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When washing/rinsing out a German style tuba, is it safe to run the snake through the valve section if the valves have not been removed? The way the tubing is laid out it looks like it would be a clear path.

Thanks

I would not.
Those surfaces are mechanically critical, and the farther a snake is extended, the less control there is, and the more the likelihood of jamming/scuffing/scratching/cutting.

Consider hooking up a rubber (NOT vinyl !!!) hose to a hot water source (washing machine, or water tank drain), with the outlet end of the hose in a controlled area (such as a bathtub w/beach towel, or outdoors In soft grass). Attach a high-pressure nozzle to the hose. Remove the main tuning slide. Controlling the hose - and avoiding being scalded, jet high-pressure hot water through the instrument from the mouthpiece receiver and work the rotors vigorously for as long as a minute or two, allowing smut and debris to be flushed out through the main tuning slide outer tube.

This should work as well as any snake (not as good as complete disassembly, but accomplishing something), and avoiding any risk of lodging something in the instrument or nicking critical valve surfaces.

This method (nor a snake) will remove NO hard lime deposits.
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Though I’m completely capable of a proper cleaning job and have am completely set up for them (as I regularly do them for others), I use this technique on my own rotary instruments, because it’s quick and easy, and because it seems to avoid the full-blown job becoming necessary. My vintage F tuba features a small diameter mouthpipe tube, and this type of cleaning seems beneficial when the instrument doesn’t seem to quite play as well as it had been playing.

I also subscribe to the belief that heavy frequent - daily or even more often - oiling (with nearly no cost oil, such as ultra pure lamp oil) discourages hard lime deposits.

Thanks Bloke. That confirmed my suspicions but was sure. Certainly don't want to do any harm.

Imagine having a snake lodged where it is already passing through two or three rotors… What a nightmare!

My teacher taught me to fill the bell with water and then take a plunger to it. Just make sure the pressured jettison coming out of the mouthpipe is aimed in a responsible direction!

Further tips:
Let it air out a day. Or better yet if you have an air compressor (even those you use for blowing up air mattresses): dry out your mouthpipe completely.
Afterwards run a generous amount of valve oil down the leadpipe, let it sink in about a half hour then do a bit of thicker oil (like you use on the linkage. I do this hoping to get the oil sunk into every molecular cranny possible and to give it a fighting chance against what inevitably is coming; moisture. From the air, from your breath, from saliva.
I further oil my mouthpipes before and after playing. As long as the oil was there first moisture will move on.
At least that’s my theory. I encourage any and everyone to prove me wrong because, well, if it’s wrong it’s wrong.

When touring caves, people are prohibited from touching surfaces, because oil from hands stops the formation of lime stalactites.