Discussion of tuba sizing

[pjv]

When a tuba is built 7 - 9 inches taller than another tuba (as the CSO York-style key-of-C lap sousaphones are often not much taller than three feet tall...37" tall seems common), the equivalent place in the expansion of the bugle of the taller one (compared to the shorter one) is necessarily going to occur (rather than "up top") around the area where the taller tuba's bottom bow ends...so the taller tuba's upper bow is going to necessarily be smaller diameter than the squatty CSO-style lap sousaphone's upper bow...though the taller one (where both straight bugles and laid out side-by-side) might be easily seen to sport just about as much overall bugle interior volume as the stubbier one.
Additionally, I doubt that an inch or two of bell pancake is going to add much interior volume (cubic inches/cubic centimeters/what-have-you) to a tuba.


This Hirsbrunner kaiser B-tuba is 44 inches tall with a 19" bell and am 807" valveset bore , and


this Miraphone kaiser B-tuba is about 45-1/2 inches tall, with a 17-3/8" bell diameter and a .835" valveset bore

again: if you look towards the small ends of the bottom bows of these very tall tubas, that's roughly the same place (in the overall bugle taper) where the apex of the top bow occurs in the key-of-C lap-sousaphones.

These kaiser B-tubas (to me) resemble huge "blown out" Miraphone 186 or Meinl-Weston 20 tubas, whereas the CSO York-style key-of-C lap sousaphones (to me) more resemble huge "blown out" and "cut-to-C" King 2341 tubas.

SUMMARIZING: It's a mistake to compare the upper bow of a tall kaiser B-tuba to the upper bow of a CSO key-of-C York-style lap sousaphone, notice that the lap sousaphone's upper bow is fatter, and - from that - determine that the entire instrument is fatter, because to do so is to look at two DIFFERENT percentage locations of the overall length in the tapers of those two instruments.

Really glad you took the time to map this out.
I wanted to as well back when this discussion flared up in another post.
But then I thought “nah” and suggested that this could be a lovely new topic.
And look what’s become of this monster!
Entertaining for sure.
But in the end...???
A tuba is very conical and they’re all so different.
So determining different “sizes is, like has already been said (over and over), is like giving it any other name: useful within the scope of the manufacturers own products.
Any further than that might as well be taken with a grain of salt. Just a general indication.
Very general.
Now, we can all live with that, right?

[Rick Denney]

Here’s a Holton and a 20J side by side.



In playing characteristics, this particular 20J was more of a lap sousaphone the is the Holton. But my Holton has quite a lot of zip in the sound.

Rick “the front bell is bigger, not sure about the throat” Denney

[donn]

Here’s a Holton and a 20J side by side.



In playing characteristics, this particular 20J was more of a lap sousaphone the is the Holton. But my Holton has quite a lot of zip in the sound.

Rick “the front bell is bigger, not sure about the throat” Denney

To put a Holton into the same bell front format ... proportions unreliable because of different perspective, but I'm going with bigger. Makes me wish I had a kid, this is where you put them -

[bloke]

This is a bit off topic (though an analogy to my previous post), but – in the same way – my very large kaiser bariton (rotary) - at first glance - appears no larger than a typical English-style top-action euphonium…UNTIL someone actually measures down to the same distances on the instrument and measures the bugle’s diameter at those places.
Just as with fat (vs. really-fat) tubas, the *sound isn’t much different and (as with some people’s tastes with really-fat tubas) the largest mouthpieces do not seem to be the best choices for the kaiser.
—————
*Just as with with fat vs. really-fat tubas, more of the differences are found to be in the “player experience” vs. “how they sound to patrons and colleagues”.

[bloke]

sorry...no charts/graphs/numbers (and I respect and am fascinated by them)...but (only relying on observations, memory, personal anecdotal, and the like...)

If an ancient Conn 36J is a "grand orchestral" (yes...?? no...??) tuba (am I wrong, that this was the first tuba with that sort of designation...?? ...and - yes - I could easily be wrong), The Rudy 5/4 tubas' bell shapes seem (to me) to mimic some of those old Conn (non-detachable...and NOT the 25J bells that some stick on the recording version 36J) bells. Further, the Cerveny 601 tubas (which were bought by some - often due to their pricing) seemed more like double-oversize-bore rotary valvesets stuck on Holton/York/etc. 6/4/lap-sousaphone-shaped bugles/bells. With this, too, I'm willing to be shown that I'm wrong...so I wouldn't really put either the Rudy 5/4 B-flat nor the Cerveny 601 B-flat quite into the "kaiser" category, BECAUSE...

