Posted by Bill V. on November 20, 2003 at 01:40:18:
In Reply to: Stuck slide posted by Josh on November 18, 2003 at 02:24:19:
Last month I had a badly stuck main tuning slide in an old (70 yr old) sousa. The horn probably hadn't been used in decades.
I put some WD-40 around the ferules and put even pressure on it for a while, but that didn't do much. I then had already planned on running some warm (not hot for the laquer's sake) water through the horn to free up things inside of it. (like the old news paper that came out!)
After I had gotten all of the water our of the horn I tried to pull on the slide again and managed to work it loose. My arms were sore for a day or two from the pulling, but I got it out and with no breaks or tweaks in the horn. I'm not sure if WD-40 had any negative affects on laquer, but it didn't hurt mine.
Please note that i'm not an expert and am only speaking from experience, not training. I used to have to fix my tubas in high school as well since we were on a slashed band budget.
Good luck!