Results 1 to 5 of 5

Thread: FS: assorted Shires trombones

  1. #1

    Thumbs up FS: assorted Shires trombones

    After more than 20 years of playing Shires trombones, I've fallen in love with something different and am selling most of them to fund the purchases of some new instruments. While I know this is mostly a euphonium forum, many of us double, so I thought I'd list these here in case anyone was interested.

    Large tenor trombone:


    • TW47 slide - standard weight .547 yellow brass bach-width slide with nickel-silver .547 crook. 9/10 action, never been damaged, as good as it was when I got it new from shires, never been taken apart. I give it a 9/10 because I'm sure a good tech could make it a little better, I've never felt it was bad enough to bother and I'm very picky. no dents on the crook. TINY bit of lacquer wear on the hand grip area, almost too little to mention.
    • 2L brass leadpipe. A little bit longer than the standard 2 brass leadpipe for a more centered feel and a tiny bit more resistance.
    • trubore valve section. this is an early one with the "patent pending" engraving however it was updated by shires to have the same internals as the current ones. tiny bit of lacquer wear on the section that touches your neck, looks worse in the photos in the bright sunshine than it does in person. a little bit of cloudy lacquer on the F tubing on the part that is hidden by the bell - they made it that way. Shires rest bar installed which is a feature I really like but you can easily take it off with an allen key if you don't want to use it.
    • gold brass seamed tuning slide - I like the gold brass tuning slides as I think they compliment the yellow bells by warming them up a bit. The seamed tuning slide is a more expensive upgrade that I felt added a little resistance and made the sound a little more interesting. There is a tiny scratch, about 1/8" long, on the side that faces the player.
    • 7YLWSP bell - this is the same as the very popular yellow brass two-piece soldered rim 7YLW bell but "special". We all know that more letters in the model number equals a better playing instrument, right? I felt it played almost identical to the 7YLW but felt a little easier and quicker to respond. It does hold together well at high volumes regardless. They won't really tell you what's in the secret "SP" sauce but they did say it's a little lighter than a regular 7YLW. The principal trombone player in the US Army Band "Pershing's Own" played the same bell until recently. Of course, they also make a 7YXLW and I don't know how it compares to that... The bell has a very small shallow dent about an inch below the engraving on the player side and several small deep scratches there where the end of the slide tenon once came slightly loose in the case and made contact with the bell. There is also a more subtle but longer scratch at the edge of the flare opposite the engraving. No mute dings that I can see.


    Price is $3200. Everything is pre-Eastman if that matters to you. No case included. No surcharge if you want to pay with Paypal. Shipping is extra. A great playing trombone with a really nice secure centered feel, clear articulations, easy response, and a consistent sound quality across dynamics. Has earned me quite a few compliments from conductors and audience members.

    Medium-bore tenor trombone:


    • T25NLW slide. Nickel-silver light weight .525 slide. 9/10 action. feels pretty good to me and I'm very picky but it makes a tiny bit of noise when dry which would indicate to me that the alignment could be improved. It's as good as most new Shires slides are... stockings are fine. lacquer is perfect (it was relacquered by Shires) however there was some fairly serious wear on the one cork barrel that your hand goes over and it was relacquered and you can see the metal isn't perfectly smooth underneath the lacquer because of this.
    • MT2 leadpipe (takes a large shank mouthpiece) and I will also include an M2 leadpipe which takes a small shank mouthpiece. It's amazing how it feels more like a .547 trombone with the MT2 and a .509 trombone with the M2. The M2 ring has a little more lacquer wear.
    • straight gooseneck section. this has an almost imperceptible tiny dent on it and was relacquered after being repaired by my tech with a spray can of lacquer, so the lacquer on this piece isn't great.
    • yellow brass tuning slide - has a few scuffs on the end where orchestra stage managers have seated me too close to a wall but no dents.
    • shires 3-piece counterweight
    • 7GLW8 bell - 8" gold brass lightweight 2-piece soldered rim bell. No dents, scratches, or mute dings. It does have several fairly prominent acid bleed spots on the rim at around the 2 o'clock position, Shires soldered rim bells tend to do this.


    Price is $1900. Everything is pre-Eastman if that matters to you. No case included. No surcharge if you want to pay with Paypal. Shipping is extra. I've found this to be a great setup for quintet use, where you can go from dixieland parts to beautiful dark "second horn" or "first tuba" timbres in the blink of an eye. All the components are nice compliments to a large-bore Shires setup if you have one you want to swap parts out with. There are always lots of Shires valve sections for sale if you wanted to add a valve.

