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Lacquer flaking off in chem bath?
Posted: Sun May 29, 2011 12:54 am
by katietes
I recently had my MW2145 chem cleaned, and it came out of the bath missing large chunks of its lacquer. The tech said that it was just bad lacquer that had been put on the horn in the first place, because the horn was only in the bath for the normal 3 minutes. He patched what flaked off, and charged me half price, but I'm still pretty bummed- it came back looking worse than it went in. Is this a normal occurrence? The horn had been chem cleaned once before, so maybe the lacquer was just in weaker condition because of this?
What's done is done, so I guess I'm not really looking for any solutions (other than how to hide the patching??), I'm just curious to see if this is normal or what. Thanks for any input!
Re: Lacquer flaking off in chem bath?
Posted: Sun May 29, 2011 8:49 am
by SousaSaver
It also depends on what the horn was being cleaned with. 3 minutes is probably reasonable if you are using a product called slime away. In my opinion, 3 minutes is probably too long if you are using a diluted acid solution.
The tech could have been right about the lacquer not being very good in the first place. That does happen sometimes. Bloke is correct in his post above.
Re: Lacquer flaking off in chem bath?
Posted: Sun May 29, 2011 1:47 pm
by bort
Where on the horn was the lacquer flaking off? If in a high contact area like under your right arm, bottom bow, or where your left hand is, I wouldn't be very surprised. Pre-worn lacquer doesn't always need much encouragement to come off.
But if you're talking like patches from the side of the bell or something ugly and completely off the wall, then yes, I'd be annoyed too and probably asking the same questions as you!
Re: Lacquer flaking off in chem bath?
Posted: Sun May 29, 2011 2:04 pm
by katietes
It flaked in various spots, with the largest chunks coming off on the bell. It seems it must have been a combination of several factors possibly including lower-quality lacquer and too long in the bath, but he also did my MW182 (which is at least 22 years old so likely a different lacquer on that one!) and it came back with no lacquer damage at all.
....but at least it's gunk-free now....!
Re: Lacquer flaking off in chem bath?
Posted: Sun May 29, 2011 6:43 pm
by SousaSaver
bloke wrote:
Here's what I generally do with tubas:
Rather than have some gigantic tank and flooding the never-need-cleaning large bows of the tuba with cleaning solution, I remove pistons or rotors, plug up tubas watertight, and (leaving a couple of temporary air vents) fill them up from the small side of the main slide (or mouthpiece receiver) and fill up ONLY the valveset, mouthpipe, and main slide with cleaning solution. Once I've let it sit for the appropriate amount of time, I empty it into a large clean/empty tub and pour it all back into the normal-size-instrument container.
(Hardly any tuba lacquer meets the cleaning solution that way, and I don't have to keep some giant drum of cleaning solution ready for tubas.)
bloke "but then again, I live in 'the south' so I'm stupid"
I couldn't agree more* AND you don't have to try and spin the horn around to get all of the liquid out. The clean up room in my shop is narrow and long with a low hanging fluorescent light, so spinning a Tuba around in circles without damaging it presents a very special challenge.
Excellent recommendation Joe.
*except the stupid part. You AREN'T stupid.
Re: Lacquer flaking off in chem bath?
Posted: Sun May 29, 2011 11:55 pm
by tubaguy9
The lacquer coming off can happen...it's happened to horns I've done, some of it just happens when lacquer doesn't want to stick to a horn anymore.
A chem clean where I'm at, the shop calls it a "supertune", and I put it in a tub of degreaser, scotchbrite the inside of inner tubes, and use a "slurry" with the outer tubes, put it back in the degreaser, let it sit a little longer, use citrashine on all reachable tubes, and put it in the acid for less than a minute...and it works great, but flakes off lacquer occasionally...