...I have a bit of a stricter concept of "kaiser" in my head...The two pictured in my last post qualify (and they must be B-flat tubas), the Meinl-Weston 197 certainly qualifies (well: duh) and others that are close to that shape/size/height...and I believe the somewhat towering height is part of the definition, because (just as with the stubby height of the lap sousaphones - mostly in C) the distance from the tuba's opening to the player's ears (ie. how a tuba is heard by its operator) has definite effects on how a player reacts to their instrument...and the other characteristic (as Rick points towards) is their NOT-sousaphone-bell-shaped bell throats.

' no need to argue these points...They're just MY personal concepts of "kaiser" (B-flat), and no one's else.

[donn]

I believe the "Kaiser" designation will also be applied to helicons - like the "Kaiserhelikon mit Walzenventilmaschine" on the 5th (bottom) part in Daniel Ridder's lovely Tannhäuser excerpt.

[lost]

When a tuba is built 7 - 9 inches taller than another tuba (as the CSO York-style key-of-C lap sousaphones are often not much taller than three feet tall...37" tall seems common), the equivalent place in the expansion of the bugle of the taller one (compared to the shorter one) is necessarily going to occur (rather than "up top") around the area where the taller tuba's bottom bow ends...so the taller tuba's upper bow is going to necessarily be smaller diameter than the squatty CSO-style lap sousaphone's upper bow...though the taller one (where both straight bugles and laid out side-by-side) might be easily seen to sport just about as much overall bugle interior volume as the stubbier one.
Additionally, I doubt that an inch or two of bell pancake is going to add much interior volume (cubic inches/cubic centimeters/what-have-you) to a tuba.

This Hirsbrunner kaiser B-tuba is 44 inches tall with a 19" bell and am 807" valveset bore , and

this Miraphone kaiser B-tuba is about 45-1/2 inches tall, with a 17-3/8" bell diameter and a .835" valveset bore

again: if you look towards the small ends of the bottom bows of these very tall tubas, that's roughly the same place (in the overall bugle taper) where the apex of the top bow occurs in the key-of-C lap-sousaphones.

These kaiser B-tubas (to me) resemble huge "blown out" Miraphone 186 or Meinl-Weston 20 tubas, whereas the CSO York-style key-of-C lap sousaphones (to me) more resemble huge "blown out" and "cut-to-C" King 2341 tubas.

SUMMARIZING: It's a mistake to compare the upper bow of a tall kaiser B-tuba to the upper bow of a CSO key-of-C York-style lap sousaphone, notice that the lap sousaphone's upper bow is fatter, and - from that - determine that the entire instrument is fatter, because to do so is to look at two DIFFERENT percentage locations of the overall length in the tapers of those two instruments.

...but why is it that this entire thread continues to remind me of the works of Lewis Carroll...??


bloke "Drink me."

Like I said in short, you must measure on the same spot not take the first tennon because it differs a lot.



Taking the distances from the patent of Cerveny I measured my 191.
bell kaiser 191 existing oldtuba
247 220 180 178
1250 115 83 87
2000 77 60 57

So the 191 is just the size of an old tuba described in the patent.
I've also tried calculating the volume using a conical shape.
Kaiser tuning slide 23mm vs 21
Total length 530 cm minus 80 cm for distance from tunning slide to mouthpiece = 425.3 cm. The bell volume is estimated by a conical shape from the last 24.7 cm to the same size bell of 48 cm.

Kaiser = 60 + 24.9 = 84.9 liters
191 = 41 + 22.6 = 63.6 liters
Say the 191 is a 4/4 then the kaiser is 5.32/4 in volume.
A true 6/4 would need 95.5 liters.

Make the 191 a CC tuba the volume drops to 51.6 liters.
A CC kaiser would then be 68.6 liters.
A true 6/4 needs then 77,4 liters

These are estimated figures!

I don't read german. I don't think anyone would claim 6/4 implies a true 6/4 either. The terms are to denote general sizes that have become traditon when referring to tuba size.

If a Kaiser is a bigger version of a standard full size tuba, then that would be called a 5/4 by the company. The whole reason this thread started was people claiming kaisers are called 6/4. Rudy does make one, and I'm sure a few more exist that would rise to that level. The majority of kaiser horns though today fall into 5/4, because it's a size higher then a companies' full size horn.

If same company creates something even larger, like an American piston squatty, tubby, call whatever floats your boat, york Grand orchestral lap tuba copy, they have a right to call it a 6/4 because who wants to buy a 5.137/4 tuba. Doesn't ring as nice and would probably confuse people.

[Doc]

If a Kaiser is a bigger version of a standard full size tuba, then that would be called a 5/4 by the company. The whole reason this thread started was people claiming kaisers are called 6/4. Rudy does make one, and I'm sure a few more exist that would rise to that level. The majority of kaiser horns though today fall into 5/4, because it's a size higher then a companies' full size horn.

