Sousaphone Knowledge Bowl

[k001k47]

186

[jacojdm]

Has some similar characteristics to modern King sousaphones...

Yep. Three valves. Tuning slides. A bell. Might be a King.

[dwaskew]

We're going to have to reconsider your tenure ...and (perhaps) redo your orals.

yup. I agree.

[Todd S. Malicoate]

A Weril J470 - in silver? I didn't know they made them in silver...would that be a J470S?

Nice looking horn!

[windshieldbug]

King 1250

[ZNC Dandy]

Is it a Boosey or Besson?

[TUbajohn20J]

I almost said it was a Conn 38K..until i noticed the short action valve. But I would have to go with the short action Holton, as it was made before Conn patented the short action valves.

[TUbajohn20J]

ok we give up...SOOO WHAT IT IT???

[iiipopes]

Miraphone 3100U

[The Jackson]

York #4?

[TUbajohn20J]

I knew something was fishy here. I would have never guessed it was chinese. It looks exactly like a 38K to me but that is definately one beautiful horn.

[Rick Denney]

bloke "My favorite feature is the campy east German-style bracing.

That's what kept my fingers away from the Submit button. Those braces look just like the braces on the erzatz Alexander or like-a-B&S-but-much-less-refined that Dan Schultz was asking about in another thread. I've never seen braces like that on an American sousaphone, but I haven't seen every American sousaphone.

Sanders tubas were not Chinese very early in the 80's. I bought an SM-1314U in 1985 that was Cerveny/Amati through and through, including under the stick-on label that said "Sanders". That was not a bad tuba, actually, but it was definitely not Chinese.

Rick "who knew those were not Holton short-action valves" Denney

[TUbajohn20J]

So..did that thing actually come with short action valves from China? or was it a custom American job

[OldsRecording]

York #5?

[windshieldbug]

Sousaphone Knowledge Bowl

New test, easier, therefore less mean...

My guess: NOT a sousaphone

(you say 'less mean', but still creepy!)

[Bandmaster]

Let me guess... the Chinese manufacturer was Jin Boa? I played one of their sousaphones at the 2005 NAMM Show and it had short stroke valves that look just like the ones in Bloke's satin silver sousa. It is definately a Conn rip-off design. I remember pulling out one of the valves and saw the huge stack of felt washers on the valve stem to align the valve. I was thinking at the time that they should install a solid plastic spacer and just have a couple of felts on top of it it instead of a dozen or more felts stacked together. But it also played pretty nice as I remember.


(Sorry, the angle of the photo make the bell look really big...)

[imperialbari]

Like Wade I saw several conflicting hints towards one well-known maker. I checked with my instruments, my galleries, and catalogues. So far I only knew of one European maker applying the true American style valve block and not just a rewrapped top action block on their sousaphones. That of course was B&M/Nirschl. But apparently Alexander also have made such sousas. At least they are in a 30 years old catalogue.

I remember your previous reports on this Chinese short action non-offset sousaphone, but they didn't come up from my memory until after you gave the solution.

Given the quite impressive present finish of that sousa: have you bought it back and overhauled it?

The 20K is said to have body of the older 38K/40K, only the valves having been changed. I had a suspicion that its flat 3rd partial came from the distortion caused by the short action valves, as the 40K has no oddities to its 3rd partial. But when the short action Chinese valves don't cause any extreme flatness of the 3rd partial, why then does that note cause troubles on the 20K?

Klaus

[Bandmaster]

Let me guess... the Chinese manufacturer was Jin Boa? I played one of their sousaphones at the 2005 NAMM Show and it had short stroke valves that look just like the ones in Bloke's satin silver sousa. It is definately a Conn rip-off design. I remember pulling out one of the valves and saw the huge stack of felt washers on the valve stem to align the valve. I was thinking at the time that they should install a solid plastic spacer and just have a couple of felts on top of it it instead of a dozen or more felts stacked together. But it also played pretty nice as I remember.


(Sorry, the angle of the photo make the bell look really big...)

probably...but 20 years before 2005. Again, in the same group of samples (c. 1985) there was a predecessor to the (Chinese) "Sanders" rotary BBb...a reasonably faithful copy of the Communist German tall rotary BBb tuba.

All of the instruments in that sample lot had lacquer finishes. The quality of the polishing jobs were very marginal. All of the instruments appeared to have (only) been tripoli buffed, cleaned off with lacquer thinner, and then spray-lacquered over the ho-hum lustre.

--------------------------------------

hmm...According to this: http://www.alibaba.com/product-gs/20063 ... phone.html

the Jinbao sousaphone only has a 16mm bore...If they have never changed their model (though the bell diameter is correct), this would not be the correct manufacturer.

The correct model for this match up is http://www.alibaba.com/product-gs/20063 ... phone.html which shows a bore size of 18.6mm, so who knows? Below is a close up of the valve section of the sousa I played at the NAMM Show in 2005. It shows that the braces are of the same design. So it just fuels the fire for the comparison...