How do you know when a valve needs oil?

[AtomicClock]

I feel foolish asking this. But I never knew when to oil my rotary valve. I oil it every day... or every week... or every month... or when I can't remember the last time it got oil. No difference in sound; no difference in feel. I oil it religiously -- not in the frequency sense, but in the sense that I believe, without evidence, that it is doing something. Because people I respect tell me so.

On top of that, I don't know what weight oil to use. Thin/thick? I can make an educated guess based on Hetman's marketing material and my instruments' ages. But I don't know how anyone can know whether an oil is too thick or not. I guess you could spend a lifetime playing with oil A, and someone else with oil B, then compare compression on your deathbeds. But I doubt that's it.

I don't know... I suppose it's possible I ruined all my valves with poor maintenance, and at that point it doesn't matter. But I don't think so.

[ithinknot]

It's easy to test compression in a casual way - valve actuation pop having just pulled your valve tuning slide a set amount. Of course, if you don't grease your tuning slides they're leaking too.

It's also easy to know if an oil is excessively heavy - it'll slow down the valve. If it doesn't, it isn't. Use the heaviest weight available that doesn't slow it down. (And heavier on the bearing points.)

In theory, you can make almost any valve seal properly - it may just require a molecular weight generally reserved for tunnel boring machines and revolving restaurant transmissions.

[Burgerbob]

It definitely depends on the valve, but most of mine play significantly better when lubed. I'll convince myself otherwise, but then I oil it and everything about the instrument improves pretty drastically.

I had a stainless Thayer section on a bass a while back (should never have sold it...). When I bought that section, it was horrendously out of spec. Huge gaps and leaks. It played and sounded great. I bought the horn after playing it dry at Brassark, where it blew me away. When I had Benn Hansson shave down the casings and refit the valves, the horn was easily 100% better in every conceivable way.

[elmsandr]

Well, when in doubt, oil it. If you haven’t ruined a shirt or three from freshly oiled horns, you need to oil them more.

Cheers,
Andy

[boneagain]

By the time you KNOW your valve needs oil you've likely already got some damage. If you make a habit of waiting until you KNOW, you will shift from slight wear on the shaft to contact and wear on the circumference of the rotor.
Too much oil on the circumference can gum up your slide, so I'd follow Andy's advice there.
For the shaft, I'd do like voting: oil early and often!
To get an idea of the importance of oiling the shaft, consider how McCracken designed the Duo Gravis valves. The cap side of the valve is no biggie: unscrew the cap and oil the shaft.
For the leve side of the valve he designed to have the stop arm screw hole extend down into the shaft, and cross-drilled inside the bearing sleeve. He was serious about getting oil where it would do the most good!

The result of not oiling enough? I've seen more than one horn with the shaft actually clanking in its sleeve. Not pretty.
Of course, YMMV.

[AtomicClock]

In this video, the host says (1:23):

"You can also remove the tuning slide which was easily done here and you could do a little squirt down the neck pipe as well. That helps you get to a different part of the valve. As you do this you're going to find what works best for you. Some people like doing it down the neckpipe, some people like doing it down the slide receiver".

How do I know what works best for me if I'm not getting any feedback from the horn? Just the convenience of doing one side vs. the completeness of both?

[Specialk3700]

If you don't notice a difference when oiling the valve I wouldn't stress much over it. In highschool we had countless yamaha's with rotors that were mostly likely last oiled at the factory. They worked fine and had compression. Not saying I would recommend that but just trying to add some perspective. Every 2 weeks or so should be fine to prevent damage.

[tbonesullivan]

It'll feel sluggish compared to usual. But like most people who have posted, I just usually oil my valves periodically, depending on how much use that horn has seen.

[spencercarran]

I found out over the summer that a sectionmate has never oiled the rotor on his trombone in the time he's owned it (which I'm sure has been well worth of a decade). It does still turn. The whole horn probably plays worse than it would if it had been more carefully maintained, but that sort of slow degradation in performance over years of neglect is easy to not notice as its happening.

