Vintage Conn 8D Double French Horn

Description

Cool horn here and a bit of a mystery.
Here we have a vintage Conn 8D of unknown date and provenance.
It has a 600XXX serial number, which normally would make it an Elkhart horn, but the bell doesn’t have the Elkhart engraving. But it also doesn’t have the CONN LTD engraving of the Abilene horns, instead simply reading “CONN USA” There’s no letter prefix on the serial number, but “8D” is stamped on the lever bar to the left of the serial, whereas normally “8D” is stamped on the ferrule at the beginning of the leadpipe.
Still, it is undeniably a Conn 8D. The design, the bracing, the levers, the font of the engraving, the valve caps. It’s all Conn. Best guess I can give is that this might be a hybrid horn, made from some Elkhart parts and some Abilene parts. I know that some horns like that exist that were made around the transition between the two factories. This could be one of them. Just a guess, though.
Wherever it was made, it’s quite a nice player. Valves have fantastic pop to them and the instrument is very responsive with that warm, round sound that 8Ds are known for.  Gets around easily both high and low, easy to play in tune, and I would describe the overall feel as very free blowing.
Instrument has some cosmetic dents in the bell branches and some of the slides. As far as I can tell, none of these negatively affect the way the instrument plays, though at this price it would be very easy for a buyer to have these rolled out by a competent repairperson.