Cleaning brass reeds?

[mChavez]

Hi All,

 

For my sins I've bought an antique flutina/French accordion squeezebox thing with a view of overhauling it...Unfortunately, the list of problems is longer than my arm and I think I'd be lucky to get any music out of it before the end of the year, but for now I've decided to slowly chip away at it and fix it up one step at a time.

 

The box is equipped with brass-plated brass-tongued "flutina"-style single reeds, and a lot of them are covered in some sort of black soot. I suspect it might be a mix of old dust, mould and decades of tobacco smoke... As I'm overhauling the bass side, I took the reeds out, soaked them for a few hours in IPA and tried cleaning them... without much luck. The stuff did not just magically dissolve as I was hoping. A lot of scrubbing the reed with steel wool seems to remove the black stuff, but bass side alone is 60 reeds pairs, so the process will take me forever. 

For steel reeds I'd usually just soak in IPA and then a quick rub with a cloth would clean the surfaces.

 

Any advice on cleaning brass reeds with unknown stuff stuck to them? Some sort of Dremel wheel with brass bristles?

 

Thank you.

Edited February 11 by mChavez

[Tiposx]

On 5/19/2020 at 9:11 AM, Tiposx said:

I recently restored a Lachenal with brass reeds. A couple of the reeds were in really bad condition including this one. I bought some clock cleaning fluid. It is incredibly expensive and toxic, and I am scared stiff of it. But I followed the instructions and here is the result. I have only washed the reed and plate, not touched it otherwise except to handle it.

Hero lens is the nuclear option, but I hesitate to recommend it…

[Tiposx]

“Horolene” is the correct name of the product I used.

[ttonon]

I suggest pure ammonia. It's very effective at dissolving grease and grime. More eco-friendly cleaners are those containing orange oil, like Go Jo and others, but I don't think these are as potent.

[Stephen DOUGLASS]

Bilt Hamber Deox-C is not toxic and has worked well for me with rusty reed rehabilitation. The fiberglass brush on the other hand......

[Jacokotze]

Try mixing baking soda , soap . a toothbrush, take the reed unit out  😉 be careful whith the toothbrush ! Onley donw  (strokes) while cleaning, if cleaned tap in clean water and ues a hair dryer to blow the reed , im sure this is not a good method , one concertina was out of tune and notes not playing and now its like new ,eaven seeing how brown the baking soda mixture was after cleaning 

[SIMON GABRIELOW]

You can sometimes get special sort of fine sponges that work to remove stains on any surface with just the slightest dampening with very little water ( no chemicals needed).. and they can be cut to any size!

They take tarnish off cutlery quite nicely🌝🌝 and that's metal so ?

[Chris Ghent]

If you are using any chemical method and the brass is starting to look a little pink it means the zinc is leaching out and leaving the copper behind.  

[mChavez]

Thanks.

 

I think it's a balance between chemically damaging the reeds, mechanically damaging the reeds and staying sane. I hope that 24hrs in IPA will kill any potential mould and dissolve any old grime, only leaving the oxidisation to deal with...

 

There seems to be a selection of watchmakers' horolene-like baths that I think might work, but I'll see if a gentle scrub with something less nuclear works first.

 

I am guessing flutina-style reeds in a would have been from around 1850s? That's a lot of years of grime & oxidisation build-up.

The thing's so old, quite a few hide glue joints started failing, so will have to be renewed.🤪 And bloody Parceforce must have played a game of football with the parcel before dropping it at my door.

Edited February 12 by mChavez

[Tiposx]

Pity about the jigsaw puzzle, but to be fair it would only have taken a light tap to break those reed blocks off. The mating surfaces should clean up nicely with a damp cloth - the beauty of hide glue. (apologies if you already know this)

[Bassconcertina.net]

https://akkordeon-museum.ch/j-solari-ft-bruxelles-4-reihen-diato-chromatisch/

 

Here's a similar museum instrument, I assume anyways, from the reeds.

[mChavez]

Same maker, thank you.

1890s seems a bit too recent for such reeds, I would have thought?

 

Jigsaw puzzle's not that much of a problem. Biggest issue is that everything is covered in some sort of black soot. Tobacco smoke residue? Mould? Bubonic plague spores?

The fact that some of the reed boxes fell off made it easier for me to make the decision to take the rest of them off for a thorough clean of the entire growlbox.

[Tiposx]

I have always thought that the uk owned aerophones have been filtering smoke from coal fires, industrial pollution and cigarette smoke for many decades. A lot of the buildings where I grew up in Manchester were black on the outside, and brown inside because of this.

[Matthew Heumann]

mChavez: I recently refurbished a Lachanal Edeophone which had a thick deposit on the brass reed-frames that also wouldn't dissolve. I finally used some brass-wire dremel brushes because steel is harder than brass, so brass on brass is pretty low impact, but it cleaned the reeds & frames beautifully. The only problem was flying bristles, so i rigged up a large cardboard box with a cellophane top cover to watch my hands & dremel inside the box (made holes in sides) while protecting my torso from flying bristles. Worked great (see pics)

---Matt Heumann

[mChavez]

Thank you.

 

I'll try vinegar+baking soda bath & rub (today, hopefully) with a toothbrush first.

 

My concern with brass bristles is that they might be harder, than brass tongues, which can murder the tongues. Copper bristles are harder to find, but I'm keeping the dremel option open.

 

Re re-gluing the reed boxes: the leathers have to be replaced & reeds cleaned, and for that I need to open up the boxes. The lids on each box are screwed down with 2 screws, but all of the screws have seized, so I ended up with a destructive approach, having to cut a couple grooves in the lids, pry them off with a chisel & remove/file down the screws. Will have to make new ones when I'm assembling.

 

If any of you are putting screws into wood, it's a good idea to rub some candle wax on the threads before putting the screw in. That will stop it from seizing. 

 

I am now considering whether I should glue the boxes back in, or attach some leather gasket to the bottoms and come up with a wooden block & screw retaining mechanism for ease of re-assembly if that is required (e.g. the growlbox needs to be screwed onto the soundboard before the reed boxes. Any adjustments to it will require the blocks to be un-glued again).

Edited February 14 by mChavez

[Theo]

Clock cleaner really is the solution(ha!)

one brand, Horolene has already been mentioned.  Place all the brass parts in the solution and leave overnight. Wash in hot water and dry.  It works like magic.  No time consuming mechanical cleaning required.  When I’ve used it the parts have come out looking as if polished.  It works on other non ferrous metals too.  I’ve had good results on nickel buttons. It is designed to be used on delicate clock mechanic parts so I would not be concerned about using it on brass reeds.  If the rivet is iron you would need to do some tests first.

 I’m not sponsored by Horolene.

Before and after images of buttons. All I did was remove the felts. No mechanical cleaning or polishing.

Edited February 14 by Theo

[SIMON GABRIELOW]

That Magic sponge  - I mentioned earlier - will do the job and no chemicals needed just dampen the stuff and - presto, perfect finish😊

[mChavez]

Wow! That's quite an advert for Horolene.

 

4 hours in vinegar+baking soda solution, and some of the lighter tarnished reeds are looking quite good. Heavier tarnished ones are looking much better, but still some way to go. I do like the fact that vinegar is not toxic and doesn't smell too bad. Will see what happens if I leave the reeds in there overnight.