F Attachment on .500 bore Gilkes instrument

[brsndhny]

I need opinions about adding an F attachment to my new Shires/Marshall Gilkes .500 small bore trombone.

[Burgerbob]

Why exactly?

I'm not against the idea, I use a King 3B/F at work and I LOVE it. But, that's a pretty cheap horn and it's a little bigger than your Shires.

[harrisonreed]

Just get a horn designed to have an F attachment, like a 3BF. Or is the valve a drop in option for Shires? If that's the case, go for it.

[Matt K]

Their small bore F attachment horns are superb. I’ve only played one though. If I could convince my better half that it would be prudent for me to buy a new one, I’d probably get an MD+ with an F attachment.

That said, my King 3BF is also pretty great.

[Finetales]

Does Shires do small F attachments on custom order? I know you can get Rath to make you an R12F for example, but haven't heard of anyone doing that with a Shires. If that's an option, I'd go that route.

My only specific recommendation is that if you're going all in on adding a custom valve section to a small jazz horn, consider having it built in G with an additional slide for F. A horn smaller than a 3B that you're probably not going to be playing low Cs on is the perfect use case for the mid-register facility of a G valve.

[Elow]

Shires posted a .508with a valve on their story on instagram and i asked if that would become a standard option and they said “Absolutely!”

[OneTon]

Do you have any specific concerns?

Many years ago I ran with people on the east coast who played jazz, popular music, and genres outside of jazz and pop on similarly sized straight trombones. I have seen a few 0.500 bore f attachment trombones over the years. It sounds to me like you may already have something in mind to play on it. The trombone modified as such will offer many options and has potential to expand the horizon of anyone for whom you play.

[Matt K]

They use the same rotor as their alto. As of a few years ago the pricing was the same as the large bore offering but they didn’t make them Modular

[elmsandr]

Does Shires do small F attachments on custom order? I know you can get Rath to make you an R12F for example, but haven't heard of anyone doing that with a Shires. If that's an option, I'd go that route.

My only specific recommendation is that if you're going all in on adding a custom valve section to a small jazz horn, consider having it built in G with an additional slide for F. A horn smaller than a 3B that you're probably not going to be playing low Cs on is the perfect use case for the mid-register facility of a G valve.

This makes the most sense for 99%+ of tenor players, too. Sure, you may need a low C eventually, but certainly not daily.

Cheers,
Andy

[BGuttman]

Does Shires do small F attachments on custom order? I know you can get Rath to make you an R12F for example, but haven't heard of anyone doing that with a Shires. If that's an option, I'd go that route.

My only specific recommendation is that if you're going all in on adding a custom valve section to a small jazz horn, consider having it built in G with an additional slide for F. A horn smaller than a 3B that you're probably not going to be playing low Cs on is the perfect use case for the mid-register facility of a G valve.

This makes the most sense for 99%+ of tenor players, too. Sure, you may need a low C eventually, but certainly not daily.

Cheers,
Andy

Certainly for a tenor player who uses a small bore. Your need for the outer positions is minimal: occasionally a C in the bass staff or a B below it; never an E below the bass staff. For a small bore tenor player, sometimes a trill valve (half or whole step) makes more sense than a true attachment.

[Finetales]

This makes the most sense for 99%+ of tenor players, too. Sure, you may need a low C eventually, but certainly not daily.

Cheers,
Andy

Certainly for a tenor player who uses a small bore. Your need for the outer positions is minimal: occasionally a C in the bass staff or a B below it; never an E below the bass staff. For a small bore tenor player, sometimes a trill valve (half or whole step) makes more sense than a true attachment.

If you play weddings, you 100% need an F valve (not a G valve) on your commercial horn. Proud Mary is on the set and there's no bari player? Better get ready to pop some loud low Ds and C#s.

Of course you could just bring two horns, but it's much easier to just have a 3BF.

But yeah, most of the time a small tenor doesn't need those low notes.

[Matt K]

Just get a 2nd valve on the 3B!(…yes, I’ve thought about it…)

[Finetales]

As have I!

[brsndhny]

Will the Shires .500 bore Gilkes horn be a stuffy difficult blowing instrument in the F Attachment range? An article on a Thompson Music site talks about a so called "advanced rotary valve". What's the difference in sound and response between a "traditional rotor valve" and an "advanced rotary valve"? Are these terms synonymous, both referring to the same valve? I don't want to install a non-free blowing valve that produces an unstable funky sound on a new Marshall Gilkes model horn. The Shires Team has implied to me that the valve could be interchanged with a "gooseneck" which would cause the horn to become a straight tenor trombone with no valve.

