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Tales Of Disaster.


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At the 1982 Chippenham Folk Festival, the late John Gasson was without an Anglo, so borrowed mine to play a few tunes in the session.

 

At the time, John was a dancer with The Seven Champions (Molly Dancers), and I knew some of the other team members. Gavin Atkin might well remember this, but one member told me that they used to put an Anglo into his hands in the session, and take it away again at the end. I didn't quite understand why, until John told me the story a year or so later.

 

John had been away either at a Festival, or Morris weekend with The Seven Champions. It was Sunday afternoon, and they were striking camp. John very carefully placed his Jeffries Anglo on the roof of the car, whilst they completed the packing up operation. I guess that you know what's coming next :unsure: ; he forgot that it was there, and the concertina eventually came off the roof of the car. Unfortunately, this did not happen until they were on the motorway! :o

 

I can only try to imagine the scene. They stopped, but only found about half of the pieces. So, by Chippenham 1982, John was between Anglos. John did finish up with a very nice Dipper, but sadly did not get much use out of it, as he was killed in a car crash on the way to Sidmouth 1987.

 

Regards,

Peter.

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We had a particularly good day at a dog show and finished up by winning best dog and best of breed

(English Setter).For this win we received two large Silver Cups which were very valuable and years old.

We proudly collected these from the cup Steward and due to their size they were placed in a large carrier bag.

On reaching the car the dogs were being naughty and hard to control.so I put the cup bag down to sort out the dogs and give them a drink of water.We put the dogs in the back of the car and when pulling away I drove over the cups flattening them.

They were restored perfectly but it cost me a lot of money.

Al

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At Broadstairs festival in 1995, I was carrying my wooden ended edeophone in a soft bag. I thought I had it protected with plenty of padding in case it was dropped downwards. However, I put the bag down while we were watching the fireworks display on Wednesday evening. It must have been hit by something heavy with a sideways impact. No one appears to have noticed it happen and I will never know exactly what hit it. My best guess was one of those very solid & hard guitar cases with guitar inside. The perpetrator would not have known what was in the bag and probably never noticed the impact. Afterwards I just picked up the bag and returned to my B & B. I only saw the damage when I opened the bag the next morning. One end was almost completely shattered. When I handed it over to Colin Dipper, he asked me if it had been run over by a car! It needed a new end and the impact had also damaged the bellows.

 

While it was very frustrating waiting for it to come back, I used the time for serious practice on my Hayden duet. And when it did come back, it seemed better than ever, with 7-fold Dipper bellows instead of the original 5. I bought this instrument in 1984 or 85(?) from Malcom Clapp, thn in Bath, U.K.

 

The lesson is never rely on a soft bag, always use a hard case.

 

- John Wild

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The lesson is never rely on a soft bag, always use a hard case.

Even with a hard case, it's important to make sure that it cannot open in a way that can let the instrument "escape". I had two incidents, luckily neither fatal.

 

... With my treble English, I was walking along at a festival, looking ahead and not toward the concertina case dangling from my right hand. Suddenly there was a shift of weight. I had no time to think, but for some reason reflexively flexed my knees, bringing myself almost to a kneeling position as the concertina rolled out onto the grass from the case, whose "lid" had fallen open. :o

 

This is one reason why I like my current case, where the lid opens upward, no matter whether the case is being carried by the shoulder strap or the shorter handle.

 

... The other time, I was carrying my 80-button duet on a concrete railway platform when the case -- another one where the lid is on the side when it's lifted by the handle -- suddenly fell open. In this case my luck appeared in a different form, as the instrument fit snugly enough in the case that although the case was tilted downward, friction kept the concertina from falling out.

 

But these are the reasons why when carrying those cases which have the lid on one side when you pick them up by the handle, I now always hold them so that the lid is facing my leg. That way, if the latch does fail, my leg will prevent the case from falling open, and the pressure will let me know what happened.

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[but these are the reasons why when carrying those cases which have the lid on one side when you pick them up by the handle, I now always hold them so that the lid is facing my leg. That way, if the latch does fail, my leg will prevent the case from falling open, and the pressure will let me know what happened.

It would be great to find a good source for a top opening concertina case. I'm sure there's one on here somewhere.

 

I took my lead from Allison and got a colorful Native American "leash" at NEFFA, and tied it around my case through the handle. She got the idea to tie one end of it to her wrist and the other to the handle, in case she got busy and forgot about the concertina.

 

On the other hand, there must be some way to secure a tie-down of some sort inside of the case. I wonder if anyone's done that?

