Good morning to all, and Greetings from Colorado, USA!
I wanted to introduce myself and to let you all know that I'm the person who bought this concertina (if you're curious).
So, I'm Dan and I repair accordions here in Colorado and have been doing so for eight years now. I bought most of my inventory of accordions of various types ( over 100 by now! Yikes!) from a popular internet auction site. I buy instruments, repar them as necessary, and then resell them here locally. I'm not really a big player in the business, but I am starting to gather a group of folks who love accordions. Most of my work is in repairs of existing instruments, but I do end up selling a half dozen or so instruments over a year. Again, not really a big player. To date, all of my work is by word of mouth.
I have had the privelidge of having a mentor in all this. Turns out that my wife grew up up the street from Gordon Piatanesi who made Colombo brand accordions after his father and grandfather for many years. Whenever my family goes back to San Fransisco to visit, I usually take an instrument or two and spend some time with Gordon. Again, I feel privelidged for his guidance. I've also been to Italy and Germany several times to buy parts.
Sorry for going on so much about me... on to my latest instrument. It IS a Wheatstone. I've already been in contact with David Leese as I've bought repair materials from him before. I had the chance to work on another English concertina several years back. Basically, most of the necessary repairs are leather-related. New valves, pallets, an as you mostly noted, proper straps. I am not in a hurry to repair this and wish to do it right. I would welcome any comments about this instrument and advice on how you personally would proceed.
I would guess that one question I might have on it right off the bat would be how old is it? By what I've garnered from this website over the last day or two, the serial number of 7037 that it bears may shed some light on this. That would make it a rather earlier instrument, right? Only thing is that it's really in good shape. I mean really good shape. Especially if it's that old (mid to late 1800's???). About the oldest other instrument I've got is a 1912 Dallape half-chromatic accordion, and it's not only in rather "degraded" shape, but it's rather primitive in it's workings. That's usually how (with the larger instruments) I can narrow down it's age. Everyone seems to think that their grandpa's accordion is from the 1800's, even though it's pretty clear that most instruments you find are certainly NOT that old. I mean even Hohner didn't actually start making accordions (Handharmonikas) until 1903. As I mentioned earlier, this is only the second "real" concertina that I've touched so I'm not sure how to judge it's age.
Well, I think I've gone on long enough for this post. Again, I apologize for going on so long, but I am impassioned about our instruments and wish to perfect my art of repair. Thanks in advance for your help and kind consideration.
Sincerely,
Dan.