[AtomicClock]

Well, I just gave my carpet a good oiling. I hope you're happy!
Don't buy Hetman's in the eyedropper bottle, I guess.

[whitbey]

You only need to oil when you want it to move.

I am allergic to most oils. I use slide o mix combined to oil my rotary valves. Seems to last a while. As it drys out the Teflon and silicone set in and the next lube goes on top. I throw some in the tubing once in a while too.

[ssking2b]

I oil my rotors every time I play them. I oil my piston valves every time I play them. I have a piston valve horn that is over 70 years old and the valves work like new. My oldest rotor valve horn is from 1962 and the rotor fantastic. Early on, one of my teachers impressed me with the need to clean and lubricate horns frequently. He told me if it feels like you need to oil a valve, or lube a slide, you have waited too long. That may be over the top, but it has always worked for me. I insist my students do the same.

[OneTon]

My valve lubrication habits have emulated the Shires video. My Hagmann is approaching 30 years of service. My Duo-Gravis I have had since 2001. I use Holton Rotary Valve Oil. If a valve were to feel sluggish immediately after being lubed, I would flush it with Al Cass and apply something lighter than what was previously applied. I have never had to have a valve serviced, since the early 1970’s.

[AtomicClock]

Where does Al Cass fall into the spectrum? Very light?

[ghmerrill]

I found out over the summer that a sectionmate has never oiled the rotor on his trombone in the time he's owned it (which I'm sure has been well worth of a decade).

I'm not shocked. A lot of trombone players seem to obsess over oiling their rotary valves. Tuba players don't. Why?

Because tuba players are well aware that rotary valves aren't like piston valves (which need to be oiled quite frequently, and cleaned fairly frequently). And yeah, a lot of people have this vision in their heads of their poor rotors grinding against the casings and wearing down because you've neglected to lube them. But that doesn't happen. Unless your rotary valve is maladjusted (in a way you should be able to tell just by trying to use it), the rotor doesn't touch the casing at all. The surface of the rotor doesn't touch anything at all -- unless you've let it get so dirty that it's rotating back and forth in a soup of disgusting junk. But that's not a lubrication issue. That's a cleaning issue.

It IS important to lubricate the spindle (or bushings, or bearing points, or shafts, or whatever you want to call them) -- as mentioned previously here. And is is important to CLEAN your valves reasonably frequently -- even if just by flushing with soapy water and rinsing. And it is important to lubricate your linkages.

And when you do lubricate those spindles, a good approach is to drop oil on the end and then pull out your tuning slide (most, but no all of the way) so that the vacuum will suck that oil in. That actually does help. Then open the valve, push the slide in, let the valve close, pull slide out again, etc.

All that being said, I find that I do lubricate my trombone rotors (by dripping oil onto them through the tubes) fairly frequently -- mostly because it's so easy (compared to doing that on a 4-5 valve tuba!), and I think that the additional lube may aid in flushing any gunk particles down through the valves into the slide -- but that's really mostly speculation.

And I do clean my trombones (and all my instruments) thoroughly at least a couple of times a year. And I do take my valves apart and clean them about once a year -- just to be sure I'm not having an corrosion or build-up problem, and because they do tend to get dirty over that period on the bottom and top plates of the rotors. In general, for rotary valves, cleanliness is better than oiliness.

[OneTon]

Where does Al Cass fall into the spectrum? Very light?

Very light. I use Al Cass on trumpets and cornets. I think this Shires presentation talks about using Al Cass as a solvent for gummy rotary valves. If used every time a horn got played, it would suffice. I don’t know what the results would be if we had both analyzed. But I prefer Holton Rotary Valve Oil. I put two to four drops of oil into each valve tuning slide after the horn is assembled and resting on the trombone stand. I have yet to get any on the carpet. If leakage occurred with Al Cass, it might be too light.

[BrassSection]

I don’t own a trombone with valves, but I oil my French horn valves usually every other time I play it. It gets used usually for one or two songs about every 3 weeks. My horn is old style mechanical linkage, not string, so every moving joint gets a drop, caps come off and bearing surface gets a drop, and tuning slides are pulled and add a few drops down each tube. No valve issues in 30 years of playing an old school auction horn.

