Penzel-Mueller "C" Clarinet

$400

This wooden clarinet is approx. 20 1/4 inches long

It is marked with a serial number of 9031-C.

I am listing this for a local clarinet player. This is what he has to say about it:

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This Penzel–Mueller C can be a great instrument if the potential owner is willing to invest additional resources into getting it set up properly.

I purchased it complete with 2-piece body, bell, barrel and Bb mouthpiece. It played woefully flat, almost a semitone down. A few measurements revealed the problem.
This horn has a primary bore at the bottom of the upper joint of 13.62 mm. This is actually consistent with how a C instrument should be voiced. The bore tapers to 14.2 mm at the top of the joint. The barrel, which lacks any sign of the PM logo, has a larger 14.75 mm bore.

I am unfamiliar with PM designs, but such a perturbation will cause pitch lowering and will affect some notes more than others.
A standard Bb mouthpiece has a bore of about 14.8 mm and a relatively large volume. This horn should have been fitted with a C mouthpiece having both a smaller bore and volume. While fairly common in the past, I have not been able to locate such a mouthpiece.

I have done some tinkering to confirm my suspicions. I fitted an Eb mouthpiece and added a tuning ring to fill the gap between the MP and the barrel. With this setup, 440 pitch was maintained throughout most of the range. The bell tones were flat and the upper B and C ran sharp. I am convinced that with a proper mouthpiece and perhaps smaller bore barrel, this horn can be made to play as it was intended. The flat bell tones suggest that the bell may have been taken from another PM instrument.
With the Eb mouthpiece setup, I was able to play a reading with my orchestra, although some creative lipping was required.

Pitch aside, the keys are very well made and comfortable and the action is smooth. The sound is sweet and resonant and the resistance medium to low.

I have opted to buy a Buffet E-11 "C" Clarinet only because of time constraints.

Obviously, this instrument needs some reworking to play properly, but the effort will be well worth it. Modern C’s tend to have an overly large bore so that a standard Bb mouthpiece can be used. While a good instrument will play in tune, the sound is not as sweet as a smaller bore instrument.
This Penzel-Mueller would be a great klezmer horn and would work for occasional orchestra work too.
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There is a tight crack in the barrel.
I neglected to photograph it first time round, so I went back a took the two pictures which appear at the bottom of the group of photos below - ONE and TWO.

This clarinet comes with the pictured "Woodwind" Company Eb clarinet mouthpiece, marked "G8" and "Steel Ebonite". The cork tenon is wrapped with tape so that it will fit in the P-M barrel. Also included is the pictured single-screw ligature.
I measure the mouthpiece to have a 0.046" tip opening.

The pictured case is also included.