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Daily Instrument Care and General Information

Here are a few simple steps you can use to keep your Instrument in good condition and end up saving you hundreds of dollars in unnecessary repair bills

Contents:

• Daily Care
• Weekly Care

1. Daily care of  your instrument

• Before you play you need to tighten your bow and check that you have enough rosin. Usually you will need rosin after every 2-5 hours of playing depending on how hard you play. Sometimes people put too much rosin on the bow and it will end up sounding really scratchy.
• Wipe the instrument down every time after you play. You always get a small build up of rosin which if left, will cause a caking effect on the topplate. this will effect the varnish and the sound of the instrument. Use a soft flannel cleaning cloth, and first wipe under the bridge, the top of the fingerboard, the strings and then wipe the entire instrument down.
• Unwind your bow. If you leave the bow hair tight, the bow will loose it's spring over time.

• Check your pegs. do they stick or slip? if they creak or stick, you will have to apply peg paste. If they slip, you will have to wind the strings on again
• Check your fine-tuners: Usually when you are tuning the instrument, you only wind them in. Every now and then you have to wind them out again.
• Check your Bridge weekly. As you are tuning the instrument the bridge will start leaning towards whichever part of the instrument you use to tune (ie. the pegs or the fine-tunes). If the bridge is leaning towards the scroll or tailpiece, you will have to straighten it. If you keep your bridge straight, it will last between 10 and 15 years. if you don't it can be bent after 3 month!
• Check the strings: are they corroded, or slightly frayed? You can prolong the life of you strings by putting graphite (Pencil) in the grooves at the nut, or on the bridge. Try to do this carefully not to get pencil lines all over the rest of the bridge or instrument.
• Make sure the instrument does not have any more bumps or bruises. If it does, you may be able to find out if it is the way you are handling the instrument that is causing the marks. Sometimes something hard in the case causes scratches, or the bow marking the instrument.