2 oz dropper bottles

[bloke]

I just bought this group of six for 10 bucks shipping included.
I like to have oil in the case with each of the instruments that I use most commonly.

Quite a few people here know that I use lamp oil that I purchase by the gallon (Pre-election, it was about nine cents an ounce; I don’t know how much it is now, because I haven’t bought any since then), and refill off-brand 2 oz. plastic valve oil squirt bottles over-and/over.

Well… Those are wearing out, and it’s hard on the plastic nipple to pull it out repeatedly to refill the bottles.

Heh-heh…You said “nipple”.

I’m going to try these out and see how they work. As much as people are trying to charge now for their “miracle“ brands of oil, this isn’t much of an investment if it doesn’t work out to my satisfaction.

I suppose I wish they were plastic, but I doubt that I’ll break them.

Many of you don’t remember that Al Cass used to come in 2 oz. plastic dropper bottles - and before that glass, but we use those and managed just fine, so I’m going to try this.

One thing I’m not going to try is going back to paying three dollars an ounce or more for friggin’ valve oil.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/281942096043

0159CE39-E7B9-4987-B247-F377B4A2E66C.jpeg (72.55 KiB) Viewed 1098 times

Since there really isn’t any sort of issue involved here, I would imagine that this should start quite an argument.

[bloke]

I remember Al cass in a glass bottle. Seems like a lifetime ago. Oh wait, it was

[the elephant]

I use a glass Al Cass dropper bottle.

For my lamp oil ($1 to bloke) I use old Hetman NEEDLE bottles that were carefully washed out. I put a square piece of blue tape over the label to differentiate between the lamp oil and actual Hetman’s. They are nice and “flat-ish” and the green plug never falls off. Refilling involves unscrewing its retainer cap. I have a tiny funnel for filling.
_________________

EDIT: added "NEEDLE" because it was NEEDED.

[tofu]

.

[bloke]

I never oil on stage.

If I break one of these, it’ll be backstage or at home, and hopefully won’t be any big deal.

Maybe, I should buy some BAST (big ass shrink tubing) and shrink a couple of inches of that stuff over the sides of each of these - to minimize shattering, just in case they are dropped.

… and - if I find them annoying - I guess I could just limit them to home use.

[2nd tenor]

It seems to me that several different solutions work and work well enough that it mostly doesn’t matters which alternative is used.

Currently I’m using Yamaha Vintage Valve Oil, it’s OK and I don’t use a lot but when I come to need a replacement I’ll think about buying something else first. A clear dropper bottle and common oil might suit me. I rarely oil at rehearsals and at performances, it’s best to do it at home.

Glass is fragile and it is hard too, both present hazards that can be managed but plastic seems more fail-safe to me. I wonder if the dropper is one more item to loose and, relative to an open dropper bottle, the old screw top squeeze bottles are less ‘eventful’ when they fall over … sooner or later such things nearly always fall over.

[the elephant]

This is what I was talking about earlier. I noticed that I had omitted the crucial word "needle" in my bottle description. When Hetman first released this type of bottle it leaked and was "deemed to be dangerous to children", and they were redesigned to what you see here. These are EXCELLENT bottles. They do not leak. The needle is thick for its size, so I have never bent one. They are easy to refill using a tiny funnel that was part of a set I bought at Walmart, or Autozone, or some such for cheap. It was actually this little "toy" that I could never find a use for but was too much of a cheapskate to throw away. Well, it is perfect for filling these bottles with lamp oil.

Years ago, I purchased a case of these and used up most of the contents but, again — being a cheapskate — I saved all the empties because they were too nice to toss. Now I keep one in each gig bag and a few on the bench, all labeled LAMP OIL on the blue tape because I'm sort of stupid, donchaknow.

Oh, and the same caveat emptor I use when talking about lamp oil is still valid: Do not get "low odor" lamp oil; only purchase "odorless". Low odor stinks like the nasty kerosene it is. It is *far* from a subtle aroma and will stick around for days. Only get ODORLESS lamp oil! Other than that, I *love* using the stuff, and I fully credit Joe with turning me on to a product I might otherwise have never tried.