I have no way to travel to the Shires shop to try out the proposed combinations.

[Finetales]

Will the Shires .500 bore Gilkes horn be a stuffy difficult blowing instrument in the F Attachment range?

With a modern, custom valve from a boutique maker? I seriously doubt it.

[OneTon]

I own a 0.500 inch bore Shires from before Eastman took Shires over. I like it better than a 6H. I also own a Bach LT42AG and Bach LT42G. I like straight horns: Nobody is taking a knife to my Shires or LT42G. I am retired and do not relish spending large amounts of money on my hobby/addiction.

Years ago Chuck Ward rebuilt an Olds Studio slide for me. I bought it from Sam Burtis. It was a good horn. Most people hot rod the 0.485-0.500 dual bore slides into 0.500-0.500 bore slides. We couldn’t get a 0.485 bore at the time. I elected to use a new King 0.490 upper with the King leadpipe and a new King 0.500 lower. The end result did not blow exactly the same as the original. The difference was within what I would expect between two production horns, side by side. I listened to Chuck Ward’s advice and was satisfied with the outcome.

I own a Duo-Gravis with funky butt side by side triggers and the stock King rotary valves. I put Holton rotary valve oil into it every time that I play it. I think it probably helps fill up any gap due to older tolerances and wear. I am used to it and other than occasional arthritis issues, I am satisfied with the results. Some people are really impressed with a Hagmann valve and open wrap such as my LT42AG has. I could live with Bach’s traditional valve and closed wrap.

From having worked with Chuck Ward and BAC, my experience and expectation is that Shires, Baltimore Brass, Chuck Ward, and BAC are unlikely to do something with an f attachment that fatally changes a horn’s basic characteristics. Neither is that horn ever going to blow the same. No one can predict the outcome of your proposed modification.

Sam Ash has an Olds Recording with an f attachment that at 0.495-0.510 will be very close to the 0.500 bore
Shires. At $705.00, something like this would give me an “outside” and spare gig horn. I could see how much of the literature that I play justifies an f attachment. I have played a straight Olds Recording and know that the straight horns are good horns. It would be reasonable to expect to get most of my investment out of the Olds Recording. There are 0.508 bore King 3Bfs out there that are more mainstream. I do not have the numbers on converting a Shires to an f attachment.

That’s all of the facts, data, and identified subjectivity that I can offer. Good luck.

[brsndhny]

I wrote a very lengthy full page small print reply, but lost it after being told to login for a second time after trying to post a worthy answer. Unfortunately it was not saved and I did not know it was going to be destroyed. Cheers Guys

[brsndhny]

Maybe an administrator has it somewhere?

[OneTon]

It’s happened twice to me, too. I was trying to give helpful content. Maybe I should have let it go.

[BGuttman]

If you are planning to make a large post, consider typing it in a Word Processor and copying it over.

I know my computer sometimes seems to like to delete whole paragraphs possibly due to my fingers hovering over the touchpad and doing things I didn't expect. On a short note it's inconvenient, but when whole pages of stuff disappear it's maddening.

[Matt K]

Its hard to troubleshoot some of these issues when they arise because I never seem to run into them. That said, I use a very, very vanilla setup for my social media so I don't have any extensions or any additional privacy settings enabled. There's one particular extension that I used to use that gave me a ton of strife that I don't remember the name of, but the basic idea is that it frequently deletes cookies. I stopped using it because it broke like, every site I used it on.

If you do run into issues like that, I do recommend making a comment in the suggestions area of the forum with the OS, browser (and version), as well as a list of all addons you have installed. If I get that, I can possibly figure out root cause. That said, I pretty much always do what Bruce recommended, one way or the other, for this site and others because I also get spell check. I don't always act upon that spell check but sometimes I do!

[TromboneSam]

On the topic of posting, I like to use the preview feature to “save” my work periodically. It also tells me whether or not my formatting is right for photos.

As far as the Marshall Gilkes model with trigger, I’m eager to see what OP finds out from Shires and if they go through with it.

[harrisonreed]

The shires valve won't be stuffy. It isn't stuffy on their alto, so there is even less of a chance of it being stuffy on a tenor. If they can throw in an interchangeable gooseneck, you can't lose.