Piston valves on my other horns get cleaned and oiled once a month. Euph usually needs a refresher after 3 weeks if it’s used a lot. Trumpet could probably go longer, but as with all my internal combustion engines, oil is much cheaper than major repairs! (Plus I get over 200,000 miles out of my engines)

[ghmerrill]

I oil piston valves based on the particular instrument and how frequently I've been playing it. The more I play, the more the condensation will wash lubricant off the valves. So sometimes it's once a week, and others its once every two or three weeks. For my 100 year old tuba, it's every time I use it.

For some years I've been using the Yamaha synthetic valve oils (after experimenting with any number of others). They're odorless, colorless, and totally unproblematic. I'll also use them on the my trombone valves, but since they're less critical than pistons, I'm using up a bunch of leftover stuff first. I've never seen the value (or any specific difference) in using any "special" rotor oil or spindle oil on the rotors, and I go nuts if I open my supplies drawer and there are half a dozen bottles of oil for the instruments. There are all kinds of good oils I could use for lubing the trigger/key mechanisms on my horns. But I just use the Yamaha stuff I have. I could probably save a couple of dollars a year by using cheaper oil for the linkage oiling, but it's not worth the additional to me of having more little oil bottles around.

I need to use thee viscosities of the Yamaha oils. My tuba has very tight valves. If I even let it sit for a couple of weeks, they'll start to stick and freeze up in the cylinders. So those get the Yamaha "light" valve oil. The euphonium has pretty tight valves, but I can generally use the "regular" Yamaha synthetic oil on it. If I use the regular on the tuba, it noticeably slows down the valves.

For my 100 year old tuba, I will either use Yamaha Vintage valve oil, or even some "kick slide" oil I've got from a different company.

Everybody has his or her own favorite oils. It's a kind of cult thing.

[Kbiggs]

If I remember his old website correctly, Steve Ferguson of Horn Guys suggests oiling AFTER you play, and before AND after for new valves.

Why? If you oil before you play, by the end of the session, or day (or whatever interval), the oil has already done its job to lubricate, and is now thinning out (getting diluted) from the air, condensation, and saliva working their way through the horn. When you oil after play, you help prevent corrosion of the valve, the valve chamber, and the spindles (for rotary valves) from the residual air, condensation, and saliva.

[Posaunus]

Steve Ferguson of Horn Guys suggests oiling AFTER you play, ...

Why? If you oil before you play, by the end of the session, or day (or whatever interval), the oil has already done its job to lubricate, and is now thinning out (getting diluted) from the air, condensation, and saliva working their way through the horn. When you oil after play, you help prevent corrosion of the valve, the valve chamber, and the spindles (for rotary valves) from the residual air, condensation, and saliva.

That's what I do. My valves work smoothly. I don't know whether I'm "over-lubricating" - but oiling regularly is fast and cheap. (Part of my regular hygiene protocol.) And the downside of "under-lubing" could be an expensive trip to my tech, an hour's drive away. I don't want to engage in that experiment!

[harrisonreed]

How do I know when my rotors need oil? The answer is simple.

"Yes."

Does this rotor need oil right now?

"Yup!"

Basically if you think of it, it's time...

[ghmerrill]

Basically if you think of it, it's time...

The ultimate triumph of valve oil marketing.

[harrisonreed]

I have never used an entire bottle of hetmans, though. When I switched to ultra pure, I've barely put a dent in it after a few years.

Oiling two, the times a week for seven years and I think I got rid of one bottle of hetmans 11 because the bottle material started to degrade, not because I ran out.

It's like Trombotine. I heard that the Edwards factory is still on their first tube.

[bitbckt]

I could swear my tube of Trombotine is refilled by some act of spontaneous atmospheric creamification between every use.

I have seen the worm at the bottom of a valve oil bottle, though.