[the elephant]

As far as eye-dropper style bottles, other than the ancient glass Al Cass Fast bottle I keep on my bench, I bought a six-pack of these in 2015 and am still on the second bottle. I keep my flux in these. On the first one, the bulb hardened and cracked after a few months of use. The second one has never done this. I changed from Oatey to Johnson, and my soldering got cleaner and this dropper's bulb has survived for many years. The brown glass is nice as I do not use that for *anything* other than flux, so it is easily identified as such, even in the dark. I still have the other four in the box in a cabinet, ready to go if ever needed. They seal up well, and the dropper is glass. The brown glass is actually brown and not a lacquer as on some wine bottles of the type that is coveted by your better variety of wino and some of your less-informed California millennials. <snicker>


Six for $11 or 12 for $13? If I needed twelve I would go that route, but I bought six and have only ever needed two of them in seven years; they are pretty decent and would make good lamp oil bottles if you use a hard case or if you only keep it in your house. I personally would not put a glass bottle in my gig bag.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B008ZSX42K

[bloke]

Yeah… We still have some hetmans products sitting around here from when they were a fad.
I guess I’ll take a look and see if any of the needle droppers are the style that you demonstrated. If they are, I’ll probably keep that in mind and - if I don’t like the glass dropper bottles – I’ll pour the oem concoctions out of the hetman bottles with needles, and use those.

Anyway, 2022’s ten bucks is only 2020’s four bucks, so I haven’t lost much…and the solder flux thing sounds like a good idea.

[the elephant]

I think you might like them, Joe. The semi-flat shape works well in a gig bag, and the green stopper fits very tightly and does not leak. The retainer cap *could* come loose and leak but has never done so in one of my gig bags. I have come to value these old bottles. I also reuse my old Schilke grease tubs, filling them with my own concoction. I keep one of these bottles with one of those tubs in a ziplock freezer baggie (much heavier and longer-lasting than a sandwich bag) in every gig bag I tote to work.

[Mary Ann]

https://www.etsy.com/market/2_oz_squeeze_bottle

[travisd]

All kinds of needle-tip bottles over on AliExpress. https://www.aliexpress.com/wholesale?ca ... .1000002.0

[bloke]

I have several needle oilers, but I just wasn’t sure I wanted to have them on board in my cases. I’ll think about it. Also, I tend to splash/shoot a lot of oil on fairly hurriedly and unceremoniously. I really think sloshing oil all around inside my instruments tends to keep them cleaner and freer of scale. A squirt bottle puts out a ton of oil, a dropper probably nearly as much, but a needle oiler… I’m just not sure if I’m that patient.
(I keep something that looks like it might be 3 ounces with a needle oiler on top next to my music stand. It has secret proprietary formula hinge tube and bearing oil in it (whatever-was-on-sale 30W that I dripped out of the bottom of one of those five quart jugs, after an oil change).
I appreciate all the suggestions and sources.
—————
COMPLETE NON SEQUITUR
sigh… The rear right wheel has begun singing on the huge John Deere mower. I have determined that what I’m going to have to replace a thing called a hydraulic motor (basically a servo motor that is driven off of hydraulic power). The John Deere place wants $1600 bucks for one of them plus their exorbitant labor. Per typical, that’s about 500% of the price of the generic part (without their name slapped on it…), and I guess I’ll be watching a couple of YouTube videos about installing one of these things:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/144684210874

I may get a friend to help, because I need to make damn sure that I don’t get any air in the line.

point of non sequitur:
I wish I could think about oil, oiling, oilers, practice, playing, and souping up my own instruments to the point that I’d like to have them souped up - and even finished (appearance-wise)…This little place on the Internet is quite an escape from reality, isn’t it?…but life on Mrs. bloke’s farm dictates bleak realities... and when your wife purchases a BAP (big-ass-place), problems which are normally minor problems are all BA Problems.

[Yorkboy]

I have a whole box of these (and where they came from is still a mystery to this day)……I find the oil doesn’t play nice with the rubber bulb very much. Otherwise I just pull the nipple out of a generic valve oil bottle and fill it with my own oil-brew.

My liquid flux (Johnson’s) I keep in a black colored needle oiler (from McMaster Carr). The different colored bottle is good, especially after that one time when you accidentally grab the flux thinking it’s valve oil…..

Side note on flux - does anyone else use Rubyfluid paste flux? I had not one, but two successive tins that were defective; the flux would not flow under any circumstances. The color was even off. When I brought it to the manufacturer’s attention, their reply was basically “there’s nothing wrong with our product, what do you want us to do about it?”

[bloke]

I hate paste flux.
I wish I didn’t have to use it for brazing.
It occupies space.