anglo Odd East German Anglo

[MikaelBF]

Hello everyone

 

I was browsing my local second hand shop today came across this odd little box, in which was an equally odd concertina.

 

It was really cheap already and on sale on top of that (I ended up paying about 12 euro for it), so I thought "why not?" 

 

The production year can be narrowed down somewhat, given that it is produced in the "German Democratic Republic" (East Germany) so somewhere between 1949 and 1990.

 

A quick google makes me believe that it is a Scholer, but perhaps someone can verify this? Also it seems to be a G/D instead of a C/G.

 

It feels really cheap and is leaky, but sounds ok for what it is. The buttons are decently responsive and overall it feels much better than the 200 euro Chinese eBay crap I started with a year ago. Yes, I am one of those people

 

I probably won't be choosing this over my Phoenix anytime soon, but I might give it to my niece so she has one of her own to get started with. She's tried playing my Phoenix and is annoyingly quick to learn

[lachenal74693]

Scholer certainly made G/D Anglos. I think an identifying criterion may be the dimension

of the flats - they were 4" (6.9" across-the-flats, I think). Other companies made them,

I have a 'Commander' which is pretty similar (and not very effective). I won't be trading in

my Marcus or Lachenal G/Ds any time soon.

 

There are some videos on YouTube dealing with Scholers. One of them is here.

[MikaelBF]

1 hour ago, lachenal74693 said:

Scholer certainly made G/D Anglos. I think an identifying criterion may be the dimension

of the flats - they were 4" (6.9" across-the-flats, I think). Other companies made them,

I have a 'Commander' which is pretty similar (and not very effective). I won't be trading in

my Marcus or Lachenal G/Ds any time soon.

 

There are some videos on YouTube dealing with Scholers. One of them is here.

It measures 104 mm (so roughly 4") on the flats, and the inner mechanism is similar to the one he shows in the first video, except most of it is metal and not wood.

It might be an original, or it might be a copy. Either way, it is absolutely a bottom-tier box

I did manage to fix a sticky button by straightening the spring, but only because it was the outermost button in the row. Otherwise they are quite hard to get to properly.

 

Thanks for the feedback 👍

[catswhiskers]

On 9/24/2021 at 8:53 PM, MikaelBF said:

It measures 104 mm (so roughly 4") on the flats, and the inner mechanism is similar to the one he shows in the first video, except most of it is metal and not wood.

It might be an original, or it might be a copy. Either way, it is absolutely a bottom-tier box

I did manage to fix a sticky button by straightening the spring, but only because it was the outermost button in the row. Otherwise they are quite hard to get to properly.

 

Thanks for the feedback 👍

I had a Scholer 20 key anglo in G/D which predated yours, being made in pre-partition Germany.   Cosmetically it looked a bit different but the basic construction appears the same.  I had to do quite a bit of work to make it playable, but once it was up and running it was quite good - as you say, definitely superior to the Chinese boxes.  It had wooden buttons like yours and a wooden action, but one problem was sticking buttons - the button would go too far into the hole and stick.  I solved this problem very simply by gluing a thin strip of foam under the lever arms just below the buttons.  This stopped them going so deep into the holes and also gave them a bit of extra spring.  I never had a sticking button after that and the playability improved a lot.  It may not have been the greatest instrument ever but it was my entry into Anglo playing until I could afford to move up to a Lachenal.  I sold it on Ebay for slightly more than I paid but rather regret doing so now.

John

[MikaelBF]

10 hours ago, catswhiskers said:

I had a Scholer 20 key anglo in G/D which predated yours, being made in pre-partition Germany.   Cosmetically it looked a bit different but the basic construction appears the same.  I had to do quite a bit of work to make it playable, but once it was up and running it was quite good - as you say, definitely superior to the Chinese boxes.  It had wooden buttons like yours and a wooden action, but one problem was sticking buttons - the button would go too far into the hole and stick.  I solved this problem very simply by gluing a thin strip of foam under the lever arms just below the buttons.  This stopped them going so deep into the holes and also gave them a bit of extra spring.  I never had a sticking button after that and the playability improved a lot.  It may not have been the greatest instrument ever but it was my entry into Anglo playing until I could afford to move up to a Lachenal.  I sold it on Ebay for slightly more than I paid but rather regret doing so now.

John

This one is already fitted with a sheet of thick felt under the buttons to help this. The sticky button was actually more because of a slightly bent spring, that didn't really push the button back in place. So maybe "sticky" is not the right word

 

However, I am thinking of maybe raising the felt sheets a bit with some thin wooden sheets. Fortunately I have access to a lasercutter, so getting the dimensions right should not be a problem

 

As I mentioned, I am not planning on selling it. I'll give it to my niece, so she can see if it actually is something she wants to pursue. If she doesn't stick to it, I'll gladly take it back, since it's such a curious little thing. And if the mechanism breaks eventually, I might try and turn it into a digi-tina at some point