Cleaning a F attachment rotor trombone.

[oldbandnerd]

I offered to clean up a trombone for a friend of mine forgetting that it has a F attachment rotor.I don't know how to deal with the rotor. The horn is a KING 3B.

How do I clean that part of the horn?
* Do I have to take it apart?
* Can I just submerse the entire section in the soapy water with all the rest of the horn without taking it apart ?
* If it is best to take the rotor apart how difficult is it?
* How do I take it apart ?

My friend needs to sell this horn for the money and really doesn't have the things needed to clean this up so I really want to do this to help him out. Any advice here would be appreciated.

[Dan Schultz]

To REALLY clean the horn.... the 'F' section really needs to be taken apart.

BUT

If the rotor is working OK right now... there probably isn't a need to even worry about the 'F' section. If your friend has the original case, there is probably a cleaning rod inside the lid. Just clean the inside the inner and outer slide tubes. That's where most of the 'crud' will be, anyway.

[oldbandnerd]

I got the trombone form him today the rotor works just fine. I won't worry too much about that . I also found out that this King is 35 years old ! It hasn't been played very much in the last 14 years. Thanks for responding to me Tubatinker and bloke. Should I go ahead and dunk the whole bell section in the water anyways ? It has been a few years since it was cleaned. It's mostly been sitting in a closet and it has a nasty,funky,stale cigarette odor to it that I would like to get rid of.

[Dan Schultz]

Why don't you just run a bunch of lamp oil through the entire bell section (following up with some sort of snake brush) and clean off the outside with furniture polish?

The case may actually be the stinkiest thing...vacuum, and (if you just have to) hit it with the least offensive scent of "Carpet Fresh".

Yup.

[oldbandnerd]

Thanks for all the good advice bloke and tubatinker. I have used it all wisely.

[SousaSaver]

bloke and TubaTinker have posted some very sound advice. I would like to make a contribution regarding the case.

I have had decent luck with spraying the case with febreeze or an equivalent and setting the case open in the sun to air out.

Good luck!

[oldbandnerd]

Thanks for that advice. As luck would have it I work for a company that sells restaurant equipment and supplies. They also sell to hotels,nursing homes ... etc. I work in the chemical division as the dish machine repiar tech and have access to all the chemicals sold there including commercial grade room fresheners. We sell a odor neutrilizer that was meant to be used to kill tobacco odors in hotel rooms. It's some reall kick *** stuff. I've already sprayed down the case. But I agree with you about leaving it out in the sun. Best remedy ever! Unfortunatley it's been cloudy and rainy here since I've had it . That will have to wait.