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My "new" rebuild tenor Mark VI sax!

2632 Views 12 Replies 9 Participants Last post by  JL
Hello Musiclovers!
A couple af weeks ago,I started a thread about I had decided to give my
Mark VI tenor from 1968 a complete overhaul!It took nearly 3 weeks to get the job done,but yesterday I get it back!And I am very,very pleased of the result,because he told me there have been some troublesome repairjob because of earlier repair job that not was done correctly!I bought it 2 years ago, so I dont know about this!The mecanic's are nearly noiseless,no gaps ,and it is
totaly leakfree,and it feels like playing a brand new sax,and I can imaging
how the person who bought it back in 1968 felt when he played it for the first time,wow!
I have a question!When I playing it now I feel a much higher resistance than before,specially in the upper registry,and it feels a little harder to blow with
my Berg metal 110/2,but I can go down to the low notes rather easy!
Is this normal for a complete rebuild sax,and do I have to adjust my embou?
I have to admit that I have not played on my alto during the time for the repairjob,because I have built a new DAW for my homestudio,so I have lost some of my embou!
If someone have some experience of playing a rebuilt sax for the first time,
please give me a reply!
Here are a link to a picture of my "new" sax!
https://lagring.storegate.se/user/share.aspx?id=3dec96ca-4396-4e8f-8a4f-0ccc78bd24db

Take care!
Opus7:)
BTW The guy who have doing the work on my sax is
Per [email protected] Music Workshop Sweden
1 - 13 of 13 Posts
Try going up 1/2 strength in reeds.
I actually found that after my six is overhauled, it requires more air, but the sound was definetely way fuller and bigger. Kinda the opposite of what you experienced. Give it a few day to adjust, my friend.
If I were you I'd give it up as a bad job and send this Tenor to me. I'm in the UK so postage shouldn't be too bad. I was born in 1968 and always thought about purchasing a sax from the year of my birth. :D

I'm sure it's nothing you won't overcome in time. This is a problem I find regularly on my alto. My tenor is always in favour and it takes me a little while to re adjust back to my Alto. If you've been busying yourself with your new DAW, it may be just a re-learn required. Looks a beauty.
Thanx for your replyes!
Hurling Frootmig!
I forgotten to say that I use Rico Royal 2.5 reeds!
Opus7
You may have been so used to playing around the leaks that now the horn is sealing up well so you feel more resistance. A slightly harder reed might improve matters or it may just be a matter of getting used to it.
Russ said:
I was born in 1968 and always thought about purchasing a sax from the year of my birth.
I was born in 1976, so have never been tempted by such a course of action.
Well, you haven't played it in 3 weeks. You might have lost some chops over that period.
davidk said:
I was born in 1976, so have never been tempted by such a course of action.
Your best best would be a Yani bari and Yani soprano from that time frame. Maybe a Yamaha 61. On alto and tenor I think the best horns out in that period where the Keilwerth horns. Their bari's are nice as well.
A Yani bari eh? OK, so now I am tempted, but still skint. Thanks for putting the thought into my head though.

Must... resist
Russ said:
I was born in 1968 and always thought about purchasing a sax from the year of my birth. :D
I was born in 55. Hmmm, wonder if there were any good tenors made in that year? :shock:
You might want to check that the upper stack is regulated correctly. The action might be set too low on the palm keys and the side E. If it was a complete rebuild many times these guys don't take the time to really tweak the palm key heights just right by shaving a hair of the cork at a time. It's a tedious job, but it pays off big time with the way the horn feels.

You shouldn't be experiencing any resistance with an over haul. You were probably used to the key heights being more open with the cork being compressed over the years and as such the horn was a little more free blowing. My self I prefer the action to be a little higher than normal on all my selmers, although I've argued with techs about this as they think having the key heights as low as possible is the way to go for fingering speed, but for me it smothers the tone.
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I second what Heath says on key height. Several years ago when I had my VI completely overhauled I was lucky to have a tech who actually suggested raising the keys heights a bit to open up the sound. He asked if I wanted that and it sounded like a great idea to me. He was right.

With a good overhaul, your horn should play noticeably better, unless it didn't really need the overhaul in the first place. Even then, it should play at least as well.
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