Want opinions on Winnenden

I don't play a Winnenden but since no one has chimed in I will throw in my 2 cents worth.

I play Kohlert 55's which according to the Saxpics website are basically reworked Winnendens so perhaps the information will be helpful. I find the intonation on mine to be very good to excellent with a medium chamber mouthpiece like a runyon or a larger chamber such as a link or the zagar that I am using right now. The intonation seems a bit better with the large chamber but very close either way.

Sound wise I would say they are a versatile horn with a core sound right in between the sweeter sound of the Selmers and the more raucous sound of the early Conn horns.

I am thinking tenor when I make these comparisons as that is what I play most of the time. On alto I have played mostly american or german derivatives. Not too many french horns. I find less of a difference on alto but I don't play that nearly as much as tenor.

I will say I have found kohlerts to be very consistent in quality and intonation(even the later ones and the stencils). They are undervalued IMO, which I like because I can own more

Hi again
OK,the tonholes are domed one mine as well. I thought that type of tone holes is called bevelled in general-learned something. If they are rounded on the inside
it is only slightly-they look and feel almost straight to eye and finger.

Sax Magic to answer your initial question: Most of the (old) german saxes
(Adler, Hammerschmid, Hess, Hohner, Hüller, Köhler, Kohlert, Mönning, Schuster, Keilwerth, Weltklang, Wunderlich) had a dark strong voice- somewhere in the middle between the French and the vintage american saxes. Apart from Keilwerth these companies dont exist anymore, but their horns where pretty good in terms of craftmanship and sound. Many(not all) are as good as the vintage French /American saxes,but outside of Germany they are hardly known. More infos you find on www.saxwelt.de, but its all in german language

Peterogping: I am from Hamburg,I was several times in Denmark, it is so close, but since years I live mainly in Portugal. If there is an opportunity to meet, play and compare we can send PM
Besides you I never heard of anyone who owns one of these Kohlerts. Perhaps some more will appear through this thread.
And finally here are two pics of my sax.

Ps. I still hope to get some answers on my Tenor MP Ben Davis thread.

tonfisch said:

Sax Magic to answer your initial question: Most of the (old) german saxes
(Adler, Hammerschmid, Hess, Hohner, Hüller, Köhler, Kohlert, Mönning, Schuster, Keilwerth, Weltklang, Wunderlich) had a dark strong voice- somewhere in the middle between the French and the vintage american saxes. Apart from Keilwerth these companies dont exist anymore, but their horns where pretty good in terms of craftmanship and sound. Many(not all) are as good as the vintage French /American saxes,but outside of Germany they are hardly known.

Click to expand...

I agree. The Kohlerts are right in between. To me that makes them more flexible. You can get a nice classical, jazz or raunchy R&B/rock sound easily with the same middle of the road setup (medium to large chamber with a rollover baffle).

Don't be afraid to try out any of the more obscure german saxes that you run accross. There are quite a lot of pleasant surprises out there. Lots of saxes from the Adler/Huller/Amati stable out under some pretty obscure names. I've seen a couple under the Gracin name that looked real nice. I think some of the Weltklang ones would be worth looking at. I suspect that these are dogged unfairly because they came from a former soviet bloc nation. Lots of these out there under various stencil names.

Back to the kohlerts. I believe any of the Kohlerts up through th early sixties are worth looking at. Anything with the man in the moon neck would most likely be a good horn. Kohlerts are very consistent in QC and everytime I have bought one off the cuff it has turned out well. If you watch you can catch them cheap sometimes. And with Kohlert the stencils are the same build as the branded models. Here's my latest catch from EBay:http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&rd=1&item=220139444393&ssPageName=STRK:MEWN:IT&ih=012
This one is from 1958 or 59 same as the 57 with a few modifications and should be a fine hirn when done. If you can do the work, or most of it, yourself you can have a great horn for cheap. I'll have way less than $300.00 in it when I am done.