Tidder Concertinas, Any One Know Anything About Tidders?

[d.elliott]

Sorry about the PC problem, we all take a hit on that sort of thing from time to time, although not usually through drowning. My wife is a volunteer transcriptor of parish, census and registry records for the Yorkshire genealogy group so we are well versed in one record saying 'Harry' and the next record saying 'Harriet' for the same person, we usually find Occupations the oddest data fields to decipher.

 

I will gladly take photo's & try to post to both, I assume the email is via the shop?

 

Dave

[Stephen Chambers]

... I assume the email is via the shop?

 

That's it!

[chris]

Yes please Dave. Email would be fine

[d.elliott]

So where did I put my trusty old Kodak box brownie?

[Stephen Chambers]

So where did I put my trusty old Kodak box brownie?

 

Gosh, "state of the art technology" - before my 1910 Wheatstone was made!

[d.elliott]

I also have a Houghton-Butcher with six fold bellows, and a Aldis- Butcher lens, complete with a shiny dark brown leather field case.

 

All still working

[Stephen Chambers]

I also have a Houghton-Butcher with six fold bellows, and a Aldis- Butcher lens, complete with a shiny dark brown leather field case.

 

All still working

 

But have you got a digital back for it?

 

If you want to get "serious" my (concertina-playing) mate Jim's got TWO Gandolfis, and knows how to use 'em...

[d.elliott]

Digital Back? sure.

 

4 digits to open the bellows one digit to cock the shutter mechanism, 2 digits to turn the view finder 2 digits to wind on the film and a digit at the back to steady the camera.

 

Yes it also take good pictures as well, B/W roll film though.

[Stephen Chambers]

That one has many similarities with the Schuster German made EC that I posted about earlier in these discussions

 

Theo,

 

I've never actually seen a Schuster in the flesh, so can you tell us if they too have serial numbers or are marked R and L, or D and B, in the two ends? Better still, do you have any internal photos of the one you worked on? (Or does anybody else?)

Edited March 3, 2014 by Stephen Chambers

[Theo]

Unfortunately I didn't take any internal photos. As far as I can recall there were internal serial numbers, rubber stamped rather than impressed into the wood, but I don't recall whether there were any L and R marks (or their German equivalents).

[Stephen Chambers]

As far as I can recall there were internal serial numbers, rubber stamped rather than impressed into the wood, but I don't recall whether there were any L and R marks (or their German equivalents).

 

There's an unlabelled German-made English in The Concertina Museum Collection, Ref:C-370, that looks a lot like the Schuster you worked on and posted external pictures of - does the interior of it maybe ring any bells with you? (I do realise I might be asking a lot, seeing that it was a decade ago now. )

 

That Concertina Museum Collection one appears to have the same ends, metal buttons and 6-fold bellows (which would be pretty much unheard of on an older English-made English-system concertina) as the Schuster you worked on, but it is marked (German-style) with D and B for right and left, with no stamped serial number, whilst the levers are different to those in the eBay one, which also has bone buttons and only 5-fold bellows, but the reedpans and the valves look similar in both.

 

This is starting to get complicated, and we need more photos/data!

 

Edited to add a link

Edited March 4, 2014 by Stephen Chambers

[Theo]

I may be wrong about the serial number in the Schuster, but the reeds in this one

 

 

There's an unlabelled German-made English in The Concertina Museum Collection, Ref:C-370, that looks a lot like the Schuster you worked on and posted external pictures of - does the interior of it maybe ring any bells with you? (I do realise I might be asking a lot, seeing that it was a decade ago now. )

 

do look familiar - crude filing and shaping of the tongues, and very large heavy stamps of note names.

[Stephen Chambers]

... the reedpans and the valves look similar in both.

 

Compare this right-hand reedpan, from #5236 on eBay:

 

To the corresponding reedpan from the unlabelled German example in The Concertina Museum Collection http://www.concertinamuseum.com/Images/Concertinas_T-Series/C370g1.jpg

 

They're pretty-much the same, though other features of the two instruments are different.

[Stephen Chambers]

Here are the photos of the one Dave Elliott is asking about, which gives every indication of being made by the same people as #5236 that's for sale on eBay:

 

Edited March 7, 2014 by Stephen Chambers

[d.elliott]

Thanks Stephen, for displaying the photos, you can see the baggy bellows gussets, ink stamping, the style of th pivot posts and the curvature of the arms., the fretting styles and the overall craftsmanship.

 

Dave

[Stephen Chambers]

Dave,

 

I'm going to compare some serial number stampings next, but it all takes up a lot of time.

 

Would I be right in thinking that the bellows of yours have been worked on - maybe new papers and top runs? Also, are they five (as I suspect) or six-fold?

[Stephen Chambers]

Here are images of the serial number stampings of three Anglos and two Englishes that I would consider appear to have been made by the same maker, and describe as "Tidders" - though we could definitely do with reports/photos of more instruments with similar features.

 

The earliest one, baloo's 20-key Anglo labelled J. Wallis, Euston Road, London, "has several serial numbers - 372, 378 and 399 all in different places" with 378 'printed' on the righthand reedpan (though we could do with a better image of it, as well as pictures of the other numbers), below:

Wayland's 20-key is numbered both 921 and 924:

But the one Jim saw in Helsingør Library, and photographed, has only the one number, 3116:

The English-system ones are stamped R and L in the right and lefthand ends, in addition to the number. This is Dave Elliott's one, number 3459, which sparked this thread:

Whilst this is from the eBay one, number 5236:

To my eyes those numbers all look like they were made with the same rubber stamp(s), which (along with other features) would seem to confirm that they were made by the same people.

[d.elliott]

Dave,

 

I'm going to compare some serial number stampings next, but it all takes up a lot of time.

 

Would I be right in thinking that the bellows of yours have been worked on - maybe new papers and top runs? Also, are they five (as I suspect) or six-fold?

 

Steve,

 

the only work is a top run and end wrap re-bind, the papers are original, and the bellows are four fold.