Irregular tremolo in brand new accordion plus other issues

[Robbellow]

Hello.

I bought a brand new Hohner bravo 3 a few months ago in a well known, reputable american store.

This instrument, in the violin voice, has a pretty irregular tremolo from one note to the next. It can have a moderate tremolo at the middle C, a slow tremonolo at the B, and then an awfully fast tremolo at the A. I am a trained musician, and this is killing me.

Is this to be expected? Should I requeste a change or repair free of charge?

Also it has some annoying problems i some keys, some metallic "interference" type noises in some keys, and I have had to take it to repair because some reed issues already.

This seems like too many issues for a brand new accordion bought a few months ago, which is basically played at home for lessons, no giging, or anything like that.

Should I request a change of the instrument, a refund, or something like that? I paid 1700 cash for it. What can I get for the same money and what should I pay attention to if I were to replace it for a new one?

 

[dak]

This instrument, in the violin voice, has a pretty irregular tremolo from one note to the next. It can have a moderate tremolo at the middle C, a slow tremonolo at the B, and then an awfully fast tremolo at the A. I am a trained musician, and this is killing me.

Is this to be expected? Should I requeste a change or repair within waranty?

Sort of. With a cheap instrument, the effort made with tuning is reduced compared to a fancy instrument. An experienced tuner will knock out a pretty consistent tuning in a short time nevertheless, with the imprecisions of a fast job being hidden where they are least noticeable. That means that the (slow) beating of fifths will be more or less consistent, the octaves and non-tremolo registers will be pretty clean, and the tremolo will be rather consistent.

Now take away the experienced tuner and put a factory worker in their place with a precision electronic tuner. Since they don't have the time to do several tuning passes (and lean towards tuning upwards on the last pass), they do a somewhat imprecise job. A cent of difference will be seen as ok. The problem is that they tune each reed independently from the other reeds. That means that a reed may be up one cent, its tremolo reed down one cent. The next note may be down one cent and its tremolo reed up one cent. Result is that the tremolo of successive notes differs by 4 cents.

An old-style tuner picks off 440Hz or 220Hz, then tunes fifths/fourths from there with a good feeling for how much they'll need to beat (possibly cross-checking with the electronic tuner when they are too tired to reliably hear the difference between 2 cents higher and 2 cents lower) until they have laid down the base octave and its circle of fifths ends up reasonably round. Then they take the octaves and clean reed sets from there, and then put up a consistent tremolo from there. That makes sure to minimize the problems that one can hear. It also tends to be pretty good absolutely even when done fast by an experienced tuner. But that's a side benefit (except that in ensemble play, you also want to be matched to your colleagues).

Personally I think $1700 is too much for what amounts to an unfinished job by unskilled workers and without proper QA. Whether the vendor chooses to finish the work on this instrument or provide you with a proper working one is likely their own choice to make (at least for a few iterations), depending on the customer protection laws in your vicinity.

 

[Ben-jammin]

I would return it and put that money towards a used Italian or German made instrument that’s been gone over by a competent accordion shop. 1700 can buy a very decent used instrument. The Chinese made Hohner accordions are considered the best Chinese made accordions but they are inferior to the older German made instruments in materials and craftsmanship.

 

[debra]

Hello.

I bought a brand new Hohner bravo 3 a few months ago in a well known, reputable american store.

This instrument, in the violin voice, has a pretty irregular tremolo from one note to the next. It can have a moderate tremolo at the middle C, a slow tremonolo at the B, and then an awfully fast tremolo at the A. I am a trained musician, and this is killing me.

Is this to be expected? Should I requeste a change or repair within waranty?

Also it has some annoying problems i some keys, some metallic "interference" type noises in some keys, and I have had to take it to repair because some reed issues already.

This seems like too many issues for a brand new accordion bought a few months ago, which is basically played at home for lessons, no giging, or anything like that.

Should I request a change of the instrument, a refund, or something like that? I paid 1700 cash for it. What can I get for the same money and what should I pay attention to if I were to replace it for a new one?

All of this is to be expected when you buy a Chinese rubbish accordion (even with the name Hohner stamped on it) instead of a quality Italian accordion. For the same amount of money you can buy a similar accordion that is 20 to 30 years old, made in Europe, refurbished and tuned.
It is very sad to see people be misled by the Hohner brand, expecting Hohner quality but instead getting Chinese rubbish.

