GordonH

Hello,
I bought a cornet on ebay for £30 in terrible condition but it was made near to me in Glasgow so I thought I should get it. It turned out that there was one identical one in an instrument museum and I was able to date it to 1887.

I found a good repairer who specialises in restorations of historical instruments and its just back from the initial restoration which consisted of getting all the dents out and making a new leadpipe because the old one was badly split. He had to make a completely brand new leadpipe to match the exact taper of the old one.
The amazing thing is that the valve compression is still pretty good. If you pull the third valve slide you get a satisfying pop.
The repairer says it would benefit from having the valves plated but I took it home last night and it plays very well as it is.

It was a conversion from high to low pitch but it now plays a bit flat on a modern mouthpiece so I am going to get him to sort out the receiver to take a modern mouthpiece and then get the added bit reduced to bring it into correct pitch.