[TromboneSam]

Welp, there you have it! Marshall was able to get one direct from Shires.

[TomRiker]

The same video is on Shires facebook page. There it says the valve is .525 bore. It also says that a detachable valve is a standard option for the Gilkes model.

[chobone]

I own a Shires small bore with an F-attachment. I purchased this a while back from someone who used to work there. I'm not sure if it was a prototype or just a fun experiment based on the lack of lacquer and the not quite finished look. I believe the rotor is the same one they use on their altos. Despite the smaller size it plays fine through the lower range and isn't as stuffy as you would think. I found that all of the Shires horns I own always feels and plays bigger than their counterparts, ie a .525 8" Dual Bore setup vs a Bach 36B or MD+ vs a 3B. So for comparison's sake I'd say that it plays somewhere between a 36B and a 79h and definitely bigger than a 3bF.

The bell is an S1YM8 and the slide that came with it is an odd one. It's a dual bore 500-508MD slide with nickel outers/crook and side mounted water key.

I'm looking forward to trying out the Gilkes F model horn if they ever put it into production. If Shires figured out a way to make a closed wrap F attachment with a free blowing valve I would definitely buy one. It would be the perfect horn to play all of these reduced orchestration show books with low C's and B's floating around.

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[shinythings7]

Wanted to resurrect this thread and ask if anyone has had any follow up with the MG horn with the f-attachment and if we know what value they put on it? Also thoughts on how it plays to you would be appreciated.

[Blabberbucket]

Wanted to resurrect this thread and ask if anyone has had any follow up with the MG horn with the f-attachment and if we know what value they put on it? Also thoughts on how it plays to you would be appreciated.

It's a .513 valve, identical to the ones used on their Alto w/ Bb valve horns. Valve tubing is .525, so it opens up very quickly from the receiver into the valve and then has a choke on the return thru the valve.

I built Marshall's small bore modular bell section when I was there. There were a lot of design/fit issues, poor fixturing, etc with those small bore valve sections due to a rather quick and poorly planned roll-out of the small bore modular line. They were addressed when I was building them, can't speak to the build quality of the ones being made now.

The one ChoBone posted is a one-off, but looks mostly like the ones being built now except for the new ones come with a single angle brace on the F slide, instead of the double.

[shinythings7]

Wanted to resurrect this thread and ask if anyone has had any follow up with the MG horn with the f-attachment and if we know what value they put on it? Also thoughts on how it plays to you would be appreciated.

It's a .513 valve, identical to the ones used on their Alto w/ Bb valve horns. Valve tubing is .525, so it opens up very quickly from the receiver into the valve and then has a choke on the return thru the valve.

I built Marshall's small bore modular bell section when I was there. There were a lot of design/fit issues, poor fixturing, etc with those small bore valve sections due to a rather quick and poorly planned roll-out of the small bore modular line. They were addressed when I was building them, can't speak to the build quality of the ones being made now.

The one ChoBone posted is a one-off, but looks mostly like the ones being built now except for the new ones come with a single angle brace on the F slide, instead of the double.

Awesome, thanks for taking the time to respond! Really appreciate your perspective and insight, as I was especially curious what the dimensions were for the valve and tubing.

[Vegasbound]

This makes the most sense for 99%+ of tenor players, too. Sure, you may need a low C eventually, but certainly not daily.

Cheers,
Andy

Certainly for a tenor player who uses a small bore. Your need for the outer positions is minimal: occasionally a C in the bass staff or a B below it; never an E below the bass staff. For a small bore tenor player, sometimes a trill valve (half or whole step) makes more sense than a true attachment.

Or very useful in any number of theatre pits when you can’t go past 3rd without limbo dancing under the players chair in front of you

[CalgaryTbone]

Its hard to troubleshoot some of these issues when they arise because I never seem to run into them. That said, I use a very, very vanilla setup for my social media so I don't have any extensions or any additional privacy settings enabled. There's one particular extension that I used to use that gave me a ton of strife that I don't remember the name of, but the basic idea is that it frequently deletes cookies. I stopped using it because it broke like, every site I used it on.

If you do run into issues like that, I do recommend making a comment in the suggestions area of the forum with the OS, browser (and version), as well as a list of all addons you have installed. If I get that, I can possibly figure out root cause. That said, I pretty much always do what Bruce recommended, one way or the other, for this site and others because I also get spell check. I don't always act upon that spell check but sometimes I do!

I had the same issue twice recently.

JS