Tenor Sax Pad-Saver

[brother cavefish]

i have been out of it for LONG WHILE, and i used to use one of these in the body while stored as to take up moisture, after the swab of coarse, do any of you use it

[Mel]

I use one of these after I swab it. I also put it in if I am taking the sax somewhere.

[brother cavefish]

i used to too, but i was just making sure i believe it takes up extra moisture, maybe i will get one again

[Anonymous]

Sadly the only way to fully dry out a sax is the old fashioned way – after various cloth pull throughs, leave it on the stand for the air to dry it out.

Other than putting in a microwave for 10 seconds, connecting it to a hairdyer, take it in a sauna ….
Its an age old problem.

This year and last year my sax was repaired and in both cases, they still had to clean the inside and replace worn pads. I put it down to the fact, that i put my sax straight in the case after cleaning with a pull through cloth.

My biggest concern is my sax as a whole is so soft. I can bend every moving part on it with my fingers.
When the sax bell lip got bent, i just straightened it out with my hands. My sax is so delicate, a slight tap on a pad would put it out of position.

My daughters clarinet is the same , she was playing with her back to the wall, and accidently tapped the clarinet on the wall, and bent a few things.

[Anonymous]

Hi BC, I use a BG pull-through cloth after playing, but I’ve discovered there is still quite a bit of moisture left on the pads of the sax. What I do now after using the BG cloth is slide a 1″ wide strip of sugar paper under the pad and press the valve down, so the moisture is transferred from the pad to the paper. It takes a minute or two to do all the pads, and this helps to prevent mold growing on them which makes them sticky. Rubbing the pads and valve seat with a dampened Q-tip (Ear bud) removes any residual muck present.

[Mel]

By swab I was meaning the pull through cloth. It is amazing how wet the cloth is when pulled through a couple times. I use paper towel strips after that to push the pads down on and those still get wet. I also put old reeds under the pads that stay closed to help them dry so they don’t stay stuck closed.

[brother cavefish]

of coarse of coarse, with out skipping
i do all these thing too, it is a given
i pull through clothes, wipe every thing down and use a BG microfibre pad saver, or little piece of cloth under each pad and let it sit out to dry, this is not a toy, it is a fine tuned instrument,

[Anonymous]

coarse or course?

[William Cingolani]

I used to keep a dry swab in the bore of the horn after swabing. My current sax tech told me to leave the swab out since the swab is silk and it just collects moisture, so I swab with the swab and then I pull a rag trough the horn. I do what sxpoet, brother cavefish, mel and Jeff and most of you sax players do, then I let it air dry and I leave sax case open……every thing short of using the hair dryer

[Mel]

It’s also nice to have a tall saxophone stand so you can keep your sax out and not have to put it away in the case all the time.

[Author]

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