Bushing Wood Ended Bone Buttons

[richard]

Hello

 

I would like to bush the holes on the rosewood ends of my Lachenal. The bone buttons are very clickety clack.

 

The problem is there isn't too much extra space surrounding the buttons as they fit through the holes.

 

Is there some very thin material that would work well to quiet down the noise while not interfering with the buttons movement within such a small space?

 

And if so... any instructions and appropriate glue etc. would be appreciated.

 

Thanks,

 

Richard

[Pete Dickey]

Richard

 

Are you quite sure that the noise is from the buttons and not the Lachenal hooked action?

 

If not then you have a few options but this depends on whether the buttons are 6mm or 5mm or other size. Assuming 6mm then:-

1) Ream out the holes to accept standard bushing felt

2) Turn the buttons down by about 1mm to make space for the felt

3) Replace the buttons with smaller ones e.g from a scrap English concertina or buy/make new ones.

 

I'm not sure just how thin you can go with bushing felt for it still to be effective.

 

Get a copy of Dave Elliott's excellent Concertina Maintenance Manual and this will show you how to fit bushings in the holes.

 

As far as glue is concerned then there are differing thoughts. PVA (wood glue) is favoured by some although it is a bit permanent for my choice. I prefer Liquid Hide Glue but I'm sure others will not agree. Your choice really just DON'T use Superglue or Epoxy resin. Dave Prebble wrote a superb piece on this some months ago if you do a search on C/net.

 

Hope this helps

 

Pete

[Frank Edgley]

There's no problem with liquid hide glue as far as I can see. It's also removable.

[Cecil]

Pete Dickey Posted: Sep 11 2004, 07:15 PM

"Richard

Are you quite sure that the noise is from the buttons and not the Lachenal hooked action?"

 

Pete,

In what way do you mean the Lachenal hooked action would cause noise?

Cecil