Alaskan restoration

[markp]

I like vintage horns, and Olds horns in particular. My main axe is a Super Recording completely restored by Dr. Valve.

This looks pretty. Anyone familiar with this outfit and the chances of this being a great playing horn? You know, not just anyone can pull this off.


http://cgi.ebay.com/F-E-Olds-FRENCH-Trumpet-Rare-Beauty_W0QQitemZ280296488601QQcmdZViewItemQQptZBr

I don't want to cast aspersions on anyone's work, but there ARE some companies that just do a superficial hack job.

Also offered by this company at present is a green Ambassador.

[A.N.A.Mendez]

Click on the previous names on ebay button..............


Been discussed here before.
_________________
"There is no necessity for deadly strife" A. Lincoln 1860

☛ "No matter how cynical you get, it's never enough to keep up" Lily Tomlin☚

[Conn6B]

[John Mohan]

[Conn6B]

[ohiotpt]

The other thing to remember -
Many e-bayer's DON'T leave negative feedback. While the rules have recently changed AGAINST the seller, it was typical to leave retalitory negative feedback, so people stayed quiet to avoid getting THEIR record hurt. Now a seller CANNOT LEAVE NEGATIVE feedback, makes it much less effective device for the seller.

Also check FEEDBACK left for others. This fellow has left quite a few negatives in his day. Some might of been justified, some were the persons ONLY negative. Also look at the TONE of the negative.

Reasonable: "No pay after usual procedure, sorry but failed to complete"
Un-Reasonable: "Liar! Cheat! Crook! Will burn in Hell after my lawyers get through!"
Who do you want to do business with?

-fred

[Trptbenge]

I have seen them on ebay for a number of years and they have done some wonderful restoration work. I thought that some of their work was at one time, done at a store in Cleveland. I could be mistaken about that. The only thing that I have ever questioned about their horns was the price. This one is no exception. They seem a little high. I realize they have been refurbished.

However, I was at a friend of mines a couple of weeks ago who collects Olds.
We were working our way through them playing each one for a couple pieces and then switching horns. His top four Olds were the Mendez, the Recording, the Super and then the French Model. It was a superb playing horn. It is in very good shape with some slight lacquer wear and an original case in good condition. He paid $750 for it a little over a year ago. So, while the French Model is hard to find I am not sure if I would pay as much as they are asking. You may have to look around a little bit but you might find a better deal.

Just my 2 cents.

Mike

[davewithabuescher]

I have never dealt with the alaska folks but they told me they had a second location in Cleveland, when I contacted them a few years back.
The Cleveland location ended up being Borodi Music.
In short I had a very bad experience with Borodi Music, here is the relevant portion of a much longer post of mine on a different topic...

<open snippet>
On Ebay I found a vendor who auctioned off complete rehab and/or re-plating of horns (I won’t mention them by name here) they had excellent feedback and the website pictures showed dire horns made new and whole again. They had 2 locations, one in Alaska and one here in Ohio an hour or two from us. I contacted them by phone and talked with the owner of the Cleveland location who told me the Buescher 400 was an excellent horn and that he would rate it as equal to a Bach, Benge or Schilke and could rehab it to better than new for $300.00 in a couple of weeks.
I took a few before pictures and sent the horn and a check to the merchant and waited.
Well a couple of weeks went by and I got a bit worried so called and again talked with the owner.
He said the horn had been laquered over the silver and gold plating and that he couldn’t buff the finish as it would just turn the laquer cloudy and dull all over, but said he could strip and re-silverplate the whole horn for and extra $100.00. I asked my son what he thought and he eagerly offered to pay the extra himself for the extra new “shinyness” treatment (some things never change . At this point I had as much money in the old 400 as the nearly new Blessing, but having a nice horn at home to practice on seemed like and awesome idea.
Well after another month I called again and “your horn is almost ready”. Well I called the next week and he promised to send it out the next day. A few days later the Buescher arrived home..
It was very shiny and the dents were mostly gone, a faint ripple here and there but mostly nice until you began to look closely…..All the slides were plated end to end, which would be fine except they were so tight they were almost immobile. The new plating was only shiny in the open areas, it was dull and flat in the nooks and crannies. My son loved it anyway and oiled the hell out of the valves trying to break them in as the vendor claimed to have re-plated them. Well 2 weeks and a bottle of Al Cass later I called back and complained of the sticking valves as they were really worse than when we had sent it in. The merchant asked me to send it back and he would polish the finish and hone the valves. Well again a large period of time and a few phone calls later the horn arrived with no discernable changes made. My son tried to play it for marching band but hated the valves and managed to get another dent or two in his backup horn.
I got him a new Blessing ML1 for Christmas and put the 400 in the closet for a few years.
<close snippet>

original thread -
http://www.trumpetherald.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=81336&highlight=alucard
_________________
1928 Conn 2B
1939 Buescher 400
1941 York Custom Model
1947 Blessing Super Artist
1959 Mt Vernon Bach Stradivarious
1961 Buescher Aristoproject
1979 LA Benge 5x
???? Holton T102S
2009 Del Quadro Custom

[Conn6B]