TromboneChat

I play a Bach 6 made in the early 30's, and It is difficult to get up to a Bb, even with the tuning slide all the way in. Would a solution be to reduce the size of the stem so it goes in farther? I don't know much about how this would effect the lead pipes and/or the venturi. I am using a Pickett custom mouthpiece.
Thanks

A lot of older horns like that were built before A=440 was the standard. There were even older instruments at "high pitch" so they were very sharp by today's standard, and when people started to make the move to "low pitch", it took a while for that to be standardized at 440. A lot of those old horns are built at A=438 or even lower.

Cutting the horn down around the tuning slide is one possible solution, but that might mess with how the instrument plays, and will not be great for re-sale value on a classic instrument. A custom short tuning slide might be a pricier but less permanent fix - could also alter the way the horn plays. A shaved down mouthpiece shank might work - same potential response issues - this would be the cheapest and least permanent thing to try.

Some of the folks that do repairs, etc. may have some good advice on what is the best way to address this.

Jim Scott

Thanks much

The straight tuning slide legs of older Bach’s pretty much all need to be cut about a 1/2-3/4”. Have a decent tech do this, Brad Close has mentioned how he likes to trim these down multiple times here.

I would trim the length of the straight tuning slide portion down to where Bach sells them today without thinking twice.

Cheers,
Andy

Trim the tuning slides. That usually makes an instrument play better, not worse.