Edited by greenferry
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It would be great to find a good source for a top opening concertina case. I'm sure there's one on here somewhere.

 

On the other hand, there must be some way to secure a tie-down of some sort inside of the case. I wonder if anyone's done that?

For years I only had a soft bag for my concertina. Then on a multi-state morris tour it took a slight dent in one end. It wasn't too serious but it made me realize I definitely needed a hard case. So I took my concertina out to the Button Box and they custom-blocked for me one of their hard cases, which do in fact have the lid on top. My concertina has been very well protected since.

 

Two comments though - sometimes when walking with it my leg has bumped up the latch, causing the bottom section of the case to swing down and almost spill out my concertina. As far as I can tell the latch seems very sturdy, maybe I just walk funny, but I'd be curious if anyone else has had a similar problem. It also does not have any kind of shoulder straps, which I think would be useful. So I recently did a custom modification (me with a drill in my basement) to add four metal loops on the lower section for straps.

 

I think it will be great - whenever I find time to get around to actually making the straps.

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Two comments though - sometimes when walking with it my leg has bumped up the latch, causing the bottom section of the case to swing down and almost spill out my concertina. As far as I can tell the latch seems very sturdy, maybe I just walk funny, but I'd be curious if anyone else has had a similar problem. It also does not have any kind of shoulder straps, which I think would be useful. So I recently did a custom modification (me with a drill in my basement) to add four metal loops on the lower section for straps.

 

The Button Box used to have a cover for the case, faux fleece lined that I bought for that very reason. Chris Timson has a very similar cover with attached straps. That is the one improvement I would really like for myself.

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Two comments though - sometimes when walking with it my leg has bumped up the latch, causing the bottom section of the case to swing down and almost spill out my concertina. As far as I can tell the latch seems very sturdy, maybe I just walk funny, but I'd be curious if anyone else has had a similar problem. It also does not have any kind of shoulder straps, which I think would be useful. So I recently did a custom modification (me with a drill in my basement) to add four metal loops on the lower section for straps.

 

I love my Morse, but the case has only a single latch which is EASILY jarred open. I had several near disasters before jettisoning the BB case. Now I use a very well padded soft camera case with rigid inserts that provide more impact protection. It also has a comfortable shoulder strap.

 

My vintage instrument is in a Savage and Hoy hard case with a very secure latch that can't be opened accidentally. It comes with hooks for a shoulder strap. But the case provides very little cushioning for the ordinary bumps of travel -- getting jostled on the subway, for instance, and having the case strike a post (I know, I'm a klutz). So often, I carry THAT case in a larger soft camera case with lots of foam padding.

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...one reason why I like my current case, where the lid opens upward, no matter whether the case is being carried by the shoulder strap or the shorter handle.
...a top opening concertina case.
...the Button Box ... custom-blocked for me one of their hard cases, which do in fact have the lid on top.

 

[but] sometimes when walking with it my leg has bumped up the latch, causing the bottom section of the case to swing down and almost spill out my concertina. As far as I can tell the latch seems very sturdy, maybe I just walk funny, but I'd be curious if anyone else has had a similar problem. It also does not have any kind of shoulder straps, which I think would be useful. So I recently did a custom modification (me with a drill in my basement) to add four metal loops on the lower section for straps.

I see I wasn't clear enough when I said "the lid opens upward". I didn't just mean upward from where the concertina sits, but upward from where the case is supported. I.e., pulling the handle will not and cannot cause the case to come open.

 

My case that I'm talking about can be seen here.

 

On the other hand, there must be some way to secure a tie-down of some sort inside of the case. I wonder if anyone's done that?

I think you must mean something like this.

Edited by JimLucas
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On the other hand, there must be some way to secure a tie-down of some sort inside of the case. I wonder if anyone's done that?

I think you must mean something like this.

Now THAT is a very classy case!

 

I can see that with a DeWalt drill, a couple of brass pieces from Ace Hardware, and some ordinary elastic, I can easily fix up my Button Box case with a nice tie-down. Perhaps could add a small dog-collar type latch to the elastic to make it easy to open. Hmmm . . .

Edited by greenferry
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Your reply Barbara reminded me of some of the dogs shown in the show ring who's owners go over the top with their dog leads , some of which for a medium sized dog look like they have been stolen from the anchor chain of the Queen Elizabeth Liner.

Al

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Your reply Barbara reminded me of some of the dogs shown in the show ring who's owners go over the top with their dog leads , some of which for a medium sized dog look like they have been stolen from the anchor chain of the Queen Elizabeth Liner.

Al

Well, why not. A tie-down fit for a queen (or a queen's anchor!).

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