 

[Big Squeezy Accordions]

These are terrible instruments, I'm sorry to say. I'm constantly warning against buying a new Hohners. These have nothing to do with the decent to excellent German and Italian made Hohners of another era. The current owners of the trademark are riding on the coattails of a once respectable brand, selling crap Chinese accordions that are no better than other Chinese brands, but with a substantial markup from those equally bad ones without the Hohner name. They are probably betting on the fact that most people who buy them will have never played a real accordion and won't know the difference. I wonder how long they can continue to pull off this bait and switch until "Hohner" is finally synonymous with crap. I would return it and get a refurbished German or Italian accordion, Hohner or otherwise, and check the tuning before buying if possible.

 

[Robbellow]

What about the responsibility of the shop, though? I bought it from them (a reputable american accordion shop), not straight from Hohner.

 

[SteveBox]

I agree with what others have said, but if you want to keep the instrument, a reputable accordion dealer should provide a free re-tuning within the first year. It is common even for a quality new instrument to need some touch-up tuning after new reeds have been played for several months. If they won't do this, you probably bought it from a generic music store that doesn't provide accordion service. Of course, a reputable accordion dealer would have gone over the tuning and fixed any problems before you received it.

 

[Ventura]

people shop at music stores, in person or online

music stores carry a range and inventory depth of instruments to populate
the price-points the store anticipates need to be served based on store
history, demographics, etc.

please tell me, what other choices do the babes in the woods have to choose from ?

ridiculously overpriced Italian accordions with long-winded and largely fictitious
pedigrees and claims of uniqueness ? (while on the same website truly crap
Chinese accordions with elaborate Italian names and gratuitous amounts of
Rhinestone and other decoration also for sale)

it is sad, but unless some company chooses to engage the market and compete
in the affordable price points with better, more consistent, quality alternatives, then
people will continue to choose Hohner and their (marginal, but usable) warranty

some of the (few) companies that have offerings for intermediate players are
not even marketing to the general public through Music retailers.. take the Sonobella
that targets the Gabbanelli market directly.. they do not even HAVE a website or
factory internet presence, but they have a huge facebook page and free accordions in the
hands of up and coming Latina Musicians influencing the market.. they have Ayala on
their side.. they have sales and rather nice profits while literally thumbing their
noses at the traditional instrument marketing model

even if a babe finds one of the wide ranging USA website "accordion" retailers, it is
confusing as hell and they are just as likely to end up with a B, C, E F or G Chinese Soprani
as anything else they see offered, because they are un-educated and shop within
a price point UNTIL SOMEONE GIVES THEM A GOOD REASON NOT TO

you cannot get someone to raise their internal value equation without educating them
and offering them legitimate Value added reasons to choose the better, more
expensive instrument.. and THEY have to be convinced..

this is not an easy thing to do, and my issue and reason for swimming in a
contrary direction from many of you, is frankly that i have the perception
that the VAST amount of accordion offerings from most sources is
based on deception and trickery, and that there are very very few
legitimate and honest people or places to deal with out there
at pretty much any level under $7000, much less the affordable
price points that Beginners and Intermediate players exist in.

ours is not like other instrument categories that have benefited from
technology.. Even children's $100 acoustic or electric guitar beginner "kits"
are actually decently playable instruments and can actually be stepping
stones to better instruments in the future of those children

ours continues to offer vast numbers of plastic toy accordions that are
identical in every way except appearance, selling from $10 to $99 depending
on the sucker or eBay moment, and EVEN AT $10 is a RipOff

ours continues to promote old junky 12 bass accordions that wholesaled for
$33 when new as legitimate $300 instruments today, even though in the
hands of any actual Student, the usable lifespan of a 12 Bass accordion is
8 weeks, then you hit the wall..

ours will take your money and run for the most part, while Music Go Round
and Atomic will guarantee you 80% of your purchase toward a trade-up
at any time in the Future from any inexpensive Keyboard, Guitar, Bass, PA system,
Marimba, Cello, Violin, Trumpet that you buy today to get started with

ours will take your money and give you a digital instrument that the VAST MAJORITY
of owners will, within the first year, spend hundreds of dollars to "upgrade"
the sounds to something they can stomach

so yeah, curse the $1000-$1600 Hohner's all you want.. they have legit
improved greatly from the original Honica's that were the first batch
of Chinese Hohners.. and they are literally available everywhere for immediate delivery

 

[Rosie C]

Hello.

I bought a brand new Hohner bravo 3 a few months ago in a well known, reputable american store.

...

Should I request a change of the instrument, a refund, or something like that? I paid 1700 cash for it. What can I get for the same money and what should I pay attention to if I were to replace it for a new one?

If a refund is an option... about three months ago I was going to buy a new Hohner Bravo 2 - new from a dealer it seemed a safe bet. But the good folks here persuaded me that a good second hand Hohner was a better option - I ended up with a better instrument and it was cheaper, and if I sell it I shouldn't see much depreciation.