My B&S 104 Kaiser was definitely a huge tuba. Joe's 190 looked like a younger brother by comparison, and the 190 is not anything I would consider "4/4." The 104 had been labeled a "6/4 Kaiser," and I would say it certainly qualified on both counts. Subjective? Probably. Instructive/descriptive? Definitely. @SteveMarcus and I shared a couple of emails regarding size, measurements, etc. as compared to the Wessex Kaiser (which I have played a couple times), and the numbers were very similar. Even so, the 104 "felt" fatter, whereas the Wessex "felt" taller. Was it a small difference in wrap and overall design that accounted for the difference in perception? Does it even matter? Both are BARTs... make that HARTs (Huge-Assed Rotary Tubas). Are they big enough to be 6/4? I'm not sure, but the 104 had that extra BAT presence/vibration/bass knob when you wanted it, but it could still do the daisy-cutter sound unique to Kaisers. Maybe Kaisertubas are really their own unique class of BARTs?

I've played the biggest Rudy. While it is a MASSIVE cannon (it's in its own class - 7/4???), it is not what I would call (in terms of design) a traditional Kaiser, and neither is the 5/4 Bayreuth, despite both being fantastic large BBbs.

Doc (who'll likely have a Bayreuth model if he wins the lottery if, of course, he ever plays...)

[Doc]

Needed is the volume of a bunch of tubas so we can see if they can be categorized in a quarter scale.

Sounds like a great research project for a doctoral student.

[KingTuba1241X]

@SteveMarcus and I shared a couple of emails regarding size, measurements, etc.

Hopefully it was about tubas You walked right into that one

[Three Valves]

N. America will do quart scale.

EU can do liter scale.

[Doc]

@SteveMarcus and I shared a couple of emails regarding size, measurements, etc.

Hopefully it was about tubas You walked right into that one

My leadpipe is bigger than yours...

[KingTuba1241X]

@SteveMarcus and I shared a couple of emails regarding size, measurements, etc.

Hopefully it was about tubas You walked right into that one

My leadpipe is bigger than yours...

"Kaiser shank is bigger than Standard and no you can't touch it! It belongs to the wife!"

[lost]

This is the earliest ad I can find about the Hirsbrunner. It's from 1986-87 I think. Quarter systems were used by custom music earlier for sanders and RM as well.

[bloke]

Someone's going to have to dig up the issue which introduced the "HB-50 York Model"...(1980...??)
I believe there was not only a huge article, but also a full 1-page ad.
That HB-2P came later, as I remember...as they were finding additional uses for that Nirschl valveset...including (as seen in your ad) pasting that Nirschl valveset on to their rotary C tuba body.
=============
more "my tuba's better' n' yours" braggin' rights:

My Holton BB-flat "wiser" tuba is ONLY 32 inches tall...NOT 32.5"...NOT 32.2".

I challenge ANYONE to UNDERachieve THAT !!!!

[LeMark]

cool, I remember that ad

[bloke]

I don't view rotary valves as disqualifying a tuba from being a lap sousaphone.

I view the Miraphone 98 as such...but (arguably) the very BEST of them...and it happens to be a Bb instrument.

Just because something has rotors, I neither see it as necessary to either stamp some fraction on it, nor to stamp "kaiser" on it.

[hup_d_dup]

Matt Walters said my tuba is a 5/4, but I think it’s more like a 19/16. According to the Hodges tenon measurement system it comes out to more like 37/32, or maybe 75/64.

Hup

[bloke]

Matt Walters said my tuba is a 5/4, but I think it’s more like a 19/16. According to the Hodges tenon measurement system it comes out to more like 37/32, or maybe 75/64.

Hup

Why cant tuba-sizing join the modern world, and move to the metric system…??
SHEESH

[JeffT96]

Here’s my idea for a way to measure better especially when comparing short bell horns to longer bell horns. Why not measure from the end of the bell but from the center point straight down by the same amount on both tubas then measure the bell circumference at that point. In my mind I’m thinking 18” on a B flat vs 16” on a C tuba since we know C tubas tend to have a faster expansion rate. I don’t see why it wouldn’t work on bass tubas as well. On an f you could measure 12” vs 14” on an Eb. It seems to me that would take bell height factor and expansion rates out of the equation. I know there are probably variables I’m missing that might make my idea still too arbitrary. Like if it seems to work on a lot of horns but there are too many outliers.
Anyway, I’m open to anyone’s thoughts on this. In thinking more about this maybe I have the distances backwards? Maybe a C with it’s faster expansion rate you should measure the longer distance. Then use the shorter distance on B flat tubas.