Author: Lelia
Date: 1999-07-24 00:21
Repair people and people who sell mouthpieces (and let customers try them out) use another product marketed especially for sanitizing mouthpieces, called SteriSol. It's sold ready to use in small spray bottles and also in a more economical bottle of concentrate for mixing with water and refilling the spray. (Ferree's Tools carries it.) Like all cold sterilants, SteriSol won't completely sterlilize rubber or plastic. When I buy old mpcs, I wash them thoroughly in dish detergent and lukewarm water, and use a mouthpiece brush (pointed bottle-brush, sold in music stores) to clean out any crud. I follow that up with a rinse, then rinse again either SteriSol (which I carry on hunting expiditions that sometimes involve scrubbing out a mpc in a public ladies' room because I can't wait to get home before I try it!) or a disinfectant mouthwash containing alcohol, such as Listerine. If I really have doubts about a used mpc, I soak it in the disinfectant for 10 minutes or so. (It's probably clean enough for government work, but I'm squeamish.) Then I rinse with plain water and dry the mpc with paper towel on the outside and a "mouthpiece saver" on the inside. I never leave a "saver" in the mpc afterwards, because I like it to dry out completely overnight, so fungi, mold, cooties from outer space, etc. don't grow in there. I do the short form of this routine (no long soaking) once a week on my own mouthpieces. In between, I rinse them out and dry them every time after I play them.
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