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Restored Jeffries Air Button Spring Tension Adustment?


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A friend of mine recently took delivery of a phenomenal Jeffries 30-button which had some serious restoration work done by Dipper.

 

The spring tension on all the buttons across the board is quite high, which she's adapting to, but the air button has about twice the spring tension of the other buttons on the instrument and I think is way too high. The air button actually painful to use for any length of time and she's getting tendonitis in her thumb from activating it.

 

Looking at the design of the air button, it appears to have a single-wire, double sprung mechanism unlike the other buttons on the instrument. It appears to be a single-piece V-shaped saddle spring with two coil springs on either side of the lever.

 

This is way beyond my ability to adjust, any suggestions who might be able to do the work for her to lighten the air button spring tension without having to ship the instrument all the way back to England? She's in San Diego, CA.

 

Thanks for any suggestions,

 

Michael

 

 

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Im sure Greg Jowaisas could deal with this in a few minutes. I dont know any west coast repairers, though there may be some. There is theoretically nothing wrong with that kind of spring which just more tidily duplicates using two springs. But either the wire gage is too large, or there are two few coils. You could try taking off some of the preload by removing the spring, putting any sort of mandrel through the coils and wrap the legs just enough more so they spring back a few degrees less. It is easy to open them up if you over do it. Torsion springs like these build tension slowly, so removing say half the preload, ( the amount it must be compressed before it hooks into place ) it will be relatively constant at the new pressure. You only need enough pressure to keep the pad down against the air pressure. Sometimes people spring too heavily to counter a misaligned or tilted pad, or one with a leaky surface rather than addressing the underlying issue.

Dana

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We are confused, as we don't set up instruments with a 'heavy' action. The brass springs we use in Jeffries concertinas are actually lighter than the originals.

 

As always, we would ask you to contact us if there is an issue - maybe your friend could contact us directly, with a photo of the springs in question and we will be only too happy to help in any way we can. (If they are old springs, then it is best not to adjust them, but if they are new springs, we can instruct you on how to change their pressure).

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I suspect that you have two springs with their contact under the lever extremely close together. you could always try to un-hook one side to see, if oit is two springs leave it un-hooked and see how it feels/ plays.

 

Dave

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  • 3 weeks later...

Just to clarify, the spring work wasn't done by Dipper, as was clarified recently to my friend.

 

Absolutely no sleight meant at all on Dipper's work, and if there was any perceived, I apologize profusely.

 

She just wants to get the air button tension lightened and will have someone work on it.

 

Greg, I'm guessing she's already contacted you...

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The concertina in question is on the bench. It is a lovely Jeffries and of course the work the Dippers did is outstanding.

 

The present owner is a smaller person. I've raised the thumb button for easier access and am addressing the overall spring pressure to make the instrument more friendly to her light, quick Irish Trad approach.

 

Best,

 

Greg

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