Re: Re: Re: Re: 7 Valve Tuba


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Posted by Matt G on January 26, 2001 at 13:53:53:

In Reply to: Re: Re: Re: 7 Valve Tuba posted by Frederick J. Young on January 26, 2001 at 10:27:02:

Once again I will restate that your valves you be two slow and heavy to take tuba playing in the directoin into which it is headed as well as the inflexibility of an 80 pound horn in BBb/EEE. As a tubist, I can say that most modern instrument manufacturers have done an excellent job in making the tuba more "agile" while retaining a god tuba sound. That is one of the main problems I would have with an instrument of your design. Also, you state that a rotary valve of .85 is more open than a piston of .75. Well of course you are correct, but you also don't mention that that .85 is farther into the taper than the .75 of the "outdated" York. Most of the original mystique of early american hons similar to the york style wrap is the short leadpipe in combination with a decent size bore. If one were to put a .75 bore valve 17-22" after the reciever it would be stuffy, however in our "yorkalikes" they are only 9-12" after the reciever. The openess of the taper is what makes a horn open not necessarily the valves. Also take into effect that no human on earth can really acheive a sense of atmospheric backpresure when simply blowing through the horn, however our sense of backpressure is related to acoustical backpressure that when feel when resonating the instrument.
When I state the idea of the "straight ahead" design in conventional 4 and 5 valve systems is that they make the best comprimise of changing the length of the bugle and maintaining agility and openess all at the same time.
Also, if the rotary valve you use is 100% geometric in volume like most piston are, than they would be very large in diameter like the Willson rotax, and in a double vent type configuration very heavy with losts of surface area like Joe S. as discussed leading to an incredible amount of inertia which I suspect would further rob the agility of a horn of your design.
As far as hearing the true fundamental to the sound as compared to a harmonic series centered around 256 hertz, that is fine with me because that is part of the tuba sound. If we all wanted to sound like synthesized bass that is transmitted through subwoofers in rap and hip-hop, then I would buy into your design which centers on lower harmonics. However, this is not the useful tuba timbre that we have come to know and love and that composers have writen for.
It sounds like your invention is trying to replace the tuba with another contrabass instrument based on the same sound producing concepts as the tuba.
Therefore, I propose you rename it and no longer call it a tuba, as it does not sound like a conventional tuba, does not perform like a conventional tuba, does not quite look like a conventional tuba, and cannot perform all of the functions of a conventional tuba.

Good luck with the new name.

Matt G


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