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There are some schools that teach basic repair skills to music ed majors, but to be honest there are very few repairs that can be done to brass instruments that are basic. Sure, you could be taught how to replace corks, felts, bumpers, and do a cleaning, but most teachers or music stores could talk you through that.

Any other type of repair really needs specialized tools. Even dent work isn't as simple as it sounds. Depends on where the dent is, how severe it is, what the metal thickness is like, etc. You may need a dent ball and long rod held in a sturdy vise, or you may need smaller dent balls with a chaser to push them through. Then there are the times where you need a "dent master" or dent machine (two different tools) and dent hamers.

Your idea is a good one, but it would be difficult to impliment. Any repair person that is good enough to teach is going to be so swamped with repairs that they really don't have time to teach a "class" type thing.

My $.02.

Hope you had a good spring break!

My applied instructor took time out during one of our weekly studio meetings to go over the topic of instrument care and maintenance. It is definately a topic worth talking about, and every studio professor SHOULD go over maintanence issues once a year for sure. If they didn't, I think it would definately be a topic worth mentioning that you'd like to hear. That's how we got our studio teacher to start the topic.

I learned that rotors are not as scary to take apart as I once thought.

Oh the little things are most intriguing.

Well, to the extent that it is possible for a lay-tubist to maintain and repair his/her own horn(and those of his/her future students), I think that the studio instructor should be responsible for passing along that knowledge. I'd got a step further and say that a studio teacher who DOESN'T pass along that knowledge(when it becomes appropriate, of course), isn't doing their job.

Beyond that, I think that the woodwind/brasswind/string/percussion techniques courses offer basic repair and maintenance tips.. I don't know if offering more elaborate repair instruction in that setting is necessarily a good idea, though, as I can see far more incidences of over-confident young teachers("Oooh! I know how to fix that!") making a situation worse than better.

my $.02

Bloke, you´re absolutely right. You shouldn´t mess with your horn/flute/sax/bone/whatever and leave that to trained personnel. One of our clarinet players in community band is about to finish his apprenticeship as an instrument maker / repairsman (brass and reeds). Right now we´re in the process of having him holding basic maintenance classes for the band members (especially young uns, but everybody is invited). This is to improve the overall condition of the band-owned instruments. Another objective of these courses is: tell people where to definitely keep your hands off and turn it in to the shop. I think this ain´t a bad idea at all, you might even consider doing paid maintenance courses in schools.

After all, you want to have time for those wonderful pieces of art you showed us the other day rather than loosening some Dalyan tuning slide "soldered" in by dried coke, don´t you ?

Watching tubenet you frequently come across elaborate threads on bathing a tuba, squirting oil down the leadpipe and the likes.
Hans

I think that is the very heart of the matter, instrument MATINENCE, not repair. In my experiance a lot of repairs are the direct result of neglect and not understanding regular horn matinence. Most of this is due to that we all used school horns in High School (and beyond in a lot of cases) and never really developed an appreciation for them. I mean, if your horn was messed up, who cares, it wasn't yours, etc.

I think teaching matinence to kids either in middle or high school is 100% essential. And yeah, leave the serious stuff to the pros. But its like that in anything, you know? As Bloke pointed out, SOME stuff to do on cars is easy, instruments, computers, etc. are the same way. But when something is really, really screwed up, just hand it off to someone who knows whats up...

You're really funny, Bloke, but you were too subtle for the intended audience.
Har!
MA

I wasn't saying mufflers were easy to put on (I have no idea on that, never done it). I was just saying some repairs on cars and horns can be accomplished without a pro...