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[BRS]

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[UncleBeer]

I've received some very good tips on brass repair from YouTube, but mostly it's been either in person instruction, advice from right here, or just good old-fashioned trial and error. The first time I tried soldering, I didn't even know that flux was a thing

You might disagree, but I think this is one of the best channels

https://youtube.com/@TheBrassandWoodwin ... NH7fVF2uph

[BRS]

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[bloke]

Every once in awhile (when I'm not even looking for repair videos, because I don't look for repair videos) I think I've seen some person that's maybe at the cusp of "old age" (or perhaps at the end of "middle age"...??) fixing trumpets and such. I might be mistaken, but I'm thinking they live south of me, and maybe not too far from the Gulf. (I'd have to find one of the videos again and figure it out.) Anyway, some - if not most - of the techniques that they demonstrate are things that I would absolutely never do myself. I raise my eyebrows and then continue to look for what I was already looking for, which is typically a piece of music that I need to learn.

All of that having been said (and I'm not trying to be elitist or anything of the sort), quite a few of the techniques that I routinely use I would never recommend to other people who haven't been repairing instruments very long, or who are procedure-oriented rather than results-oriented. I suspect that some of the things that I routinely do could end up with disastrous results when employed by someone who really doesn't have a good touch or enough experience to have a good touch. The obvious reason I've developed those techniques is to get things done in significantly less time and with significantly less unsoldering and resoldering, and with significantly less distress to finishes. Again, don't interpret this paragraph as boasting or I-fly-above-the-atmosphere-ism. Perhaps it would be best to interpret this paragraph as "boy, is bloke lazy".

I will say (which could be misconstrued as boasting) that there is a long list of repair tools that I've never purchased because - after figuring out what they do, I asked myself "why the hell would I ever need that?"

[BRS]

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[bloke]

There’s more than one way to skin almost every catfish. The skin has to be gone. There has to still be the meat.

You can probably even do it with a dull butter knife from yo mama’s kitchen utensil drawer. Results.

truth: I have a table knife (somewhere) in my (messy) shop. It's useful.

[Grumpikins]

I find u toob videos very helpful.

However, when my meinl weston needed repairs, I was not going to attempt that at all. The joint between 4 and 5 valves came unsoldered.

My old king, I'll monkey with little easy things. It's in very good condition and I dont want to detract from that condition.

The eb i bought, was not in playing condition. It was really cheap. That's what I'm using to learn slightly more advanced repair skills.

My next project is a 'fiberglass' sousa that was free to me, they were tossing it out.

Your point of not learning on your main instrument is spot on. Really bad idea.

Anyway. Great post/topic.

Sent from my SM-S367VL using Tapatalk

[BRS]

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[GrecoTrombone]

Please, for the love of all that is brass related, don’t take brass repair instruction from YouTube videos.

I have something sitting in front of me that will cost in parts alone (which I’m not even sure are available) so much more than it would have if the owner’s internet had been down for the last week.

They pulled up the video and explained what they did. So many badwrongugly things in it.

On the other hand, YouTube is apparently an excellent source for bagpipe, piccolo, and viola repair instruction.

I think that's all I can do! Sometimes saving a few bucks on DIY isn't worth the few bucks.