Bellows

Here are a few photos of gluing on the bellows.

Painting the lines in the engraving.

Reed blocks

The reed blocks for the right side have been glued on. The photo progression below shows the process:

1. Ledger plates and blocks are dry-fitted and marked.

After they are marked, pilot holes for screws are drilled in on the other side of the soundboard (not shown).

3. Ledger plates are cut to size and glued on. There is a groove in one side of the ledger plates that an aluminum slide fits in for the hi/low switch.


4. Reed blocks are glued on and clamped.

5. The finished product with the reed plates and actions reinstalled.

The aluminum bar next to the reed blocks is the crosspiece that ties all the slides together.

Engraved!

The frames are back from the engraver. This instrument uses the so-called "spear" engraving. A refreshing change from the "pineapple" style. This "spear" engraving was used on Patek "Excelsior" concertinas and Pearl Queen concertinas in the 1930s and early '40s. Star concertinas also used several modified styles of this engraving in the 1930s and '40s.

Work continues...slowly

Slowly...not a word I want to use when referring to this instrument, but that's the way it is. Slower than I'd like. My new job has been taking up all of my free time lately. I'm back to my normal schedule now, however. I have made some headway since my last post however, and have new photos I will be posting.

After the reed blocks are leathered, the plates are fitted to the blocks.

One of the more time-consuming and tedious parts of building a concertina is leathering the reed blocks and fitting the reed plates and drilling for the hook screws. Each fin in a reed block has a thin strip of leather glued to it (as well as strips around the perimeter on the top and sides) to help ensure that each reed gets the maximum amount of air by ensuring that there is no leakage into adjacent reed cells. Leakage (blow-by) = a poorly performing instrument.

Ignore the mess you see on the workbench in the background. Christy Hengel used to have a plaque in his shop that read "a creative mess is better than idle tidiness." ;-)