Posts made by Jolter

@Trumpetb said in Old vintage maintenance.Conn:

Other oils are food based and are eco friendly.

One example is Monster Oil EcoPro Valve Oil, this is said to be 100% plant-based, is extremely long-lasting, very fast, and virtually odorless.

The threat to health is based upon high volatility and high vapour pressure. High vapour pressure means it evaporates easily.

The Monster Oil would be odourless because it does not evaporate easily.

I have not tested a sample of the Monster oil so I cannot attest to its safety. I suspect it is quite safe to use in the mouthpipe or leadpipe of an instrument.

[...]

We are very lucky to have very modern oils with low viscosity and low vapour pressure that are far safer than the more traditional paraffin based oils.

They do however cost considerably more to produce.

I looked up that Monster oil and it seems to be marked with "Aspiration hazard". Check out the picture of the back of the bottle:

https://www.thomann.de/se/monster_oil_ecopro_heavy_valve_oil.htm

If inhalation of valve oil is something we worry about, I'd still be very hesitant to recommend that anyone put even this eco-friendly oil down their leadpipe. As you say, the asphyxiation danger comes from getting the oil into the alveola of the lungs, and I'm sure that's possible from any oil of a particular viscosity, regardless of whether it is sourced from petroleum or vegetables.

@ROWUK said in Old vintage maintenance.Conn:

I would never oil the inside. Remember: valve oil is NOT food safe and if you oil the bore, you WILL breathe in the vapor.

Regular maintenance should include bathing the horn in proportion to how often it is played.

Supposedly WD40 is food safe and designed to displace water (WD=Water Displacement). That may be an option, but just as I prefer bathing myself, my horn certainly deserves regular attention too!.

I am not convinced WD-40 is food-safe. It does not have the smell of a food-safe product.

In fact, I googled it and would advise against using it in a wind instrument based on this material safety data sheet:

IF SWALLOWED: Immediately call a POISON CENTER or physician. Do NOT induce vomiting.
IF INHALED: Remove person to fresh air and keep comfortable for breathing. Call a POISON CENTER or
physician if you feel unwell.

Apart from that nuance, I agree completely with your assessment.

Hey there!

I've heard people mention oiling the leadpipe for this particular reason, but I've never put much stock in it myself. Red rot is a form of corrosion. There are apparently still competing theories exactly how it happens, but everyone seems to agree it is caused by exposing the metal to a slightly acidic environment over a long period of time. Ergo, the best way to preserve brass should be to keep it clean and dry when in storage. If you have acidic saliva or sweat, you run greater risk of red rot, but it should be very possible to mitigate it by simply cleaning it more often than others.

If you're really worried about this antique, maybe do a leadpipe swab after each play session, followed by a wipe down with a soft cloth. No horn will rot if it's clean and dry.

I suppose the argument for oiling would be that the film of oil will stick to the inside surface and prevent acid (hydrophilic) solutions from sticking there. I don't know if there's anything to that theory, but my experience as a mechanic says that if you add oil to any place that's exposed to air, that surface will start collecting particles (dust). And once you have particles stuck on a surface, those particles will absorb humidity, which means you now have an oily, dirty and wet surface. I'd say that's a red rot waiting to happen right there.

An engineer would say: lubrication goes directly on bearing surfaces and nowhere else in the machine. Other surfaces should be clean and dry.

All this said, I don't swab my leadpipe. I do empty out all slides when I get home after a rehearsal or gig, and there's usually plenty in there once the cold night air has condensed the humidity out of the last breath I left in there. I clean as often as the next guy (every few months). I always rinse out my mouth or brush me teeth before playing. Never suffered red rot in one of my horns yet.

Certain models seem very prone to red rot. Kanstul "Besson Meha", older Benges, the Yamaha Miyashiro model, for instance. You might have to be extra careful around one of those.

@ConnDirectorFan That's very cool, has anything more happened to this initiative?

