A few photos of a 1920s two row German melodeon. The bass side needed some new buttons and the reeds were overhauled and tuned.
[youtube=https://youtu.be/PtwScEBI71U&w=320&h=240]
1920s Melodeon restoration
Category: Workshop
Restored Hohner melodeon
Here are some pictures and a video of a restored Hohner one row melodeon. I should have checked the model number before I gave it back to its owner. In the video I say it’s a 1004 model….when of course it ain’t. It’s a 1040. Duh. Too late to record another vid.
Here are before and after shots of the treble side.
As you can see there are no reed blocks. The reeds go straight into the case. I tuned them before I fixed them into place. Tuning them in situ was going to be a pain otherwise. The little round-headed tacks help transfer the sound to the casing. Check out the video below – I think this little melodeon sounds great. Its owner was pretty pleased with it too.
[youtube=https://youtu.be/VtbtaSc8dDk&w=320&h=240]
Scandalli PA from 1942
I thought I’d show you a few pictures of this lovely old accordion (which is sadly NOT for sale), shipped from the US. Scandalli makes beautiful accordions. They sound marvellous and have a light action. In particular the bass is as light as a feather to play and has perfect response.
Sonola PA
Did some maintenance to the reeds on this lovely old Sonola accordion yesterday. The grille looks like it comes off a Buick. The build quality is superb, but oh my, it is heavy – I didn’t actually weigh it but it is at least 13kg. You want to be sitting down to play it. The new owner was very pleased with it – as I would be too.
Hohner Student PA 24 bass (restored..)
Small piano accordions really should not be overlooked, especially if you want to play in folk sessions and want to carry the thing around. The Hohner Student III has 24 bass and 25 keys. I had two of these little instruments and completed a complete rebuild of one of them. This entailed dismantling the keyboard, replacing the messed up finish on the keyboard, re-facing all the pallets, then overhauling the reeds (clean, revalve, tune etc), sorting out the LH mechanism, fixing the bellows and so on.