Ha, sell it?! I've bought four accordions, one per month since September. It's a dangerous hobby to get into!

 

[dunlustin]

1. This problem has been around for 50+ years
(Can't remember the population of China but I don't believe maybe a billion or more customers are happy to be sold rubbish.)
3. It used to be 'Made in DDR' was the perceived problem, despite a nation of communist accordion players
4. The question then and now: "How much did the importer pay at the dockyard gate and what is the retail mark-up?
5. So, just who should have the troubled conscience?

Believing people were out to put one over was called paranoia - maybe now it's just being necessarily careful.
That said, how do you allow for all the good people just making an honest living?

 

[Robbellow]

I don't agree with this generalization about musical instruments from China. I play the cello and I have to say I have played and helped students choose and buy cellos manufactured in China that are pretty good quality and excelent quality/price ratio.

For the price I paid for this Hohhner Bravo 3 I would have gotten an excelent quality china manufactured cello.

 

[dak]

I don't agree with this generalization about musical instruments from China. I play the cello and I have to say I have played and helped students choose and buy cellos manufactured in China that are pretty good quality and excelent quality/price ratio.

Chinese master string instrument builders that learnt their craft in Europe produce instruments competitive enough in price and quality that they make restoring mass-manufactured Bohemian and Saxonian instruments from around the 19th century (often with vignettes insinuating Stradivarius and other famous builders) no longer worth restoring to playable state. That doesn't change that mass-fabricated Chinese violins using CNC milling and sold with case and bow in the $100 (probably more by now) price range are, hardly surprising, trash. They are heavy and not responsive enough to be fun playing. You cannot sensibly machine-mill resonating wooden parts. In contrast, machine-milling reed block parts (or electric guitar bodies, or even some non-sounding parts of a violin) is fine, assuming well-aged and well-treated wood.

In contrast to violins, accordions are not really individually built, so it's hard to avoid mass-manufacture of significant parts. And the Chinese work culture tends to consider workers expendable and exchangeable. That is a problem for arriving at high-quality results when processes depend on individually maintained skills of a group of workers.

 

[Dingo40]

What about the responsibility of the shop,

Hi, Robbellow!
Buying something as complex as an accordion, whether new or used, is something of a crapshoot and not to be attempted lightly, as various members can testify.
Check with your "consumer affairs " bureau as to what your consumer rights are in your state and possibly negotiate a remedy with your vendor.
Where I live, such a product would be considered "unfit for purpose " and you'd be entitled to a full refund.
Although most reports regarding Chinese made accordions have tended to be rather less than favourable, there's always someone with a good luck story: luck of the draw, I guess!

 

[SteveBox]

What about the responsibility of the shop, though? I bought it from them (a reputable american accordion shop), not straight from Hohner.

If it is a real accordion shop, then they should offer to retune the accordion to even out the musette (tremolo), and at no cost to you. Have you talked to them about this? If they sold this to you without checking it over, then that is not good for their reputation. Even an expensive Italian instrument can arrive from the factory with a few problems. A good dealer should check over all instruments in their repair shop before selling them.

String instruments are simple compared to accordions. A string instrument does not have hundreds of mechanical parts and hundreds of reeds that need to be factory tuned.

 

[dunlustin]

Re: "I don't agree "
R-b-w - I was not clear in the point I tried to make.
I have an electro-acoustic guitar that was M-i- c - a beautiful instrument.
I also have a M-i-c Whyte Ladye Tone ring banjo that is also of v good quality.
Some time ago I read of a designer interested in having guitars built in China.
He was shown around a workshop, asked what quality he was interested in and it was clear that they would manufacture to his spec.
If he wanted rubbish, they would build it but...
The issue is not that they can't do it but rather what they are asked to build.
For goodness sake, they have their own Space Station! They also have a network of high speed trains and build most of the world's EV batteries and almost all the world's electric buses.
We need to stop rubbing our own backs.

 

[Ffingers]

"We need to stop rubbing our own backs."

Indeed.
"How canst thou remove the mote that is in thy brother's eye unless first thou remove the beam that is in thine own?"
Or something to that effect.

Look to your own country's market ethics ( or rather lack of them ) before even considering those of other nations.
In Australia we have moderately good consumer protections, and volunteer bodies who are prepared to challenge the bureacracies when the fail to fulfill their responsibilities.
A 'free market' without adequate government regulation and oversight is open to all kinds of chicanery and there are plenty of people in every community/society who will act dishonestly where there is money to be made and Caveat emptor becomes a long and tortuous journey for the neophyte.