Since there are a lot of duplicates photos, I assume some manual checking and removing of redundancies could be useful, as would categorizing/systemizing the scans further.

@ConnDirectorFan That's very interesting to hear, that JK are now providing their mouthpieces. So they got out of that business altogether, then.

I never saw their 7EW, but I bought a new 7DW when I visited Praha in 2004 or so. It had a wide rim, which was quite flat, a fairly sharp inner bite and a tiny tiny cup in a heavyweight blank. (Not quite megatone-weight but something like that.) I was coming from a Yamaha 11C4/7C and was hoping for just that little push in endurance/range. The honeymoon was nice. Unfortunately my intonation and tone suffered, and this was when I first discovered my lips are too big to be able to play extremely small sizes. I was young and stupid but a senior section member clued me into that my new mouthpiece was not helping my playing.

(The wide rim promoted some bad habits, too, like I used a lot of pressure those days...)

I passed the MP on to a donation drive, instruments for poor students. Hopefully one of them had thin lips...

I have experience of three Amati Kraslice instruments. A pocket trumpet (pretty sad but OK for the money), a stencil double french horn (pretty OK for a student model) and a forward-facing tenor horn (bassflugelhorn/basstrompete).

The tenor horn, pictured, was really quite good. I played it in small ensemble (and even in symphony once) for about five years before selling it on. I inquired about its age and got a response by email that it was “35-40 years old” (in 2016).

The sad part is, it has no serial!

Cerveny are currently producing a very similar tenor horn under its own mark (I believe it is CTR 592-3), which I have played side by side with this one. The new one is of course more airtight, more efficient, and slots more tightly, but the old one holds its own.

@josephtriscari62 Welcome to the forum!

@SSmith1226 I missed this topic, apparently, just caught it now. Very cool project! I bet the kids were really happy to have made a music video.

This reminded me of this take of the same song. This is now my head-canon version of the tune. Whenever I hear the original on the radio, I am disappointed that it's not The Smoking Section.

@tmd Thank you for the assist!

That is so interesting! Like getting a "message from beyond the veil". It's rare that a web forum gets to do an exit survey.

I have seen the same problems at TrumpetHerald, and have decided not to create an account there for the time being, and I think this forum is a bit friendlier and more useful. The only drawback I see to Trumpetboards is the low traffic/participation.

For now, I will just continue to participate, and maybe to a somewhat larger extent now that I'm trying to limit my time on Meta services.

(Administrator, if you do put up a Paypal link or something, I would be happy to contribute some small amount towards your costs.)

@dr-go said in Future survival of this forum:

From this count it appears 10 new users in the past month but no comments made that I can see.

Ah, I hadn't found that view. Thanks! 10 per month was more than I expected, based on the limited traffic I'm seeing.

Meanwhile, the trumpet groups on facebook seem to be amassing new low-effort posts every day. I guess it's down to the convenience of posting media (photos, videos being integrated to the site)? Combined with a critical mass of users?

I guess I'm equally to blame as everyone else, since I've been posting more in a national trumpet player group on FB than here. There are groups for nearly any hobby, including particular vintage brass instrument brands, jazz impro, whatever. While that all fits here, as well, I guess few people want the added friction of creating an extra account. Personally, I see it as an added value that my forums identity is kept separate from Facebook, but seems like everyone else sees it as a drawback.

I'd love to see Meta crash and burn sooner rather than later, but the question is if it can happen before someone else arrives to eat their lunch? And who would it be, if Reddit and regular web forums like this one are not enough?

What would everyone say about a brass-instrument themed Mastodon instance?

@dr-go said in Future survival of this forum:

What is interesting to me is we have more and more new users but very little input from them.

Do we? Color me surprised, as I'm seeing no new posts most days, or even weeks. Is there a way to see the user count?

Hi all,

I've really appreciated this forum since it was formed, out of the ashes of Trumpetmaster.com. I was very happy so many users were able to find their way here.

