How to Clean a Trombone

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Last Updated: November 27, 2024 Approved

Trombone maintenance is a practice which should be a part of every trombonist’s daily playing routine. Keeping a clean instrument not only serves to maintain the value of your investment, but it also helps keep your slide and valve movements easy and smooth, allowing for more maneuverability with the instrument and better sound quality. Here are a few steps to follow when performing general maintenance on your trombone.

Things You Should Know

Disassemble the trombone. To deep clean the instrument, soak the parts in lukewarm water. Otherwise, wipe down the parts with a soft rag.
Use a cleaning rod or a “snake” to remove excess grease, oil, and moisture from the outer and inner slides.
Dry off all components with a soft rag and reassemble your trombone. Apply lubricant as you normally would.

Method 1

Method 1 of 2:

Using a Bathtub

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1
Fill a bathtub with lukewarm water. Do NOT use hot water. It helps to place a dampened towel or cloth at the bottom of the bathtub to avoid dents or scratches.
- Hot water can actually damage the lacquer. Lukewarm water will be just fine.
2
Next, take the outer slide off the inner slide. You should now have three parts. Then remove the tuning slide (or both if you have a Bb/F trigger trombone).
- Now you should have four (or five) parts in the water. Include the mouthpiece and you will have five (or six.)
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*Gently handle the parts at all times.^{[1]
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4
Once the parts have soaked for five to ten minutes, stand the bell section up away from the other parts and gently rub the bell with the cotton rags on the outside and as much as you can on the inside.
- Rinse the bell with cold water.
- Use the beach towel and dry the bell as much as possible. Set it aside in a safe place where it will not be knocked over and let it finish by air drying.
5
Take the outer slide and run the snake back and forth through inside of it. Make sure the outer slide is filled with water. Do this for about 1 to 2 minutes on each side of the slide.
- Often junk will come out into the water. That's good! Keep working at it for at least a minute on each side. Using a clean stream of cold water, rinse the inside and outside of the outer slide. Dry with a beach towel and let it air dry with the bell.
Next, take the snake and clean the inside of the inner slide as before with the outer slide. Rinse and dry and place it with the other parts.^{[2]
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Use the snake to clean the inside of the tuning slide.^{[3]
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- Often the tuning slide grease will eventually gum on the part of the tuning slide that fits into the bell section. To clean this, use a penetrating oil like WD-40. Spray the tuning slide with the penetrating oil and let it sit for a few minutes, before wiping away as much "gunk" as possible. If the horn has not been cleaned in a while, you may have to repeat this process several times.^{[4]
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This will only take about 30 seconds or so. Rub the mouthpiece with a cotton rag, then dry it. If the mouthpiece gets gunk in the cup or shank, it will greatly disrupt the airflow when playing, so do not neglect your mouthpiece.^{[5]
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Finishing off.
- After the horn has completely "air dried" you will have a nice clean trombone. You will have to reapply a slide lubricant to the slide, then apply tuning slide grease to the tuning slides. Use both sparingly -- a little goes a long way.^{[6]
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- Reinsert the tuning slide(s) into the bell section. Wipe any extra grease away with a clean cloth or cotton rag. Now your set to clean your trombone and remember clean well and clean often.

Method 2

Method 2 of 2:

Using a Rag

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Be careful not to bend or dent either slide in the process. Be gentle!
Use a cleaning rod or a “snake” (a flexible rubber coated metal wire with a small brush on both ends), clean out any excess grease, oil or moisture from the insides of the outer and inner slides. If using a cleaning rod, be careful not to jam the rod into the bottom of the slide. If you are rough, you risk denting the crook at the end of the slide.
If absolutely necessary, disassemble the rotary valve for the F attachment, rinse off each piece and wipe off excess oil or grease. However, this stage of the cleaning should really be handled by a trained instrument technician, as any sort of scratch or dent in the valve will adversely affect the playability of the horn.
Special attention should be given to the rotary valve, water key (or spit valve), and the outer and inner slides.
Dry off all components with a soft rag, making sure that no large pockets of water remain in any of the tubing or in the rotary valve.
Most of the oil should be applied by dripping it in through the pipe where the bell section and playing slide meet, though a few drops may be applied to the rotary valve directly.
12
Apply necessary slide grease or oils to the inner slide.

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Question

Can I use any spray bottle? A bottle didn't come in my cleaning kit and I was wondering if a small, cleaned, body mist bottle would be fine.

Forte Piano

Community Answer

Any bottle that has a sprayer on top will do fine. Just be sure to rinse it out first! A small, compact, portable bottle is preferred, though.

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Do I have to use a snake?

Gabe

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If you were going to clean the inside of the slide, a snake would be the easiest and safest way.

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I use a cleaning rod for dry cleaning to clean my trombone, but the cloth part tears easily. Is there something else I can use? Like an old t-shirt?

Community Answer

NEVER use a cleaning rod on the inside or outside of your trombone. It can scratch your instrument. You can use just the cleaning rod cloth for wiping away excess oil. You could use a t-shirt, too, but better yet is using water to avoid any possibility of scratching.

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Tips

The playing slide may require more frequent lubrication with grease or oil. Simply apply as necessary.

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Silver plated horns will probably tarnish the next day or so after cleaning. Using a mild silver polish, clean the horn as directed on the polish bottle. Only clean the outside: the inside is brass or copper.

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To rinse the parts, use the shower head if your bathtub has one.

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Warnings

When washing the horn, do not use overly hot water. It can cause the lacquer to flake off allowing air to get to the raw brass. For horns that are not lacquered, be careful with the heat as brass is a very soft metal and too hot a temperature can actually cause the horn to warp.

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If you do not know how to disassemble your F attachment rotary valve, simply leave it as it is and oil it whenever you conduct this maintenance. Mistakes in the assembly or disassemble of the valve may damage your instrument.

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Do not use a blow dryer for any part of the drying process, as a blow dryer can get very hot and can damage the lacquer!

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Be very careful with the parts, especially the inner and outer slide.

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Do not use abrasive cleaners or cleaning pads, which will rub off the lacquer. In other words, do not use Ajax, Comet, Brasso, SOS pads, steel wool, etc.

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When handling any of the slides (though special care should be taken with the inner and outer playing slides), make sure that they are placed on a relatively soft, smooth surface when they are not being cleaned to avoid denting, as this could result in changes in the sound quality of the instrument or even render the instrument unusable.

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Be careful when using the main slide especially. If it hits something hard it may dent and bend rendering the instrument unplayable.

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Things You'll Need

Using a Bathtub

Flexible brush commonly called a "snake" which can be purchased at any music store
Mouthpiece brush -- again available at any music store.
Bathtub
Mild soap. Some like to use horn soap (available at many music stores) but this is not necessary. Mild dish soap will be fine. Lemon or orange is even better.
Some cotton rags (old t-shirts work best.)
Beach towel to dry the trombone

Using a Rag

Two soft rags—one for the cleaning of the instrument, one for the polishing of the instrument after the cleaning is done
Cleaning rod and rag, or a “snake”
Any slide grease or oil that you normally use