[ghmerrill]

I use valve oil that I don't like (for one reason or another) as utility oil: on firearms, on tools, on door hinges, ... and of course on trombone/tuba/euphonium linkages. You don't really need specialized linkage oil.

Thy mystery of Trombotine, I suggest, is easily explained. People try it, use it for a while, but then can't really justify that because other stuff works better and the Trombotine contributes no incremental benefit. So they end up with a tube of Trombotine. I've got one. It's much more of a problem than valve oil because I can't find any alternative applications for it. I have something of the same problem now (that I've switched over to Yamasnot) with my collection of tiny bottles of silicone slide lubricants. But I'm confident I'll use those for household/shop/tractor applications eventually. But the Trombotine? It's going to have to be evicted from the lubricants drawer at some point.

[bitbckt]

But the Trombotine? It's going to have to be evicted from the lubricants drawer at some point.

Heresy. Back to Werden’s site with you.

But seriously, Trombotine is worth keeping around for two occasions: 1) a slide that needs burnishing is properly done while playing said slide (a la Matt Walker’s break in instructions) and 2) a slide that is too broken in and needs something thicker than snot (literally) to seal properly.

It’ll never expire and takes up no real space. My 30+ year old tube of magic earns its place every so often. It beats Ponds cold cream. And so it stays.

[Pezza]

During rehearsal, when you play a bum note, put down the horn & oil the valve/s. It was obviously the instrument & not you that was the problem!

[timothy42b]

And when you do lubricate those spindles, a good approach is to drop oil on the end and then pull out your tuning slide (most, but no all of the way) so that the vacuum will suck that oil in. That actually does help. Then open the valve, push the slide in, let the valve close, pull slide out again, etc.

That makes sense. It should work. But I've done it and never seen that drop of oil even jiggle. It just doesn't get drawn into my 1971 vintage 42B valve. There's vacuum there, I can get a good pop, but oil doesn't go in.

I pull the tuning slides and drop oil in pretty often, then let it sit on the stand without the slide, hoping not to have residual drops end up on the slide.

I really wish someone had told me about oiling the valves sooner though. It didn't start getting regularly oiling until fairly recently. I just didn't know.

[Posaunus]

... But the Trombotine? It's going to have to be evicted from the lubricants drawer at some point.

Gary,

Have you tried using Trombotine as lip balm?

I still have a jar of Pond's cold cream (original formula) that I lifted from my mother decades ago - just saw it yesterday in the accessories box in my trombone closet. There must also be a use for that!

And how about that ancient little can of 3-IN-ONE oil that's in my garage?

[Posaunus]

And when you do lubricate those spindles, a good approach is to drop oil on the end and then pull out your tuning slide (most, but no all of the way) so that the vacuum will suck that oil in. That actually does help. Then open the valve, push the slide in, let the valve close, pull slide out again, etc.

That makes sense. It should work. But I've done it and never seen that drop of oil even jiggle. It just doesn't get drawn into my 1971 vintage 42B valve. There's vacuum there, I can get a good pop, but oil doesn't go in.

Another trombonists' urban legend bites the dust?

Observation and measurement are powerful tools.

[ghmerrill]

That makes sense. It should work. But I've done it and never seen that drop of oil even jiggle.

I think it does work. And you can't expect it to jiggle because if the oil is being sucked into the bushing, it's done very slowly. I've noticed the same phenomenon that you have and got skeptical. But if I use very light oil and wait a bit longer, I (believe I can) see that the size of the oil bead has decreased. So I'm going to stick with it. The other thing that you can do (which I also think works, but slowly over time) is when you put the cap back on the valve, fill the recess in it with oil and then screw it on from underneath (immersing the bushing) in the oil as the cap screws on. I think the received view is that capillary action will take place, with the oil seeping into the bushing. But I don't actually have observations or measurements on that.

There's also this ... If you put the oil on the end of the bushing and PUSH the slide in, you'll see a whole bunch of bubbles come up through the oil. So ... it's reasonable to suppose that in the reverse direction, the oil is being sucked in rather than the air being pushed out. I'll take that as indirect evidence.

[ghmerrill]

But seriously, Trombotine is worth keeping around for two occasions: 1) a slide that needs burnishing is properly done while playing said slide (a la Matt Walker’s break in instructions) and 2) a slide that is too broken in and needs something thicker than snot (literally) to seal properly.

I'll buy 2. Not sure about the burnishing.

[ghmerrill]

Have you tried using Trombotine as lip balm?

Uh ... no.

I still have a jar of Pond's cold cream (original formula) that I lifted from my mother decades ago - just saw it yesterday in the accessories box in my trombone closet. There must also be a use for that!

Sure. I think I've got an old (partly dried up) jar of anhydrous lanolin here to. I could sent it to you.

And how about that ancient little can of 3-IN-ONE oil that's in my garage?

I have one of those too. Nothing wrong with 3-In-One oil (except they now have a bunch of products, which confuses references to it). But that reminds me ...

One of the new products is a similar bottle of a 3-In-One dry lubricant. There have been serious advances lately in the dry lubricant area, and I'm in the process of converting over to that for most uses in firearms. I'm thinking of trying it on some brass instrument situations as well (like linkages, at least). Not sure it would be a good idea for something like valves.

[harrisonreed]

Edwards does use Trombotine on slides there though. A lot of slides, every day.

Legend has it that their tube has never even reached the half empty point.

[bitbckt]

Magic, I tell ya.

[atopper333]

Thy mystery of Trombotine, I suggest, is easily explained. People try it, use it for a while, but then can't really justify that because other stuff works better and the Trombotine contributes no incremental benefit. So they end up with a tube of Trombotine. I've got one. It's much more of a problem than valve oil because I can't find any alternative applications for it. I have something of the same problem now (that I've switched over to Yamasnot) with my collection of tiny bottles of silicone slide lubricants. But I'm confident I'll use those for household/shop/tractor applications eventually. But the Trombotine? It's going to have to be evicted from the lubricants drawer at some point.

It may work in a pinch to work a rubber hose over a tight fitting…

[timothy42b]

Username:ghmerrill
Thanks, I'll give it another shot today and watch closely.

[timothy42b]

Well.................................I was wrong.

I set a drop of oil on the end of the shaft and pushed the tuning slide down.

A series of tiny bubbles rose through the drop. I've never seen any change when pulling the tuning slide out, but there was definitely air coming out around the bearing area when pushing down.

If air can get past the shaft area, can oil? It's at least possible.

It's also possible that the shaft or the bearing plate are worn, due to my failure to maintain properly in the early decades of owning the horn, and that the fit is a bit looser than it should be. I'd like to see if a new horn does the same thing.

It also suggests it might not be a bad idea to flood the valve with oil and then push the tuning slide down, and see if we can get oil to flow from the inside. If you can't get oil to flow in either direction, it would seem the only way to lubricate would be to disassemble the valve regularly. I don't do that, maybe I should.

You can squirt oil in through one of the screw holes in the cork plate. But it seems to me that must put oil in the valve body area and not on the bearing shaft area, and we can oil the valve body from the tuning slide more easily. Since my kids are now grown, I'm more cautious about little tiny screws. (C'mon, Daddy dropped a screw again, we gotta help him find it.)

[AtomicClock]

due to my failure to maintain properly in the early decades of owning the horn

Hi kid. Here's your rod, snake, grease, cold cream and oil. Figure it out yourself.

[ssking2b]

I’ve been using the Yamaha stuff on my horns for probably 10 years. I still have Trombotine, Superslick and Superslick silicon liquid left. Also have several bottles of UltraPure slide lube; All stored in my basement refrigerator along with additional bottles of Yamaha slide lube. Can’t bear to get rid of it. Even still have the dregs of several bottles of Yamaha slide lube that is so thin it’s probably useless. 3 in 1 is on the shelf by the refrigerator along with 4 quarts of valve oil (2 light, 2 regular) and some Marvel Mystery Oil. Also some Warburton Valve Wash. Hey - you never know…

Will try the oil on the spindle valve slide trick and see what happens.