Tuba Exchange...

[eupher61]

Case in point:

that's not GM...

[Dan Schultz]

Case in point:

that's not GM...

Pinto.... Vega... what's the difference. They were both crap! How 'bout lthose Gremlins? Remember the GM V-8's that needed a new camshaft at 35K miles?

[windshieldbug]

OK...

<img src="http://h-body.org/library/hbodyscans/19 ... ega_01.jpg" width="700">

[eupher61]

that was the Nova===No Go.

[The Big Ben]

The Vega. What a missed opportunity...

1. The engine. GM had a perfectly good all-iron 4 cylinder engine that they had sold millions and millions of as a six and are still selling in a marine and industrial version. Put a fancy valve cover and an electronic ignition on it and call it good. They would have had a motor which had good horsepower and would last for 200K miles. With *no* development costs. What did they do? Go with an unproven, all-aluminum OHC 4 that was lucky to get 50K and had a ton of development costs. They eventually started putting the iron engine in Pontiac versions and called the "Iron Duke" but people were turned off on the car.

2. The body. They designed the production line in such a way that the rust proofing solutions did not get to all of the inside parts of the metal. Who ever heard of a car rusting out above the windshield on the driver's side? In production, an air bubble would form right there which kept the rust proofing from reaching the metal...

People wanted to buy (and did buy) this good looking, good fuel mileage (30+ MPG) American car. However, the execution was so poor that it would be very difficult to choose a Vega over the cars coming in from Asia.

The Chinese have the ability to make good tubas. Dalyans, by some estimations, are passable even good tubas. Bloke had nice things to say about that small CC he was selling. If they start doing some research and development instead of just copying an existing tuba, who knows what they might make? Pricewise, they might go up but, if it was possible to have a BBb or CC 4/4 tuba that was as predictable and reliable as a Miraphone 186 but for $4k, how many do you suppose they would sell?

Now, since this thread is about the Russians, I'm not sure if the Russians will ever produce something that is reliable and predictable. The cancer of the Soviet system went so deep that I'm not sure that they even know what 'reliable' means...

[Tubaguy56]

Well, sorry to go back to the original point of the thread. I bought my gronitz PCK from Tuba Exchange and I had great service. and they recommended the correct size case for me and then sold me it. oh, as for tubas, I'll buy them from 4 places, Japan, Germany, Switzerland, Japan, 'nuff said.

[runelk]

Tuba Exchange - Run away, run away now!!!

[WakinAZ]

Richard, now that everyone's had their fun, what kind of horn are you looking for and for what kind of playing?

Eric

[cjk]

Acept sell in spain or Mexico.

that was the Nova===No Go.

That's urban legend. It never happened.

http://spanish.about.com/cs/culture/a/chevy_nova.htm

[dmmorris]

Does anyone remember the Chevy MONZA

Ya mean this one from 1962? .......never made production!

My dad had one of the real production versions......... a white 1962 Corvair Monza 4-speed, convertible. A very cool car, that was amazingly quick. It was of course "unsafe at any speed", due to a swing axel suspension and "slim-to-not-existent" ballast in the trunk. Dad usually stored his full-cases of Ballantine Beer up there.....the trunk was huge and in the front of the car!


The '62 Mazda (Toyo Kogyo Co.) looked like this Mazda took over the Wankel rotary piston license from the Germans in 1961. I think this little beauty had a 4-stroke, 2-cylinder.

The '62 Corvair Monza looked like this This little beauty had a Air cooled, 6-cylinder.

[lgb&dtuba]

The Vega. What a missed opportunity...

It came with a shop manual, standard. Should have been a tip off. I wore it out. The car and the shop manual.

[Barney]

The Vega engine story is interesting.

Does anyone remember the Chevy MONZA (confusion with MAZDA completely intentional) in which they were planning on installing Wankel (rotary) engines - and bailed at the 11th hour in favor of their standard fare?

Chevy Monza ................. a REAL Mazda

bloke "a good decision for Chevy, actually. Until very recent years, rotary engines have leaked oil like sieves, and still to this day do not offer good gas mileage... ...and yep, my Mom had an ASTRA (Pontiac Vega) p.o.s. station wagon"

Yep, I remember the Monza well. My first car, in fact, was a Monza. Fold down the rear seats and plenty of room for tubas.

