SteveS

I use hide glue. My glue pot is a jam jar on an upturned jam jar lid in a bain-marie. Heat source is a single electric ring that I bought off Amazon (about €19) together with a coffee thermometer suspended in the ban-marie water . I find that liquid hide glue, although it has a longer open time, takes a long time to set hard - heated hide glue hardens in a much shorter time. BTW I also use hide glue for valves - makes the removal of the old glue a breeze.

Thinking more about this, and especially Dave's comments about scraping wood of different hardness, I looked again at the instrument where it is broken and suggests that the laminate is ebony, I'm of a mind to try and source some ebony veneer and use that in the repair. I'll try to match the relative thicknesses of the layers of the end, and work the patches off-instrument to get the best fit that I can before patching and scraping to blend. I'll use the ebony in place of the fruit wood I suggested above. Looking at furniture restoration videos, I may have to remove some veneer material in the ends to level the arare being repaired, to aid in patching, and to key the wood for gluing. I plan to use CA glue to fix the patches - I've had good results with CA glue when staining: I've seen African Ebony veneer of various thicknesses so I might order some and see whether it might work. I can stain the ebony veneers as I assemble my laminate.

I have seen the solid ebony ends almost become dust with only what was left of the finish holding them together. I have made new ends for a few concertinas that have perished in this way. Dave, you raise a good point about the relative hardness of the veneers versus the ebony wood - scraping may be difficult to do because of this relative hardness difference. And thanks for the info about the method of making the edge molding. Alex, I adopted a similar approach to you in making new ends, including raised new ends. Layers of veneer bonded using Cascamite. These accept stain quite well and didn't see the 'grinning' effect. I have also have good results using stain with hide glue and various superglues. I think my approach is firming up - the BT ends are a sandwich presumably fruit wood (I can see the change in grain direction in the edge molding) - make a veneer sandwich - thicker for the missing piece of edging and thinner for the worn parts - work replacement parts to fit as close as possible off the instrument - I can stain the sandwich layers - and I find stain helps the eye when fitting and blending - once fitted, blend using a combination of scraper and 'targeted' sanding with small sanding blocks (I have some small pieces of hardwood that I stick whatever grade of sandpaper I need - but in general I'm not a fan of sanding concertina ends) Looking at the instrument again, it appears as though they've been refinished at some point before the damage was done - I can see that there is a loss of detail in the fretwork. (Some good news - it's pretty much in concert pitch. Bellows have some crude patches - I think a rebind will be needed) Before I commit to anything though, I'll find some videos by furniture restorers and/or luthiers. This restoration work is still in the planning stage (I have another instrument on the bench right now ahead of this one), but I like to know how I'm going to fix something before I start the work. The last thing I want is to dive in and find after while find I have problems because I'm missing some important technique - and every restoration project usually throws up some challenges - but I like to mitigate those as much as possible.

Sheep skin

Thanks for the reply Dave I am confident that I can do a good job on the polishing, as well as blending any new wood. I was just wondering whether the approach I suggested might be the best way to go. I'll see if I can find any furniture or luthier videos on YouTube that might help me consolidate an approach to take. Steve

Here is a picture of an end of an Aeola BT coming up for restoration. 1) There is a lot of wear to the ends caused by the restraining blocks (which have worn to the wood) have rubbed up against the ends - this can be seen top and bottom of this, right of the end bolts. The left hand end is similar, but not quite as bad. 2) Also missing is a piece of the end plate by the name plate. Whilst 2) is arguably a straight forward repair by adding and building up the wood with pear veneer laminate, the worn sections 1) are a little trickier to fix. My immediate thought is to replace the worn away wood with veneer, building up the right thickness, and the scrape down to be flush with the end plate - I'd need to route the edge (which I need to do anyway for the bit near the name plate). And of course I'd need to address the worn blocks in the case. I'd appreciate comments on my approach, and whether there may be another approach I could take to fixing this instrument.

