Tone-bar and slide Maintenance
 

I am new to playing weissenborn. I am using a stainless steel tone-bar and a glass bar. I am noticing light surface scratching on both. Is this normal? I am also wondering if these slides require periodic maintenance.

I've never worried about that, no. The oxidation patina on some of my slides gets a little scratched, but that's such a thin layer it doesn't impact anything. I've never noticed any significant scratches on my glass slides. I have one tone-bar but don't play that much lap slide and I could sell my bar as "Like new. Only played by a little old bottleneck player who only plays lap slide on Sunday..."

Maybe someone else has a high mileage tone bar and can chime in.

Thank you for your thoughts on the subject. I will go forth and not worry about the fine scratches.

I have a lap-dawg tone bar that I've had for at least 10 years. While I'm not primarily a lap-style player I do use it fairly often. It's the only tone bar I've had. While it has a few nicks and dents it is still perfectly usable and I'm not particularly fastidious with my gear....it's pretty indestructible.
Some day I would like to get another, but that's only as I am worried I might lose it at some stage.

no maintenance needed, just play them. My wife needed a hammer once and couldn’t find one but she could find my tone bar. Well even with a few dings it still works great