As for the engine, I don't know if this was common, but mine had a V-8 in it. Way too much engine for that sized car, but quite enjoyable for a high schooler with a lead foot.

Thanks for bringing back some nice memories.

[Richardrichard9]

Richard, now that everyone's had their fun, what kind of horn are you looking for and for what kind of playing?

Eric

um.. I am basically looking for a horn for home use/one that will get me through college.

[WakinAZ]

So you intend to play this through your college years or just up until you enter college and then you'll buy a different horn? You probably want a 4 or possibly a five valve horn if it will follow you to college.

Performance or Music Ed major or non-music major? Performance they will probably want you to play CC. For Ed or non-music major BBb is fine.

Still need more info on budget, your goals, etc.

Eric

[windshieldbug]

I wonder how one went about changing the sparkplugs on that V-8?

Growing up, I knew someone that had a 440 Dart
(and the answer was, you had to remove the engine mountings and raise it up, which kept you REAL careful from letting them get fouled up in traffic... )

[windshieldbug]

Yes, but does the lacquer have Chinese lead paint in it!?

[tubathig]

My favorite saying is "A more expensive instrument is cheaper in the long run" i also agree with schlep, run over a chicken

[Rick Denney]

small access plate under the passenger side carpet to reach the back plug on that side, the rear plug on the drivers side could be gotten to through the engine bay (but don't ask me if it was from the top or bottom!)

As I recall, it was through an access panel on the fender wells, ala the Buick Regal and other A cars of the late 70's/early 80's.

Rick "easy if you knew the secret--or had the factory maintenance manual" Denney

[Rick Denney]

Never said it was. It is a Ford Maverick. It is an excellent example of the awful little cars Detroit foisted on the American populace for a while. Dan said GM but was speaking generically. The Maverick was pretty generic.

Actually, the Maverick was not a bad little car at its price point. It was certainly no worse than the Toyota Corolla or Corona of the day, and certainly no worse than, say, a Volkswagen Squareback.

I owned (and subsequently built into a race car) a 1976 Toyota Corolla. That car was butt-ugly and had serious design issues. You didn't typically put more than 100,000 miles on one of them, by any means. I also had a '74 GMC pickup that was still running when I sold it to Ray Grim (for admittedly not much money) with something like 170,000 miles on it. Then there was the 1970 Cutlass that was then and still would be the most comfortable highway cruiser I've ever driven. We sold that car with over 100K miles on it, and it was still running fine when the idiot who bought it from use ran it into a bridge abutment the next day (he survived, but the Cutlass didn't). And then there was the '71 VW Campmobile that couldn't survive 100,000 miles if you carried it on a truck bed the whole way. It truly scared the fathers of potential dates, too.

The Vega was a reliable car--IF--you maintained them like a European car. They needed very frequent oil changes and scrupulous maintenance. People in those days thought of American cars in terms of their pig-iron V-8's and straight sixes. Those engines could really take abuse and people learned to abuse them. The Vega could not take that abuse.

There were real bowsers, of course, including the Pinto, all the AMC cars of that era (except the 'Cuda), and the Chevette. But you could include a 1200CC Corolla, a Squareback (especially the one with the "automatic" stick shift), and any French or Italian car at the lower price points in that company. These were all worse than the Vega in many ways.

But the 70's cannot be wholly rejected when this was one of their crowning achievements:



Of the 13,000 Urban Assault Vehicles (aka GMC Motorhome) they made during the '73-'76 production, at least half are still on the road, and some with half a million miles on them. Here's mine, without the nice, new paint of the coach above, but still going strong after 100,000 miles and 34 years of abuse:



Let's face it, most cars of that era were ugly because people wanted ugly cars. Nobody who wore a paisley shirt with 6-inch collar points under a polyester leisure suit has any cause to bring against car styling from that era.

Rick "who would rather buy something old whose quality and value in the used market is proven than something new that loses half its value instantly" Denney