[Swan Left Nine (G row) Reeds Reversed?]

edit;  I originally thought you'd meant the *whole row* was reversed which was what totally blew my mind. On reflection, if it's just the one reed then I am sure a competent workshop will fix that, and for the price of a beer or three (as Malcolm suggested). The risk of trying to tackle it yourself might invalidate whatever warranty you were given in the first place if things go wrong. I stand by the fact that it shouldn't have been supplied to you with such a defect, and that if there's wonky tuning on the accidentals in addition then you're within your rights to question the quality control of that particular instrument in general. The reeds are definitely waxed in place rather than bolted.

[Replacing crummy label with something more fitting]

Thanks for all your replies.

- It does have a riveted action, and leather bellows.

- Playability wise I haven't anything to compare it to; hopefully when the world opens up I'll have an opportunity to try others' and let others try mine. All I can say is I find it satisfying and responsive.

- Re: photos of the guts, I'll find an excuse to mess around under the bonnet soon enough, and since a few of you are interested I'll document the insides. Stay tuned!

 

[Replacing crummy label with something more fitting]

Hi there, this is my first post, so nice to 'meet' you all!

 

I recently got my hands on a second-hand Swan (as sold by McNeela). I was just looking for something to knock around on, and see if I took to the instrument. I managed to pick it up for a real snip so I hope to get the most out of it, including tinkering around inside it to learn without worrying too much. I consider myself a little bit handy with tools so I might even have a go at 'improving' it further in the future.

 

Honestly I have huge amounts to learn about the good construction of concertinas, and I know that you count some extraordinarily talented makers amongst your members here. Having said that, on peeking inside whilst it's clear that it's been built 'to a cost', there looks like there has been some care afforded in putting it together.

 

So far so good, and I've been enjoying the instrument and learning some new tunes. I have played piano accordion since I was a youngun and was worried that learning something diatonic would mess with my head too much. To be honest, it really did frustrate me at first, but I'm glad to say it *is* possible to overcome and it's feeling more natural with each day.

 

One thing that stuck out like a sore thumb to me was the cr*ppy labels it's supplied with. I thought this was a bit of a shame as even the infamous Wren has a really nice looking badge on it.

 

 

 

To this end I decided my first tinkering would be something aesthetic, not something I could mess up mechanically. I set about designing a simple label from scratch, taking inspiration from his Phoenix and Wren labels but keeping it simple.

 

I printed the labels on heavy paper I had lying around designed for pastel drawings.

 

 

I applied a couple of coats of matt sealant - there was a small amount of bleeding despite the care I took but I was happy enough with the results.

 

The original labels were applied to a protrusion of the laser-cut 'bushing board'. I removed this lump as carefully as I could, and used a wood chisel to remove the remains of the old label.

 

I then stuck the 'new' labels onto these lumps, using a bright light behind to get them as straight as possible. After drying, I trimmed them up.

 

 

I stuck them back on to the bushing board (for now), and used a thin piece of birch (lolly stick 😉) to reinforce.

 

 

Here is the after result. Perfect? No. Professional? Certainly not. Better? I think so!!

 

You can't make a silk purse from a sow's ear, but you can put lipstick on a pig! What do you think?

 

All the best