Obviously, there is very little activity here these days. I figured, for those few who persist in reading everything being posted here, we could take a minute to pitch ideas for what to do next.

First off, what's the competition, i.e. where is everyone now?

I've noticed there is a lot of traffic on some popular trumpet-related Facebook groups, like Positive Trumpeters Worldwide. Personally, I really dislike the Facebook product as well as its parent company Meta. They're really led the way of the notorious "enshitification of the Internet". Content is split across a multitude of groups, interlaced with ads and seemingly random "recommendations" that seem less and less relevant for each week that goes by.

What's worse, any content posted there is basically un-findable on search engines (being only accessible to members), and so the content will go the way of the dodo whenever people migrate off of that site. Web forums are at least persistent.

Moreover, Meta's latest initiative, "offering" a for-pay ad-free version of FB and Instagram feels to me like mostly an attempt to circumvent the GDPR. The EU has required that they offer a way to opt-out of the invasive tracking/advertising practices, yet now they offer it only if you're willing to pay ~10€. It will be months or years before we find out if that evasion tactic holds legal water. The fact of the matter is, few users will pay such a sum for a service whose user value has declined so much since its peak days.

I've seen a few trumpet-related Sub-Reddits, but they seem constantly inundated with sophomore highschool players with their juvenile attitudes. (r/trumpet has 40k members which is not bad, but probably most of those never participate.) Reddit has some of the same problems as Facebook, being another company driven by strange Silicon Valley economics, but at least their content is indexed on Google, accounts are free and they are not as notoriously invasive about ad tracking.

@administrator said in You may be jealous....:

Not so short anymore!

And not so trombone, either!

Anyway, that's a very rocking sound! Very cool, thanks for sharing.

It's always fun to see international attention pointed at these instruments. The Euphony "ess-kornett" is particularly well regarded. It is better in tune than the predecessor A&O ones, yet retains the correct tone.

@j-jericho said in Customized Olds Recording Model:

It looks like a solution to a problem that needed to be addressed by the techniques and skills of the player, not by adding a questionable, possibly detrimental, and undoubtedly expensive appendage to a trumpet that plays superbly without such modification.

It’s been relisted a dozen times since this thread was posted so apparently most prospective buyers are scared off by either the modification or the $2000 price.

For some closure on this, got the valves fixed (sort of). A second opinion from the replate tech said the diameter was not the problem and a replate would not help. With some lapping, he got it working a lot better but not perfect.

I have put it up for sale at a discounted price on commission at a local shop.

@j-jericho said in How about a "Random Meaningless Image...let's see them string"?:

That seems indeed very random. Am I supposed to be seeing something?

@georgeb said in I cannot find a 28b Connstellation anywhere. Is there a way to "create" one?:

I have seen a few in poor condition and the expense of re-furbishing was more than the horn was worth.

In my experience, the expense of re-furbishing is always more than the value of the horn. Both before and after.

@richard-iii said in I cannot find a 28b Connstellation anywhere. Is there a way to "create" one?:

@kehaulani said in I cannot find a 28b Connstellation anywhere. Is there a way to "create" one?:

Interested in a Cornet?
https://www.facebook.com/marketplace/109527462399665/?hoisted_items=748387889831393

Good grief. That is a ridiculous price for a 28A. I would sell mine for $500.

I don't think $800 is a lot for a playable pro instrument... Even for a cornet, which are less popular today. You would be undercharging grossly at $500. That's up to you, of course, if you were to sell. Nonetheless, I think buyers today are aware that a factory new Bach or Yamaha has a list price of nearly $ 5000. (Of course, dealers sell them below that price all the time.) Used horns have gone up in price correspondingly, at least to some degree.

"Common data formats in Germany".

@tptguy Did you go ahead with this yet?

That's really interesting, to see bright plating on the inside of the valve casing. I would have expected them to use nickel silver for the bottom half of the casing, but if you're right and it's instead plated, I imagine it complicates the manufacture quite a bit.