Anyone remember the "...they'll never successfully compete with our cars..." mantra of the late '60s and early '70s "crap" Japanese motoring products?
The old adage: "Bullshit baffles brains" is as valid in today's marketing as it was with the sideshow 'snake oil' spruikers and PT Barnum's "Bunkum."
The power balance is so heavily biased in favour of the commercial world that the average consumer is disadvantaged to an unreasonable degree.

 

[colinm]

If you can get your money back I would do that, you will never be happy with it even if the shop says they can repair it, because they can,t, and you will never be able to honestly sell it to someone else.

 

[OuijaBoard]

I'll be another voice raised in protest against an across the board characterization of these products as trash or rubbish.

Over the years I have purchased a few new Italian accordions, bisonoric and unisonoric, and there wasn't one that didn't arrive needing something worked on. A Salt that needed all tongues/voicings adjusted across the board. Another Saltarelle with super clatter noise. A Beltuna with "artistically" spray painted bellows emitting turpentine-like fumes. And . . . Uneven tremolo on at least a couple notes with almost every single instrument, including Castagnari bisonorics. And including a small Dino Baffetti PA acquired early this year with a couple of comically-way-too wet notes I still haven't had tweaked.

I have come to ruefully expect issues as part of the accordion buying experience, and just deal with getting needed adjustments locally so long as the issues are relatively minor. The point being, my admittedly small Weltmeisters and Asian Hohners have presented no more problems than the Italian stuff. The qualification being that my experience with Asian Hohners runs to small 2-voice models. I have more than one small Asian Hohner CBA, and have had no issues beyond a tremolo/tuning tweak here and there. Well, the oldest after 14 years has button tops off and just recently something has come unmoored with a reed block or the mechanism, but that's not bad for a decade and a half.

I have played but do not own an Asian Hohner Bravo PA, brand-new in a shop display. It was a small MM, and yes, there were uneven tremolo notes and a bit of metallic noise to the mechanism but the playability, response, and sound at least for roots/folk seemed pretty nice at the price point.

Bottom line uneven tremolo and other issues are in my experience hardly limited to Asian or Harmona products. I do have a concern about the OP's note that their Bravo 3 is now having reed problems. Not sure what this means, but it suggests more serious concerns. ??? I wonder if the larger Asian Hohner models are more problem-prone than the little MMs. The logic being, there would be more to go wrong since there is more to get right.

 

[kimric]

This is pretty standard for Hohner instruments , it sucks for the smaller dealers since I have never had any luck getting Hohner to comp me for this sort of work, nor would they pay the shipping to send it back for them to do the work. Hohner sells these for less to places like Guitar Center so I can't afford to adsorb the service time.
The quality of the parts is ok in the bravo , and fine tuning it can make it sound quite good, but people won't pay for the extra time I have to put into these before I will sell them.
I no longer carry them. I get them used sometimes as trade ins and I tune them then, and give a one year warranty. Hohners warranty is 90 days.

 

[debra]

I'll be another voice raised in protest against an across the board characterization of these products as trash or rubbish.

Over the years I have purchased a few new Italian accordions, bisonoric and unisonoric, and there wasn't one that didn't arrive needing something worked on. A Salt that needed all tongues/voicings adjusted across the board. Another Saltarelle with super clatter noise. A Beltuna with "artistically" spray painted bellows emitting turpentine-like fumes. And . . . Uneven tremolo on at least a couple notes with almost every single instrument, including Castagnari bisonorics. And including a small Dino Baffetti PA acquired early this year with a couple of comically-way-too wet notes I still haven't had tweaked.
...

This is a very true observation. A repairer who has worked for a Pigini dealer told me that a large accordion arriving new from the factory typically needed more than 50 (small) issues to be fixed before the instrument could be handed over to the customer. This experience stresses how important it is that a dealer you buy an accordion from has an in-house skilled repairer to fix issues with new accordions as well as to fix issues to (traded-in) used accordions, so that customers always get a fully functional and well-tuned (and voiced) instrument.
Most accordions I have bought were through a dealer who drives to Castelfidardo regularly. He tries the new instruments in the factory and gets them to fix any issues he finds "on the spot", so that when he drives back home with new accordions they are already tested and fixed in the factory. He also gives a five year warranty. That's how all dealers in new Italian accordions should work. (And prices are very reasonable as well.)
In Europe dealers selling the new Hohner accordions made in China have problems because European law requires them to give a two year warranty (for factory defects) and because Hohner may not honor such a long warranty it's the dealer's problem if something is wrong.