Advice about Tuba Chemical Cleanings

Video Transcript

Hi everybody, Kevin Smith back, TubaLove and talking about the general maintenance of my tuba. The last thing in this series that I want to talk about is what's called a chemical cleaning or a chem cleaning for short. And it's interesting that I'm doing this presentation today because it just so happens that I'm taking this horn in for the chemical cleaning tomorrow, to a place that is a band store, a music repair store, that I trust. And I've done this once a year with this instrument since I've owned it. I wasn't even aware prior in my life that this opportunity existed. In all honesty I don't know how long its been around. But the fact of the matter is, as I've said, these instruments are expensive. A chemical cleaning to me is what happens is I take it in, okay, this person, again as I had done when I was explaining the quarterly bath, they take all the stuff out of it, they take the valves out, they take the tuning slides out and he runs a chemical through it, but in this case it's one that's friendly to the brass and all the other parts of the tuba. So what it's for is the quarterly bath is great, but I do a lot of playing. And I'm bound to build up and things like tuba purists tell me "don't drink coffee when your playing because you are getting the acid from the coffee into the tuba and you are wearing it down." Maybe so, however; I need to drink coffee when I'm practicing, it's part of my ritual and I guess I'm not that much of a purist. But the chem cleaning is a way just to deal. I mean the soap bath is great, continue to do that as well. But the chem cleaning is a just bringing the big guns out. It costs me about $100 each time I do it, but when I'm thinking about the fact that because of that chem cleaning there is an excellent possibility that I can have this same tuba forever; then $100 doesn't sound like an expense anymore, it sounds like an investment. So by all means do both the bath and definitely do the chemical cleaning once a year if you do any amount of concentrated regular playing.

Watch these related videos

• 
  Advice about Tuba Chemical Cleanings

  playlist Views: 635

• 
  Tips for Cleaning a Tuba

  playlist Views: 680

• 
  How to Clean Your Tuba

  playlist Views: 928

• 
  Tips for Cleaning Trumpet Valves

  playlist Views: 1,864

• 
  Tips for Keeping the Tube Clean

  playlist Views: 756

• 
  Tips for Keeping Your Mouth Clean: Playing the Tuba

  playlist Views: 758

Community Members who...

• Favorited this Video
• Rated This Video

Thumbs up or Thumbs down? Be the first to rate this video!

Top Tags