This looks like it might work for tracking a concertina - just hide one in your instrument case. https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/jerrylin/slimca-here-a-tracker-as-thin-as-a-credit-card?ref=thanks-copy

Rather than adapt an instrument to suit the case (and risk damaging a vintage instrument), look at making (or acquiring) a slightly larger case.

Any alteration to the depth of the blind drilled holes for the captive nuts (sometimes called receiver plates) may well cause a load of trouble to some restorer in the future. Pulling out the captive nuts can damage the instrument by pulling veneer away with the nut. You may even affect the potential resale value, since putting right any alterations is an expensive process. As a repairer, I would caution against any alteration to a vintage instrument. Looking at the photo, have you tried turning the instrument through 45 degrees in its case? The wrist strap thumbscrews shouldn't then touch the inside of the case.

Look forward to hearing about it and to seeing the pics

Do any of the repairers and restorers here have any vintage wrist strap thumb screws from a scrapper available? I have a requirement for 2x wrist strap screws (Wheatstone Aeola EC), and the corresponding brass receiver plates. Thanks in advance.

As a restorer, given an appreciation for the nature and amount of work involved in a concertina, my guess would be about 1 instrument per month (maximum 2) for a sole maker (maker and assistant possibly 3-5 every 2 months).

At a ceilidh I once witnessed a potentially serious accident between a high-heeled shoe and a sporran.

There is no caller usually at Scottish ceilidhs, so that relieves the band of asking which tunes will fit. Dancers are expected to know the dances, and by and large, they do, or can pick them up in real-time.

I recall when I played in a ceilidh band in Edinburgh - we'd play may be 10 dances per hour, and 3 tunes per dance - with a few spares, we played around 100 tunes in a 3 hour set. I can't play any of them now - I went over entirely to Nordic folk music.

FWIW bandos used for Argentinian tango (Rheinische tonlage) I read that they are tuned to A=442Hz.

Still available Here's a video.

Here's a video of this instrument in action.

Here are some pictures of the rebuild process.

reduced to €2200 any interest?

reduced to €1600 any interest?

Results of experiment with glues for ends repair. As I mentioned in a previous thread, I have an EC on my bench that has solid ebony ends, and is suffering from the typical hairline cracks. I solicited opinions in that thread on various glues to use, along with tips, in repairing and strengthening the ends. One thing that was apparent from the thread is that a low viscosity glue would be best for the repair: low viscosity to allow the glue to permeate the wooden structure and any other cracks that there maybe in the wood. I conducted an experiment into the effectiveness of CA and Chair Doctor glues for the repair of hairline cracks. Objectives: - To test which glues are best suited to the repair of hairline cracks in concertina ends - To create an analogue of a solid concertina end to conduct this test - To determine the performance, open times, effects, and whether glues can carry stain - To gain an insight into how much work is needed after gluing to prepare for finishing - To understand the best way to apply glue in repair of cracked solid ends. Materials: - 2 glue types – CA super thin and Chair Doctor. - 2 test pieces were assembled – one for each glue type – CA and Chair Doctor. - Pear veneer cut into approximately 35cm squares. A sandwich of 3 pieces, glued with hide glue around the sides only, grain all running in the same direction, and then clamped up overnight. - Spirit stain (brown mahogany being an approximation for rosewood-coloured ends). - Disposable pipettes for accurate application of the glues. Method: - In each piece cut 3 parallel cuts with a sharp knife in the direction of the grain to simulate hairline cracks. o One cut to the depth of the thickness of the outer veneer o Second cut the depth of the outer and middle veneer o Third cut to almost the full depth of all three layers of veneer - Marked the test pieces, CA Glue and Chair Doctor - Raised the knife cuts slightly with a sharp knife, so that the outer surface at the cuts was a little proud of the surface to touch with the fingertip. - Applied the CA and Chair Doctor glue to the cuts on the relevant test pieces. - After allowing the glue to dry according to the minimum times suggested by the manufacturers, I scraped the excess glue with a scraper fashioned from a sharp flat-edged blade. - I then applied spirit stain to check whether the glues would accept stain. Results: - Both glues bleed through the cuts to the other side, but only with the deeper cuts. It can be assumed that with the shallower cut the glues spread to bond the veneer layers. - The CA glue seemed to bleed through more readily than Chair Doctor. I suspect that the CA glue maybe has a lower viscosity – however there may also have been differences in the depth of the cuts in the veneer than encouraged to CA glue to bleed through more readily. - The Chair Doctor glue causes the wood to swell and on setting the cuts stood proud somewhat of the test piece surface. - The CA was easier to level by scraping than the Chair Doctor glue. - After levelling, both glues accepted spirit stain - the brown stain helped make the stained cuts more visible. The stain did not rub off after application. - After applying the stain, the cuts stained a darker brown than the surrounding wood veneer. The CA glue was not as dark as Chair Doctor. - The relative approximate useful working open times for the glues are: CA 5-6 seconds; Chair Doctor 15 minutes. - Both glues filled the cuts quite well. CA required a second application to fill one of the cuts (which may have been because of my glue application technique). Conclusions: - Both glues appear to be suitable for the repair of ends with hairline cracks. - Both glues should be applied to the rear side of an end. Chair Doctor causes the wood to swell, and this would necessitate scraping and/or sanding if applied to the finished side of the end, possibly resulting in the loss of detail. - Where glue is likely to bleed through to the finished side, it may be beneficial to mask the end using suitable self-adhesive tape. Some post-glue rework may be required on the finished side of the end if glue bleeds through from the inside face. - Chair Doctor offers a longer open time – especially important if clamping is required. - If staining is required after gluing, be aware that both glues will darken. This may be relevant in the repair of say, solid rosewood-coloured ends. - both glues offer gap filling capabilities

