2nd slide comes loose

[RickF]

Well this was a first. While playing in church this morning in a brass quintet, all of a sudden I noticed a terrible sound every once in awhile. The bad sound was when ever I pressed the second valve. I stopped playing and quickly pulled out my 2nd valve to make sure it was seated correctly -- it was fine. Then the 2nd slide fell on the floor. Evidently the short leg of the 2nd slide was out far enough to leak air badly. Thankfully it was during the first vs of the first hymn and not during a more exposed section. I've never had a second slide fall out before. I use the thick Hetman's 8 on my slides which works well. Maybe when I emptied the second slide earlier I didn't seat it all the way... not sure.

Glad the brass quintet wasn't playing last week when we had some special guests in attendance to listen to 'basketball great' Jerry Lucus speak. These were Jack Nicklaus, his wife Barbara and retired CEO of GE, Jack Welch.

[ghmerrill]

Was this on the YEP? A couple of years ago (I think) I recall seeing several reports (some of them as part of reviews) about the second valve slides on Yamaha euphs just falling out while they were being played. Otherwise, I don't think this is a particularly unusual phenomenon. The second valve slide tends to get pulled a lot to dump water, and so is subject to more wear than others. But also, for some reason, they just seem to skip out more frequently -- perhaps because they just have a lot less bearing surface to hold them in. I think there may also be some issue with pressure (from the valve) affecting them more for similar reasons. A month or so ago I noticed one of the euph players in my community band having this same problem with his TE (Chinese) euph as well. On both my euphs I've very carefully expanded the second valve slides just a bit.

If it's a continuing problem that's not solved by heavier valve grease, a five minute stop at a repair tech can eliminate the problem entirely. All they have to do is run the right size expander ball into the legs.

[RickF]

No, not the Yamaha, but my Miraphone 5050. Looking back on it I think when we were doing a run-through before the first service, I emptied my 2nd slide and probably didn't slide it all the way home. I suspect the short leg barely closed.

Years ago I switched to heavier grease on my YEP because of what I read about a slide falling out. The Yamaha was much looser than the newer M5050. I did have that one swedged to be tighter.

Needless to say, I already cleaned and re-greased all slide.