Could anyone tell me a bit about this tuba?

[Tuba Frey]

Hello all,
New user here, longtime reader. I just bought a tuba off ebay recently and can't seem to find much information on the brand and can't find anything out about the model. The brand of the tuba is called Elaton, which I could not find a whole lot of info about aside from it being a German brand, whether or not it is a decent brand or not I am not sure of, there is no model number on it so I have no way of knowing that.

Here are some pictures of it http://s388.beta.photobucket.com/user/V ... brary/Tuba

I know this thing needs a bit of work but for 350 dollars I think it is worth fixing up though it appeared to me as it had a lot of amateur repairs done to it over the years and is missing a few parts (3 Back Rotary Caps and a Back Rotary Plate) which finding those parts is not an easy task. But anyways if anyone knows anything about the tuba any info would be greatly appreciated!

[mark38655]

I tried to look but it says its a private album.

[Tuba Frey]

My bad, had set that album as public but I guess I forgot a setting there, should be able to view it now.

[Tom]

Looks like an older Cerveny Piggy stencil.

Those are usually pretty decent tubas.

[Tom]

I sold that a while ago as a project horn....

Good luck!

Well then...descriptions don't get much better than that!

[Tuba Frey]

Well I suppose that description pretty much explains everything, here I was thinking this tuba wouldn't take a ton to repair as it looked in serviceable condition at least. Guess I can at least take it somewhere and see if its possible to fix. Should have probably known that wasn't the original bell since it blocks the top tuning slide.

Well thanks for the info and sorry about the amateur remark I shouldn't have said that since I know nothing about tuba repair and any repair I did would be an amateur fix

[Ben]

the engraving on the valveset looks miraphone to me. Very much like my 70's miraphone.

[Tuba Frey]

That's what I was thinking too because I am currently using a late 60s Miraphone and the engraving is identical, almost wanted to take the parts off that and put them on mine but then I realized the miraphone was a much nicer instrument than mine haha

[UDELBR]

Still says "private album" for me.

[Tuba Frey]

Strange, I've made public every setting I could on photobucket, lets see if imgur works any better, try this link http://imgur.com/a/mOKlT

[imperialbari]

Elaton is short for Ernst Langhammer + Ton (= sound). The Meinl family married into the Langhammer family and eventually the company ended up as Meinl-Weston. Their site has an article on the family history.

Maybe not directly related, but Langhammer tubas don’t surface on eBay that often:

http://www.ebay.de/itm/Error?item=16091 ... 500wt_1413

There still is a Langhammer/Elaton company in Burgwald in central Germany:

http://www.elaton.de/webshop/

Klaus

[Rick Denney]

...I had hoped to cut it to CC, but didn't have enough time or patience to work on another tuba.

No amateur repairs, here, just took a whole bunch of parts and slapped 'em together to see if they would make something usable.

I think the only usable parts on there are the bell and the valve section - if you can get the valves to work. If I recall right, the fourth valve was out of round or something - probably from shipping (had a box of parts shipped to me, though the padding wasn't too good).

Hmmm. The problem with selling something that looks usable but isn't is that your disclosure to whomever you sell it to doesn't necessarily get transmitted to any subsequent buyers. No, it's not your fault that they do so but I think you could have prevented it by taking it apart and selling the parts separately, or as a lot.

And the repairs look amateurish enough--just like the hackwork on my own project tuba.

To the OP, I'd get a propane torch, take it apart, and sell the parts, or get your money back from whomever you bought it from, if that is still possible, especially if it was presented as either a playable instrument or with the description, "I don't know anything about tubas." If it was described as an unplayable Frankentuba, then that's what you got, heh.

Rick "who would not sell his own project tuba as a playable instrument, even though it is pitched in F and reasonably playable" Denney

[TubaBob]

Now that you know it's a Frankenhorn, give yourself permission to have fun with it.

[Dan Schultz]

The valve section on my cimbasso were salvaged from an Eb Elaton.

[thattubaguy]

Thats a TON of work, man