.

Any other suggestions to help this problem would be great.

Could you get a main tuning slide trigger installed? It may be easier and cheaper.

[quinterbourne]

What about 3rd valve for any sharp 1+2 combinations?

[Mark]

Could you get a main tuning slide trigger installed? It may be easier and cheaper.

I think this is the better idea.

[ThomasP]

Tune the 3rd. valve to play E. Use it to play E. Tune the second valve to B natural. Tune the first valve to Bb. Your A should be close if it's 12, your Eb shouldn't be too far off if it's 12, but your Ab might be a little low.

This isn't that odd. I play 3rd valve in place of 12 often.

[imperialbari]

In one respect I easily can act as a saint, because that also reveals some of the less wise decisions through my long and rich-in-fun life with brass instruments:

Any brass player should have been around the trombone and possibly also around the horn. After playing these playing in tune on the other brasses is piece of cake.

In general none of my Eb and BBb basses are friendly towards instant intonation corrections by means of slide pulling. From a talk in 1990 with the present owner of Hirsbrunner (a very wise man in brass matters) I know, that the band pitch instruments in the old US tradition were set up to provide the optimal compromise of tuning, where some less optimal notes were accepted.

All slides basically were made a bit too long especially on 3 valve instruments.

1st finger F in the staff is inherently flat on an Eb instrument. The same goes for 1st finger C in the staff for BBb basses.

My take on that problem is to re-finger problematic notes, which is why I prefer 4-valve instruments.

Symphonic CC players have to lock in dead-on with the trombones and with the strings. Their tubas are set up in a different way causing at least the 1st slide being too short in most cases. But the mid-staff D has to be dead-on fingered 1.

I have a single Bb horn set up that way. In most of the range I never use the fingering of 1+2. I consequently use 3. On other instruments I use the valves like a selection of trombone positions and use whatever fingering fits into a given chord or scale.

It is terribly easy to sit on a distance of several thousands of miles and play smart-***. Still my take on the problem of the original poster would be this one (involving no rebuilding):

Pull the 2nd slide to the outer limit of, what keeps any note fingered 2 safe. Substitute 3 for 1+2. Fix anything else by pulling 1, 3, or 4.

Get the male ends of any slides chamfered/undercut.

Klaus Smedegaard Bjerre

[tubatooter1940]

Homemade, as per a design idea that Ron Bishop gave me back in 1999. He sent me some nice photos of his Alex including a homemade second slide adjuster that looked like it was easy to duplicate. I decided to try it out and came up with a quickie design that would bind less and would also be very rigid. It is very ugly, but I had not intended to leave it on the horn as it was just an experiment to see how much could be fixed on my Alex using just the second slide. Turns out to be quite a bit. Since it worked so well I just left it on my horn. The only cosmetic thing that I decided to do was to buff off the solder from the thumb ring bracket on my bell.

I have used this for seven years now. I only have to use it on certain pitches in certain situations. I use 1st quite a bit. I never have to move 3rd or 4th.

Mr. The Elephant,
I showed your picture to my wife. She told me she loved the bedspread.

[Lee Stofer]

Of all the 2nd slide trigger arrangements I've tried, the Rudolf Meinl arrangement works best, but then it is also the most expensive, about a $750.00 option on one of his instruments. I have fabricated a couple of them, but to make one that will work right, out of really dependable materials, cost just as much for me to make, and it is a job to properly fit one into the narrow space available between the valve linkage and the 2nd valve.

Andy Smith was absolutely correct, that a main tuning slide adjuster would be a cheaper fix. But, I'd also suggest that you have the instrument carefully inspected by a competent professional, to see if there are mechanical reasons that your particular PT-6 plays that far out-of-tune. Mouthpiece choice and player's habits can make a significant difference, too.

I personally do not like main tuning slide adjusters, and have found that there are very few instruments in 100% mechanical order (valves properly aligned, dent-free, no joints leaking, valves not leaking, no water keys leaking), that cannot be played in tune without such a device. If the intonation faults are inherent in that instrument, then a main slide adjuster would be the way to go.

[Wyvern]

the VMI rotary Culbertson/Neptune BAT has a second slide kicker that is on the left side of the instrument, just past the valve set.

Here is picture. It includes adjustment, so it does not fully return if wished (as mine is set).



As the PT-6 is of the same family, maybe your best bet would be to get one of these Neptune triggers fitted.