Posted by Mark on October 23, 2002 at 09:38:04:
In Reply to: Re: Re: King posted by Frank Rosenau on October 23, 2002 at 00:37:33:
Frank:
It may or may not work well, from a design standpoint, and certainly not as well from UMI's dollars and cents standpoint. The 5xJ Conn (aside from being in CC) differs in total design package - the main tuning slide starts larger than the King slide presently does. The new Conn actually uses the same slide as a 20K Sousa, I, beleive.
To apply the larger bore to the King fourth might require several other after-that-branch changes to the horn that would increase it's cost. The result could be a slightly better horn that loses tons sales to the Jupiter and other competitors. I think the new King, as is, has probably mastered the bang-for-the-buck ratio.
I do know that one can probably get away with a slight increase in 4th bore without any negative consequences; My York (VERY similar to the new King), which now has the new King valves has one brief (only 8") straight piece of .718 bore tubing that freed-up the 4th considerably. While I wonder about doing the whole branch this way, I don't want to mess with success. After playing the horn for a few months, the low register started to go to town for me as I've learned not to blow it like a Cerveny. A low CC (1234 + pull) sounds great now, and projects much better than it "feels". Recently, a good CC Mirafone player was amazed at the low register when he first tried this horn, so perhaps it's all in what you are used to.
FWIW,
-- Mark Mazak