Glueing valve to the lever

[Vitlich]

On one of my arms the valve has detached from the lever (see picture). I've gone through The Concertina Maintenance Manual, but I'm just starting with concertinas and not everything is clear to me. How should I repair this element? Author suggests PVA glue, but I doubt that soaking this in PVA glue would make long-lasting connection. Also in the book there are shown leather beads, which are holding the metal disc in place, but as you can see in the photo in my case there are just these brown blobs soaked in glue, which don't look similarly to the beads shown in the book. The pads themselves are new and in good shape, airtight. How would you approach this repair? Any tips are very welcome!

Edited September 27 by Vitlich

[David Barnert]

Your terminology isn’t clear. There are no valves in this picture. The valves are the oval-shaped strips of leather attached to the reed pan to keep air from flowing through the reeds the wrong way.

 

You use the word “pads” in your post, and it seems correctly. Do you mean something different from “pad” by “valve” or are you referring to the same thing?

 

It’s also not clear where the problem is in the picture. Counting pads from the bottom of the picture (and not counting the one only partially seen), the 3rd pad from the bottom seems to be losing its leather layer (or perhaps that’s the felt and leather layers together that are askew). Next to it, the 4th pad from the bottom doesn’t look like it is closing completely, perhaps because it is rubbing against the edge of the wooden frame.

 

But I don’t see anywhere in the picture where a lever is clearly detached from a pad or a valve or anything else. Can you be more clear as to what (and where) the problem is?

[wunks]

Looks to me as if the top leg of the spring on the 4th ( from the bottom ) lever arm has slipped from under and now holds the pad open instead of closed.  View the correct alignment on #3.

[David Barnert]

Looking more carefully now to try to see what Wunks is seeing, I notice that the reason pad #4 from the bottom isn’t closed is that you’ve got your finger on the key. Is that to demonstrate that the lever is disconnected from that pad? It’s hard to discern. Certainly the pad is lifting with the lever, but there might be some “daylight” between them. Is that the problem you’re asking about?

[Wally Carroll]

I’m a big fan of PVA glue to attach pads to levers. Hard to see what you have going there but it looks like maybe hide glue was used. Not sure how PVA would stick to a hide glue soaked leather spud (leather bead in your terminology) but you might consider running a strip of leather or fabric over the top of the spud and glued to the pad on each end to create a sort of seat belt to hold it together.  We add this extra layer of security on all of our pads.  Tandy Leather makes an excellent PVA 

[alex_holden]

It looks to me like the original pads were attached with hide glue, which has deteriorated to the point that it is turning to dust. Someone has fitted new pads at some point using PVA, but didn't do a good job of cleaning the old glue off and didn't use new sampers (the round leather discs that go between the grommet and the pad). The pads I can see in the picture don't appear to be well aligned with the action board holes, and the third one from the bottom is delaminating. The fourth one appears to have a paper/card spacer between the pad and the samper (maybe to lower the button height without bending the lever?), and the samper has torn free of the spacer (maybe because the pad is hitting the wall when you press the button?).

 

If you just want to do a quick fix to get it playing again, put a bit more PVA between the paper disc and the samper and lower the lever onto the pad, making sure it is aligned such that it covers the hole well and doesn't hit the wall when you press the button. Longer term I'd be thinking about replacing all the pads, sampers, and grommets.

 

The one next to it with the delaminating pad looks a bit more problematic to me - the lever appears to be slightly too short, so it's attached to the pad off-centre. I've seen this problem on Lachenals before. It might be possible to fix it by bending the pivot post a bit closer to the hole, but that may also affect the button height.

 

Both animal glue and PVA work and have their pros and cons. I use PVA to attach the sampers to the card surface of the pad, then thick rabbit glue to attach the grommet to the samper. If I ever have to replace a pad it's pretty easy to clean most of the rabbit glue off the grommet with hot water and reuse it, whereas PVA is permanent so I'd have to replace the grommet as well.

[Vitlich]

Thanks for all the answers! It's quite possible I used wrong terminology. What I meant by „pad” is piece of leather that is in contact with wooden board, and makes the closed hole airtight. By „valve” i meant this (non-leather) disc, to which from one side „pad” is attached, and from the other side – the lever. I'd happily hear the correct terminology!

 

Maybe it is not easy to see in the pic, but the one so-called-valve which is lifted by pressing the button is hanging on some residual glue. It did not fell of the lever completely, but the connection is no longer rigid and the disc can e.g. rotate with respect to the lever. Because of that during playing it becomes misaligned and the note is playing constantly. After manually bringing the pad into it's place everything is airtight again.

 

The pads themselves are rather new, and were supposedly made by Barleycorn concertina (there is their stamp inside, and the previous owner told me he didn't do anything with the concertina after purchasing it from Barleycorn).

 

What exactly is pad delamination?

 

And, if my explanations are clear enough now, do your advices regarding using PVA glue to fix it quickly hold @alex_holden? I'm unable to play most of the tunes as this note is used in majority of what I'm playing, so I'd rather use some quick fix.

Edited September 30 by Vitlich

[alex_holden]

In the terminology I use (other makers may use other words for parts):

 

The 'pad' is the large round white thing that is made of three layers sandwiched together: thin airtight leather on the bottom (black on yours), a white wool felt cushion in the middle, and thick white card on the top.

The 'samper' is a small thin leather disc glued to the centre of the top of the pad. It is meant to be slightly flexible. Yours appears to have the deteriorated remains of some very old sampers that weren't replaced at the same time as the pads.

The 'grommet' is a thick, small diameter leather disc with a hole in the middle that screws onto the end of the metal lever arm. The grommet is glued to the samper. Yours has some very old grommets that don't look in great condition and have a mixture of old animal glue and new PVA glue slathered on them, so they will probably need to be replaced when the pads are next changed.

 

Here's a picture of the inside of one of my concertinas, that shows the various parts a bit more clearly:

 

There are no valves in this picture.

 

When I say the third pad from the bottom looks to be delaminating, I mean the card layer of the pad appears to have become separated from the felt layer. This may have something to do with the lever being too short, which is a manufacturing fault rather than something caused by the pad replacement. Personally I wouldn't have replaced the pad without doing something to correct the short lever first.

 

Where the fourth pad has torn loose from the samper, you can do a quick fix with a drop of PVA glue as previously stated.

[David Barnert]

@Vitlich, if Alex’s excellent description immediately above this post does not answer your question, can you restate it using the terminology as defined in his post? 

[Vitlich]

Yes, it helps very much! Thanks for extensive description @alex_holden. I'll try to fix it with PVA in the next few days then