Underground Instrument Repair

09/26/2025

Oh what fun it is to find technician secrets. There is a substantial dip in this side E tone hole. Upon investigation, the post had been resoldered and if you look closely, they used a sanding dremel wheel to clean up the solder run off. Not only digging into the body but also touching the tone hole. There was an attempt to file the tone hole, almost to the body. 🤦🏻‍♂️

Do not fear! We can build up that tone hole with some brass stock. Punch out the size you need, and solder in place. I will clean it up with some filing to ensure it is level.

08/14/2025

She has gotten pretty good at directing the old man on how to do things.

08/06/2025

A general maintenance category repair on an Eastrock alto saxophone.

08/06/2025

08/02/2025

Saxophone Saturday! Second Bari of the day. 😮‍💨

07/24/2025

Removal of old adhesive, full coverage of adhesive on the new pad.

07/24/2025

Instrument was “cleaned” and “repair” by a local repair shop less than a year ago. So buckle up, here is a teaching moment.

You will notice a tear on the back side of the pad that goes through the pad seat. Not your typical wear and tear situation. To follow that up the globbed up mess that is the French shellac. Doesn’t cover the entirety of the pad, causing an uneven seat, and air pockets. Why is that a problem? Shellac is brittle and if not done correctly, pressure over time will break down that shellac and your pads will pop out.

07/22/2025

To all the musicians out there, I have an individual who is trying to get a full sized keyboard, if any of you have any leads on someone selling theirs or have one sitting collecting dust please shoot me a message! Thanks!

07/18/2025

Just a fun fact. Also, Shout out to Lee for the background music. Heads up, first section of this video will have some unwanted white noise. My apologies, you get one take on these videos and you get what you get and don’t throw a fit. 😁

07/17/2025

It’s the little things. D tone hole was warped, touched it with a 1000 grit leveling tool to find the high spots, use a tone hole lever tool and a drum stick to bring the low spots up. Boom, no aggressive filing and we now have a level tone hole.

04/10/2025

This journey is not for the feint of heart, it requires more dedication in other aspects of life other than making money. Do I feel stressed? Yes. Do I feel overwhelmed? Yes. Do I feel that I am not upholding what I told people I would do? Absolutely, and for those that continue to support my dream of having my own shop and acknowledge the struggles right now, I appreciate you.

Here is to my family, who try and bring smiles to my often curmudgeon attitude. Here is to my friends who reach out to see how I am holding up. Here is to the folks that unknowingly push me to continue to strive for perfection. Thank you.

To conclude this post I will leave you with this. Our paths are often flipped upside down so that we may learn and grow and to be better than we were before. Acknowledge the struggles and become the best version of you. I look forward to what the future holds. Cheers 🍻

11/21/2024

Full breakdown, cleaning, and regulation of instrument.