186 bottom bow
Posted: Tue Jan 27, 2026 8:28 pm
A 186 Miraphone tuba features an irreparable bottom bow, and requires a replacement.
In the depths of my memory, I was fairly sure there was one in my shop's notorious attic.
Sure enough, brownish-grey, there it was (covered with thick barn dust, and heavily tarnished.
It was originally off a satin silver instrument. (The hopeless bell - over the years - was turned into patches. Per typical with me, I probably straightened out the bottom half of it and used it to convert a King recording detachable bell to a King upright detachable bell. I remember that it had a gold-plated bell interior (such as it was). I'm thinking around 1982 or 1983, a college-buddy of mine, a fine horn player, and (at that time) a high school band director in Jonesboro, Arkansas - brought it in to see if there was any hope.
There was not. The bell was squashed flat, the kranz wasn't with it, the rotors were super-worn/rattly, the linkage was mangled. He left it with me as a "donation".
I've harvested this-and-that over the years. Last year, I harvested (though quite distressed, yet I was able to repair it) the top bow cap.
I've never needed the bottom bow, which has always looked "meh, but probably repairable".
OK, once located a couple of days ago, I started working on it.
This is one of my "keep the original bow cap installed" jobs, which are tricky, but possible.
The metal on this one behaved oddly - more springy and resistant to repair (and it sure needed repair!) compared to a typical Miraphone bottom bow (as they typically mold like clay). In a few spots, the brass peeks through, and the brass is VERY yellow - possibly very high zinc content. I remember a low-1XXX serial number, so this is probably a 65-year-old bow.
Due to the springiness of the brass (and the nickel cap as well), I've had to do a bunch of (big ogre brute-strength fingers and wrists - yeah: and major upper body muscles) hand-burnishing to get it this far.
Whoever built it really messed up the inner seam (see pic). At the factory, they put a piece of sousaphone guard wire (missing) over it to hide its buttugliness. (I'll be installing a new ugliness-cloaking guard wire to replace the missing one.)
There's also a torn flap of metal (see another pic) that I realigned and will silver-braze in place.
Predictably, it's going on a brass tuba. There's a machine shop (though I'm NOT venturing out on these ice-covered roads, and - were I to do so - I wouldn't be able to get the vehicle back up here into the property, so no...but I'm going to call him and see if (maybe?) he has a big-ass belt sander that I could stop by and use to (just barely) strip off the silver. My dent removal job is very good, but a belt sander (used very conservatively) would - in addition to giving me a huge head start in getting the silver off - also fake over the subtle dent-removal imperfections (and without making the piece too thin). Otherwise, I guess I couple pull out the orbital sander and give it a shot.
Mrs. bloke and I got a start yesterday, and - on my own - I managed to get this much farther today. (confession: I mostly screwed around today - remember? I taught myself a song. This is not one of those 1-hour bottom bows, but a "few" hours will probably get it looking quite nice...so far, I've put a "couple-or-three" in). I believe it's going to be pretty good.
I'm more than glad to do this. The person who needs it is a nice person and a fine player...and (this particular bottom bow behaving really differently from any that I've previously straightened out) is presenting a good challenge.
In the depths of my memory, I was fairly sure there was one in my shop's notorious attic.
Sure enough, brownish-grey, there it was (covered with thick barn dust, and heavily tarnished.
It was originally off a satin silver instrument. (The hopeless bell - over the years - was turned into patches. Per typical with me, I probably straightened out the bottom half of it and used it to convert a King recording detachable bell to a King upright detachable bell. I remember that it had a gold-plated bell interior (such as it was). I'm thinking around 1982 or 1983, a college-buddy of mine, a fine horn player, and (at that time) a high school band director in Jonesboro, Arkansas - brought it in to see if there was any hope.
There was not. The bell was squashed flat, the kranz wasn't with it, the rotors were super-worn/rattly, the linkage was mangled. He left it with me as a "donation".
I've harvested this-and-that over the years. Last year, I harvested (though quite distressed, yet I was able to repair it) the top bow cap.
I've never needed the bottom bow, which has always looked "meh, but probably repairable".
OK, once located a couple of days ago, I started working on it.
This is one of my "keep the original bow cap installed" jobs, which are tricky, but possible.
The metal on this one behaved oddly - more springy and resistant to repair (and it sure needed repair!) compared to a typical Miraphone bottom bow (as they typically mold like clay). In a few spots, the brass peeks through, and the brass is VERY yellow - possibly very high zinc content. I remember a low-1XXX serial number, so this is probably a 65-year-old bow.
Due to the springiness of the brass (and the nickel cap as well), I've had to do a bunch of (big ogre brute-strength fingers and wrists - yeah: and major upper body muscles) hand-burnishing to get it this far.
Whoever built it really messed up the inner seam (see pic). At the factory, they put a piece of sousaphone guard wire (missing) over it to hide its buttugliness. (I'll be installing a new ugliness-cloaking guard wire to replace the missing one.)
There's also a torn flap of metal (see another pic) that I realigned and will silver-braze in place.
Predictably, it's going on a brass tuba. There's a machine shop (though I'm NOT venturing out on these ice-covered roads, and - were I to do so - I wouldn't be able to get the vehicle back up here into the property, so no...but I'm going to call him and see if (maybe?) he has a big-ass belt sander that I could stop by and use to (just barely) strip off the silver. My dent removal job is very good, but a belt sander (used very conservatively) would - in addition to giving me a huge head start in getting the silver off - also fake over the subtle dent-removal imperfections (and without making the piece too thin). Otherwise, I guess I couple pull out the orbital sander and give it a shot.
Mrs. bloke and I got a start yesterday, and - on my own - I managed to get this much farther today. (confession: I mostly screwed around today - remember? I taught myself a song. This is not one of those 1-hour bottom bows, but a "few" hours will probably get it looking quite nice...so far, I've put a "couple-or-three" in). I believe it's going to be pretty good.
I'm more than glad to do this. The person who needs it is a nice person and a fine player...and (this particular bottom bow behaving really differently from any that I've previously straightened out) is presenting a good challenge.
