Salvation Army Tubas?

[kontrabass]

A friend of mine has a line on a 4-valve Eb tuba for sale.
Apparently it's made by Salvation Army. Did some googling and it may be part of their "triumphonic" line.

Didn't know they had their own line of horns - maybe they are Besson stencils or something like that? Can anyone tell me about these instruments? I'm going to go check it out tomorrow, but the price is good, if it's a quality instrument I may bite.

[PMeuph]

This?
http://toronto.en.craigslist.ca/tor/msg/4175691151.html" target="_blank
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It was discussed two months ago:

viewtopic.php?f=2&t=57540" target="_blank

[kontrabass]

yes that's it.
appreciate the link - seems SA actually made it and it's non-compensating... maybe not such a great deal.

[Dan Schultz]

I've seen several of these tubas. I do not regard them as good players but the individual operator may get different results.

However.... the price is right and shouldn't be difficult to resell if you don't like it. Of course, logistics tends to stack dollars on top.

[Ken Herrick]

In the early 70's, out here in Oz, A lot of these old SA tubas were around and, like this one were HIGH pitch - almost EE instead of EEb. This looks like a non-comp which has been rebuilt and converted to LP. I converted several to low pitch and by replacing the leadpipe with a longer one and shortening the amount of straight tubing added in the normal conversion procedure could get them playing reasonably.

I would be very wary of the valves. There tended to be minimal metal in the casings to allow for a second refit. I would be inclined to leave it where it is.

Some say that the Salvos had their own factory. I am inclined to believe what I was told by an old ex Boosey & Hawkes worker I worked with for a while that they were really old Hawkes & Sons products.