    Small-bore tenor trombone:


    • T00LW slide. Yellow brass .500 bore slide with nickel-silver crook. Perfect condition, never been damaged or taken apart. I'd give it an 8/10. Being a lightweight slide it's light, but I believe it probably could be improved by a good tech beyond what Shires was able to do at their factory. I am very picky about slides and I've never felt it necessary. It's no worse than it was when I got it new from Shires. Zero lacquer wear.
    • I will include the original 3 leadpipes - T0 1, T0 2, and T0 3.
    • S1YM8 bell. 8 inch two-piece soldered rim bell. The type 1 bells are more of a traditional two-piece construction than the more recent type 7 bells which have some characteristics that are more like a one-piece bell. I've heard from some people that the type 1 bells are especially good in the small bore trombones where they add a little stability. The bell is in great shape except it suffered an accident a few years ago where the bell got deeply scratched by a bucket mute with a sharp edge on it. My tech did a fantastic job of smoothing it out however he had to polish and spot lacquer both sides at around the 2 o'clock position near the rim. Because of this there is a section on both sides of the bell about 2" in area where the color is slightly different. You can't tell from 6 feet away. See the photos. It's nice and smooth and is only a cosmetic issue.
    • 1.5 gold brass tuning slide. The 1.5 tuning slide is a tighter taper than the standard shires small-bore tuning slide and makes it play like a smaller trombone
    • I will also include the standard taper yellow brass tuning slide. this one has a VERY tiny ding in it.
    • Shires 3-piece counterweight


    Price is $1700. Everything is pre-Eastman if that matters to you. No case included. No surcharge if you want to pay with Paypal. Shipping is extra. Shires small-bores tend to play big, especially with the 8" bell, and are great small bore instruments for orchestral players who are scaling down for certain repertoire. The tighter tuning slide helps, but it still has a relatively big and dark sound for a small bore trombone. It'd also be really nice for any of those applications for which a 3B is appropriate, e.g. funk/latin jazz/etc. I'd say the 1.5 tuning slide feels like a .509 and the standard tuning slide with the large leadpipe feels like a .525.

    Alto trombone:


    • A7YLW bell. This is a two-piece yellow brass lightweight bell with a soldered rim made such that it emulates some characteristics of one-piece bells. Shires TIS alto bells are one single assembly, there isn't a separate gooseneck or tuning slide. Although they usually make them all in one alloy, I had them make this one with a gold brass back bow/gooseneck to balance the directness of the yellow brass bell. It was the first one they had made like this and they told me they liked the way it came out. Absolutely mint condition, not a spot on it. One super minor thing, when they stamped "A7YLW" on the bell before assembling the trombone, they did it too far back, and the "W" is under the ferrule.
    • A85-95 slide. yellow brass dual bore .485/.495 slide with tuning in the slide mechanism and nickel-silver crook. Mint condition, not a spot on it. I give it a 9/10 for slide action only because the TIS slides are always a little heavier and not quite as slick as regular slides, but since it's an alto it's no heavier than a regular tenor slide.
    • the #1, #2, and #3 leadpipes it came with


    Price is $2700. Everything is pre-Eastman if that matters to you. No case included. No surcharge if you want to pay with Paypal. Shipping is extra. An absolutely mint example of one of the nicest alto trombones on the market, at a good discount of the price of a new one, and you don't have to wait for them to make it!

    Bass trombone:

    <SOLD>


    Photos can be found here: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/1nq0bb07v...uUtnGRqMa?dl=0
    Last edited by bbocaner; 10-04-2019 at 09:38 AM.
    --
    Barry

  2. #2
    all sold!
    --
    Barry

  3. #3
    Only after reading everything to the end I saw what was sold. No wonder good things. Okay, I hope I’m lucky with a similar one next time.

  4. #4
    Being a Trombonist/ Euph Doubler myself and also playing on Shires for about 20 years what brand of Trombone(s) have you moved onto?
    TY, John Mckevitt

  5. #5
    Quote Originally Posted by johnmckevitt View Post
    Being a Trombonist/ Euph Doubler myself and also playing on Shires for about 20 years what brand of Trombone(s) have you moved onto?
    TY, John Mckevitt
    Rath. I bought four of them and have an additional two instruments on order to cover the whole spectrum of my trombone needs, excluding historic and German.I'm blown away by the quality of manufacture and after years of writing them off as "not my thing" I finally found the combinations of their components that really worked for me. I also really like the way the tenon is designed on Rath instruments which doesn't cut into my hand the way the lock ring on typical trombones works.
    --
    Barry

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •