Skills acquisition

[Mary Ann]

I see so many of you do what I would consider to be pretty serious alternations yourselves; I spent a year between colleges working in the machine shop portion of a factory in Rhode Island, working a centerless grinder, surface grinder, and various other things, all of it precision work. When I left I had just been selected to learn to run a fancy computerized milling machine, and was sorry to not be there long enough to do that (I had saved enough money to go back to school, which was why I had been working there to start with.)

So -- the question being, where did you learn to do these things to brass instruments, like cut the bell, straighten or shorten slides, etc.? It seems a different skill set than the things I did with metal. Too late for me but the intellectual interest is still there.

[DonO.]

I will be following this thread with great interest. I am curious myself. I don’t know much about band instrument repair, but in the string instrument works there is a strong tradition of apprenticeship. I wonder if there is something like this for brass and woodwinds.

There is also a strong tradition in the string instrument repair (“luthier”) community to “do what works”, even if said repair doesn’t confirm exactly to conventional woodworking norms. I wonder if the same is true for band instrument repairs in regards to working with metal.

I have heard that there are some colleges (technical schools? Community colleges?) that offer courses in band instrument repair. I took a college level woodwind repair course once, a long time ago. Not exactly what you are asking about of course, but it shows that things like this exist. It was for band directors who wanted to be able to make emergency repairs to get kids playing again when a trip to the repair shop wasn’t feasible. Troubleshooting, looking for loose screws and springs, replacing pads properly, that sort of thing.

Just checked the internet. There is a band instrument repair program at Minnesota State College, Southeast.

[bloke]

Most of this work – that doesn’t have to do with rebuilding pistons – is handwork, and is (as any other hand skills – including stuff like cutting in trim when painting home interiors or anything) just developed over the years.
Some of it can be done using a lathe or milling machine, but (often) setting up jobs to do them that way probably takes just as much time as doing them with the hand, the eye, and measuring tools.
Even piston rebuilding is probably more handwork than it is lathe and honing machine work.
I’m getting ready to cut off a bunch of slide tubes for this nutty bass trombone cimbasso project, and I would rather cut all of these out of thin metal tubing than cut some equivalent project (in some other craft discipline) out of wood (or some other solid material) because all of these only have to be cut to the correct length with straight ends - with the ends not having solid surfaces that need to be perfect planes all the way across.
I’m having to make these, because the valve section that I’m using for this project belonged to a school, obviously, and all of the slide tubes were (as discussed in another thread about repairing school tubas) maliciously destroyed.
This isn’t going to be all that difficult, because I’m just copying what was there and putting it right back where it used to be. I’m not having to repair anything that was torn up… All that stuff is going in the scrap brass.
Putting them on the valveset just involves using the calipers carefully and eyeballing coplanar aspects a whole bunch of times for each pair of tubes. It’s not that hard, and I can do it sitting down with the heater on and the radio going.

Straightening out bells and bows (belles and beaus…??) is not an art. It’s just a craft. All I have to do is put stuff back the way it used to be to the best of my ability. Anyone who says that repairing stuff is an “art” is either over-complementing themselves or overestimating someone else’s abilities.
—————
It’s really easy to get pigeonholed in this type of work, just as with being a musician.
I can play oldies on bass guitar, I used to be able to play cocktail-music-to-Bach-lute-transcriptions on six-string guitar, but most everyone knows me as a tuba player, and those who see me playing in orchestras think of me as a so-called “orchestral tuba player“, those who run into me at the rare polka gig think of me as a “ethnic music tuba player”, and those who work with me playing jazz gigs think of me as a “jazz musician”…etc.

I believe I’ve been pigeonholed (as far as a horn-fixer, nationally) as a “tuba specialist (but I have not been pigeonholed in this way locally). I’m not particularly fond of working on tubas.

A couple of days ago, I straightened out the bells flares on a set of four professional trumpets (the owner dropped his $600 “imported/ super-protective” case that didn’t do crap, as far as protection). I didn’t put a single scratch in any of the silver bells, they all look beautiful, it only took me 45 minutes total (part of which was looking them over and writing up the invoice), and I charged $180 plus tax.
Most importantly, I didn’t perspire, and I didn’t end up being sore.
I would very much like to be pigeonholed as a “trumpet repair specialist”.

A few days after they began working here, the new trombone visiting professor at the local university had their playing slide - on their “main squeeze” trombone - trashed by another visiting professor (who came into their studio to rehearse, and didn’t notice trombone laying across its open case). They were referred to me by “everyone” (even though I live an hour away from there - for reasons I’ve gone into many times), and I believe I put their slide in considerably better condition than it was before it was trashed.

I think some people in this business come up with gimmicks, so they can do nonsense/b.s. (again: stuff that doesn’t require perspiring or getting dirty or sore) and charge a lot for it. I’ve just never been able to bring myself to do any of that sort of thing…That’s just not me… and - particularly with with trumpet repair - there seems to be a ton of hocus-pocus and charlatanism.
Trombone slide repair should involve a lathe, but most people who do it don’t use one, which is puzzling to me. I don’t see how the hell they can determine that the tubes are straight without one.
Trombone slide repair is complicated and simple. All you have to do is get everything just right and everything works.
If a tube is not redeemable, it simply needs to be thrown in the scrap brass and replaced – (unless it’s going to be marched with and it’s “sort of sort of” is usable)…and even the trombone slide repair thing has people who try to present themselves as magicians and such. I think even one of them has copyrighted their gimmicky name, and it seems to have worked for them as far is attracting business. (I don’t see there being a problem attracting repair business. I think the problem is keeping a throttle on it.)

As far as machinery is concerned, I have a longtime friend who really got carried away with a Rube-Goldberg-ish woodwind fingering system for a particular type of woodwind instruments. They bought a ton of machines which each only do one specific job for that conversion - to avoid any setting up whatsoever. I don’t see that very many people have embraced that fingering system for that type of woodwind instrument. That person is well beyond retirement age, still working, and I don’t see them being able to sell their building and machinery for anywhere close to what they spent to purchase and set it all up and nor do I suspect that any of that stuff has really paid for itself over time… I think they’re wife inherited a house, and I believe they themselves have a school teaching pension and Social Security, so…

Mrs. bloke is a woodwind specialist, and ends up getting a lot of referrals due to her attention to detail. She and I work together on saxophones (and flutes…and bass clarinet necks and bells, etc… she really doesn’t want me helping her with repairing or refitting keys) when metal parts are distressed, worn, or both.

Were we more aggressive and tooted our own horn, we could probably take over most of the school repair work in the entire area…but we couldn’t possibly do all of that (we have a lot of it, which – more and more – has become “undestroying“ type of work), so - again – we have to be careful to throttle the demand.

“repair schools”
Do any of these still exist?
I just don’t think anyone leaves one of these types of experiences being able to do very much. I’m not sure that someone with five years of experience (thinking back about myself, at that time) is really competent enough at a whole bunch of skill sets required to do all this junk (at least not with instruments that “matter”). Ten years might, if someone is particularly diligent, clever, pays attention to details, and is not (as are so many, these days) a substance abuser. I’m still figuring out things and figuring out shortcuts. I get really tickled with myself when I discover a new shortcut, because I’m not particularly excited about doing this type of work – after doing it for 43 years.

[LibraryMark]

So, Mr. Bloke - where does a person start? What tools should you buy first to give you a taste of brass instrument repair? Can a person teach themselves? Watch youtubes?

[bloke]

So, Mr. Bloke - where does a person start? What tools should you buy first to give you a taste of brass instrument repair? Can a person teach themselves? Watch youtubes?

Heck...I dunno...??

Maybe...

- some little steel rod with a little steel ball brazed on the end
- some big (3/4" diameter) steel rod with a 1" or 1-1/2" ball welded on the end

- a propane torch
- some tin/lead solid-wire solder (not teeny-tiny diameter, but smaller than "plumbing" diameter)
- a container of the clear/watery solder flux

- a 1/2 hp buffer (on a makeshift floor stand, etc.) probably adapted from a grinder.

I didn't start by "messing around at home", and I wasn't taught at any trade school.
I started by being hired - unsupervised/sink-or-swim/9-to-5 - by a couple of alcoholics (one of whom was pretty darn good at repair, and the other who was "fair" at it) both of whom had day-jobs and only showed up on Saturdays. (They shut it down a year later.)
I had walked away from a major university tuba-teaching job (personally: teaching drives me nuts...I admire those who are patient enough to deal with it), was VERY busy freelancing (back when that was possible - and the attraction of the freelancing revenue made it all the easier to walk away from the dreadful teaching work) playing bass and tuba (ALL sorts of music/ALL sorts of places), I had student-taught with one of those two guys, their new shop was about three blocks from where I was renting a place, they drove past there, recognized my car, and asked me if I wanted a day job.

>> As a small boy (though early adulthood) I had unsupervised access to my father's cramped workshop (which he and my much-older brother built, and which also had a lit/floored/covered porch - for dealing with larger stuff). After age 11 or so, he allowed me access to his power tools - along with the access that I previously had to his hand tools. When I abused or neglected to clean/put-away a tool, I would certainly hear about it. Right-or-wrong methods, I taught-myself/learned things, and (probably, and without listing here a bunch of the stuff that I made/repaired/adapted/whatever) accomplished a lot more than most other little kids (certainly: compared to today). Today, most children seem to be 95% or more "e-________" and "i-________" experienced. (Do kids today even HAVE - much less "able to repair/adapt/convert anything/everything on" bicycles? When a few of my friends' parents went to bike shops - for anything other than replacement parts - I would scratch my head.) I couldn't imagine having been able to "freestyle" malleable sheet metal musical instrument repair work without those c. fifteen years of experience messing around in that workshop.

I'm not particularly clever nor talented. Most people - with more determination, talent, smarts, and fortitude - could easily outperform me at most anything.

[matt g]

Lots of things in life that require skill acquisition benefit from being young when acquiring said skills.

Although I spent some time working in a repair shop while in college, I wouldn’t return to it as a hobby or part time income in retirement. I simply wouldn’t have the patience to get my abilities up to par for my own satisfaction.

I do consider skills based stuff like visual arts something worthwhile to pursue as a retired dude. Mainly because there’s an inherent lack of precision required, unlike technical repair.

Joe brings up an interesting notion that there has to be both an available environment plus some level of interest to even start down this path. My father’s garage never held a running car in it while growing up. It did hold engines in various stages of rebuild (including MOPAR big blocks), motorcycles, etc that he would tinker on.

I got interested in RC cars, back when the only option was to build them (RTR - ready to run, was a nascent idea and limited to lower quality stuff) and got good enough to do tear downs as well as building prototype frames for cars I had.

I also would buy up the BMX bikes from the kids in the neighborhood as they “outgrew” them and would build my own bikes from the best parts. My neighbor is a dude kinda like me and does some side work assembling, fitting, and repairing high dollar bikes for people that mail order them. He’s got lots of time as well as connections through local riding clubs. That kind of stuff seems to have value in modern times as so many people wanna do outdoor stuff with nearly zero capacity to maintain their stuff.

Rambling around a bit here, but hands on people are created at a young age. As disposable income becomes absorbed by disposable items like consumer electronics as opposed to hand tools, I see the pool of people that will do skilled repair work shrinking.

That being said, if someone wanted to take up something like brass repair as a hobby later in life, just being patient would be the biggest requirement.

[sweaty]

For those who didn't grow up learning to fix stuff or are not naturally adept at it, fear not! You can still do a certain amount of it. I am not a good mechanic or craftsman, but I learned to do various maintenance and repair to plumbing, electrical, appliances, cars, and houses.

It was necessitated by lack of money and an insistent wife. YouTube and handyman forums have enabled me to successfully do many things around the house and saved me a LOT of money over the years. Persistence was key. Everything took twice as long as I planned.

[bloke]

For those who didn't grow up learning to fix stuff or are not naturally adept at it, fear not! You can still do a certain amount of it. I am not a good mechanic or craftsman, but I learned to do various maintenance and repair to plumbing, electrical, appliances, cars, and houses.

It was necessitated by lack of money and an insistent wife. YouTube and handyman forums have enabled me to successfully do many things around the house and saved me a LOT of money over the years. Persistence was key. Everything took twice as long as I planned.

… most everything takes twice as long as I plan when repairing horns - even though I’ve been doing it forever, so you’re inability to estimate time has no relationship to your lack of experience.

Someone just gave us a perfect/no issues fancy computerized front-loading Samsung washing machine.

I’m really hesitant to install it, because our old Whirlpool-made mechanical one – as well as the mechanical dryer (that’s not even an exact cosmetic nor stencil brand match, but still Whirlpool) – are things that we can fix ourselves. Actually, Mrs. bloke usually repairs them when they break… and anything as old as these would have broken at least once.

[Tubeast]

It´s true, of course, that any skill (be it manual or otherwise) can and will be picked up by putting one´s own mind, energy, and elbow grease to it.

If You´re lucky: find some experienced person willing to share the results of a lifetime of experience.
If You´re in bad luck, You just THINK that person has relevant information to share, but it may take a while for You to figure THAT out...
If You´re left on Your own: fish for information on Youtube and then try to do the work yourself.
And then keep practising until it´s good enough to show your product to other people.
And then practise some more until you can motivate others to actually pay you to do work for them.
And THEN practise A WHOLE LOT more so you have a chance to earn money because you don´t have to waste time and material two or three times over before your product can be sold or repairwork returned.

Over here, you enter a formal apprenticeship with an established master craftsman (person?) of the profession of your choice.
The master and the journeymen they may employ will show You their trade by teaching You techniques and assigning You work that will require increasing sets of skills.
For 1 or 2 days a week, You´ll be sent to "Berufsschule" ("School of profession"), where You´ll be tought theoretical knowledge about your profession.
(Maths, basic business administration, basic business law, safety regulations...). If Your profession is rare, there may only be 2-3 of these schools nationwide, so You´ll be sent to a kind of boarding school for several weeks every quarter of the year instead.
After 3 to 4 years of apprenticeship, there´ll be an official "Lehrabschlussprüfung" (final exam) where You´ll have to demonstrate to a board of representatives of your profession that You´ve acquired the theoretical and practical set of skills to consider You a "Geselle" or "Journeyman"

In case your "master" is master in name only, that board will be the entity you can apply to in order to make sure You get decent training.
Most master craftsmen genuinely want their apprentices to do well. I´ve witnessed private tutoring on weekends, organised by the master, iron out underperformance in Berufsschule.

[the elephant]

I became an apprentice repairman at Wright Music Co. in January 1995. It was nominally a two-year, fairly structured program but I completed it in about six months. This was because I had a burning interest in instrument repair that went back to 1980. In other words, I wasn't someone just looking for a job.

I was working in the MSO and teaching about 25 students. However, the shop foreman was also the MSO's 2nd oboe/English horn player and a very active freelancer as a jazz cornet and woodwinds guy. He hired me a lot. So I was quite busy, but Charlie let me come and go as needed. This also allowed me to work at my own pace, and I progressed very quickly.

As far as some of the weird, custom stuff I know how to do: necessity is the mother of invention. I bought books, asked many questions, and taught myself. My one hard-and-fast rule is to never make irreversible changes to a horn when I am doing something new.

I have purchased (or been gifted) lots of junk instruments over the years, and these serve as a pile of parts on which to experiment. The easiest way to accrue skills is to do the work and allow yourself to make mistakes. (Skills are just finely honed, repetitive physical actions. Experience is as important as skill when doing this sort of stuff. Skill is straightening a trombone hand slide tube out by flexing it as you run it along the carpeted edge of your bench over and over. Experience is knowing how far you can go with that before it folds in half.

If you are not intensely interested in this field you will end up wasting a lot of money and time. It is dirty, can be dangerous, and you occasionally get badly bruised, burned, and sliced. Enough of this sort of stuff makes many lose interest in the work. However, if your proclivities lean in this direction, it can be a lot of fun. I love doing this stuff.

[bloke]

Having soaked in coffee to max capacity, It’s time to go face another absurdly, foolishly, and carelessly abused useless-on-the-marching-field instrument (inaudible - out there, and horribly/completely front-heavy), a (and of course it is, because this finish is impractical and cost the taxpayers much more) silver plated marching euphonium with a folded mouthpipe tube, it’s valve section twisted sideways, and its bell duckbilled. (I thought that I had finished everything for a particular school so that I can bill them, but this was hiding behind a tuba case.)

After that, today, are several overpriced beginner trumpets made in a small Asian island country (one that a larger Asian country is threatening to conquer) - shiny/not old trumpets which all seem to somehow both have bent valve casings as well as accompanying bent pistons. Hapless citizens financed the acquisition of these instruments as well. Unlike some recent tuba repairs, at least I won’t have to have Mrs. bloke out there swinging a 3-pound sledge. (I believe she actually enjoys doing that…whamming a large hammer at $XX,XXX pieces of equipment.)

It should be obvious that my attitude is a little bit better when working on instruments that are just being improved or minor inconsequential collisions are addressed. When bumping up the playability of my own instruments, I’m never really I’m really “into the moment”, but more thinking about future moments and the improved playing characteristics. Yesterday, I was working on individually owned instruments that were not absurdly abused (one of which, I was addressing how the instrument tuned in comparison to 440 tuning, as well as how the instrument physically worked with - ie. “ergonomics” - its owner… and even though the instrument sports some significant tuning problems that really can’t be overcome, I was improving things and making those problems more manageable). That was a good day (vs. the “digging a ditch and filling it back in” days).

The usual reason that most types of employment/"jobs" exist (hired/contracted/self-employed/whatever for pay) is because (usually) people won't do these things (day-in/day-out) without remuneration as a motivation. The worst parts of any "job" are the parts that seem to be ill-advised, pointless, and that don't actually solve problems - nor address the cause of the problems. The best parts of any "job" are the opposites of the previous. A whole bunch of young people (attracted to various types of musician discussion pages) seem to fanaticize about being hired to play in a symphony orchestra. After playing (even the most beloved/monumental) works a couple dozen times, and (for tuba people, in particular) killing time backstage (etc.) for countless hours during countless concerti and countless pre-1830's (etc.) compositions, even "getting to play sheet music for a living" (just as "performing weekly and/or touring with a band/combo/small ensemble" - or even "starring in a long-running hit TV series" or "competing at the very top level in some sport" - based on listening to such people being interviewed) can become mundane. To make it through any "job" for several decades (at least, for most people) requires finding ways to continue to make it interesting...or (??) something.

holidays and the self-employed:
When salaried people are not working, overeating, vicariously playing games (via hired surrogates doing so in their behalf on broadcast television) and drinking quite a bit of alcohol, these are the times that we have found whereby we can catch up a little bit on home repairs, or (since I'm both a musician and a musical instrument fixer) fixing broken or not-right stuff on our own equipment.
Thanksgiving and Christmas (for us) as well as New Years (etc., etc.) are either ignored, limited to a couple of hours of visiting with others, or working - ex: playing music, rather than any of this nonsense:

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/articl ... ravel.html

bloke "I really like my cat."


I believe the reason that we get along so well is because we both like Hogan's Heroes, The Rockford Files and Perry Mason (as well as sleeping through any/all of these.