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bloke wrote: Mon May 04, 2026 7:27 am You might have a scale build up starting to occur.

This is another uninformed guess, but sawing on and thumping on the mouth pipe to install that device may have shaken loose some scale in the mouth pipe tube which migrated down into the rotors.

If you tag me, you're going to get some sort of rhetoric, whether it's useful or not.

First, if I tag you, I expect a response....should you choose to do so.

Yeah the horn was ultra-sonically cleaned last year, but sure there very well could be some deposits that shook loose. I've bathed piston horns many times, but never a rotary horn. I wouldn't mind trying this myself.

There are some drawbacks with acid cleaning vs. ultrasonic cleaning, but a couple of advantages are that it doesn't cost $20,000 for the equipment another advantage is that acid cleaning dissolves scale rather than busts it loose, and a final advantage is that when there are red rot places, acid cleaning doesn't hurt those whereas ultrasonic cleaning can bust those holes clean through.

I guess it's okay to flood your tuba with water, but putting detergent in there won't dissolve any scale, because the detergent and the scale are both alkaline.

I jet very hot water through my two rotary tubas and out the main tuning slide with the tuning slide removed. I wiggle the valves a whole bunch while doing it. That knocks out slime, but not scale. I try to prevent scale by using a ridiculous amount of cheap oil every time I play.