Besson F

[JCradler]

They made a batch of F compensators about 7 years ago, I played one at Midwest in 1998. It was fun to play but quite small if I remember correctly. They never caught on, anyone know why? I think there's an explanation in the archives.
Way back when, Besson(Boosey) made a 3+1 compensator that looked and played much like a really tubby euphonium. There aren't alot of those around, also fun to play.

[Chuck(G)]

They made a batch of F compensators about 7 years ago, I played one at Midwest in 1998. It was fun to play but quite small if I remember correctly. They never caught on, anyone know why? I think there's an explanation in the archives.

Way back when, Besson(Boosey) made a 3+1 compensator that looked and played much like a really tubby euphonium. There aren't alot of those around, also fun to play.

The ones from about 5 years ago and apparently had some problems in intonation and ergonomics. Pat Sheridan was involved in the project, so he would have definitive answer.

[tubarepair]

The bigger question is what will be come of the Music Group (Besson, Buffet, Keilwerth, etc.)? Rumors abound as to their future and include a purchase by Conn-Selmer-Leblanc-Buick or the dissolution of the conglomerate through selling brands off such as Buffet being purchased by Yamaha. Again, mostly rumors from some sources in the know.

The ill-fated 985 F tuba was a cut-down version of the popular 983 Eb. There are a few out there and they appear on eBay from time to time.

[winston]

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[KarlMarx]

The ill-fated 985 F tuba was a cut-down version of the popular 983 Eb. There are a few out there and they appear on eBay from time to time.

Sorry, Daryl, but you are just about as way off as you ever could be! (The proper nomenclatura for your disinformation would be "fertilizer of male bovine origins").

The 985 is not a cut down 983. On the contrary:

The 983 has a .689 bore.

The bore of the 985 is .750.

The 983 has a 17" bell.

The bell diameter of the 985 is 19".

Please go back to vocational school Daryl. You surely will know about a good one. If not so, then just ask Andy.

The 985 has its documentation up on the web. Just go find it.

Carolus Marximus Non-Impressionatus

[KarlMarx]

Surely you could have made your point without flames!! Be nice!!

When the leader of a well known brass repairmen's school distributes gibberish, then he has to take the rap!

I haven't had the chance to have a 985 in my hands, so I cannot prove or disprove its often reported on quirks.

I am not exactly impressed by the way Besson has handled the accumulated brass knowledge from close to 150 years of history in the 3 or more conglomerated companies.

But I am enough of a brass historian to know, that Besson really did an effort to make the 985 idea work.

The original Besson tuba flagships, 981, 982, 992, 994 to make it short, had keept their respective .689 and .732 valve blocks for at least a century. There wasn't much retooling in play here.

The 983 and 993 basically were rewraps of the old concepts with a lightweight element added into the overall equation.

The 985 first of all called for a retooling in the making of the valve block. An integrated "tuning stick" for the 1st slide was a "first" at least in Besson production contexts. My eyes aren't that good any more, writing Das Kapital was hard on them, but they still give me a fair impression of curves, female ones included. So I believe them, when they tell me, that the 985 bell wasn't scavenged off any other Besson model. The final flare expansion is much faster. Almost as violent as in some Yamaha piccolo trumpets.

The Besson people up to 2000 mostly were boneheads (I have talked with them and written with them). But the 985 efforts involved so large costs, that they must have been ment for real.

Most folks find that these efforts failed. That is sad for Besson and for the tuba community. But true respect has to be paid.

Carolus Marximus Saddiphonius

[MaryAnn]

If KarlMarx is not Klaus, I will eat my tuba.

MA

[KarlMarx]

Bonne appétit!

Too bad that only so few tubas, non-uterus-attached-ones that is, come with a recognised ecological seal.

Please enjoy your unilateral hysterectomy!

Carolus Non-swallowphonicus

[MartyNeilan]

Herr Marx,

I think you owe the lady a little respect.