Archived under: Equipment, General | Questions, Repairs and Modifications
From the Mailbag: My Water Key is Worthless
QUESTION:
I must be a total idiot, but I cannot get my spit valves to work on any horn I have tried. It seems that if I wait until I have “water-noises”, then open one or both valves and blow soft, medium, or hard, then it doesn’t seem to work. I end up with water everywhere, it takes just as long or longer then the “pull-slide(s)-and-dump.”
Am I missing something, or do they just seem mostly worthless? Is it only intended to be used during a piece where there isn’t time to actually pull a slide?
ANSWER:
I can sympathize.
I once owned an instrument with an Amado water key on the lead pipe. While these water keys profess to be acoustically much better that the traditional water key, it never worked very well. When I would blow with force to get out the condensation, it would spray everywhere — getting my hand all wet.
Here is a technique that works for me:
While holding the instrument at rest, shift the right hand into a very tight, stopped horn hand position.
Gripping the horn tightly in the bell with that hand, open the water key with the left hand and blow gently. (Blowing hard will only make a mess. )
The air now only has one way to escape — through the open water key. The extra force from closing the bell with the hand gives a little more oomph to water drainage without making a sprayed mess.
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