I have a Wheatstone baritone on my bench right now - serial number 25278 - it's tuned as follows: C3 = 134.0 Hz C4 = 266.5 Hz A3 = 225.7 Hz A4 = 452.4 Hz The 'tina has brass reeds, which play wonderfully, making it sound like a harmonium. This concertina should be wonderful for song accompaniment. My plan is to tune it so that it is in tune with itself - my assessment is that the reeds would not tolerate being tuned down to concert pitch. What I want to do is tune it so that it's consistent across its full range with only minimal tuning (I'll be replacing pads and valves necessitating some minimal tuning). Incidentally, it's tuned in equal temperament. My question is - like we centre concert pitch on A=440Hz - which note should this concertina be pitched too? Doing a bit of research, it looks to me like the tuning is Philharmonic Society "high pitch" centered on A=452.4 Hz at 60F. It seems that brass bands used this pitch in early C20th, so maybe concertina bands also used this pitch. If this is the case, A4 is tuned bang-on.

I’m selling another instrument from my collection. This is a Wheatstone Aeola 56-key Tenor-Treble with non-ferrous reeds (serial number 29277). It is a unique concertina that started life as an ebony-ended instrument. I rebuilt it several years ago and documented some of the process on CNet at that time. When I acquired it, the ends had decayed so much they were little more than sawdust held together by the ether. There were other major things too - the reed chambers were also decayed, all leatherwork had gone - it was a bag of spare parts. I essentially remanufactured this instrument and it is finished to an extremely high standard – as it might have come from the factory. The raised ends are a walnut laminate comprising of burl walnut veneers, all finished with blonde shellac. All metalwork is plated with 23ct gold. The instrument received new bellows, new pads, new valves, new thumb straps, new wrist straps, and is tuned to concert pitch (A=440Hz). The reeds are high quality non-ferrous reeds – Wheatstone called these tropicalised. They are every bit as good as steel reeds, with one difference, they are much sweeter sounding than the steel equivalents. This is ideal for a singer, and in fact I used to use this concertina a lot for song accompaniment. It has a balanced tone, with plenty of dynamic range. In excellent condition. No case. Located in Piemonte, Italy. Price: €4750 If a potential buyer wishes, I’m happy to use an escrow service (e.g. escrow.com) to safeguard our transaction across the Internet.