Unknown 12 Bass

[werewolf255]

Hey everyone!

I'm new to the accordion and having a great time so far! I'm generally pretty handy, so I figured I'd pick up a 12 bass I found at the thrift store.

It's got reeds falling out (and fallen out) so it needs a full rewax, but otherwise nothing broken or obviously leaking. I'm hoping it'll make for good repair practice and end up a fun instrument.

I was wondering if the grill and colors look familiar to anybody? It's got the classic "Made in Italy" with serial numbers. It's also got a not-so-lovingly etched "49" on the back, which makes me fairly sure it was a student's. All the parts are marked 1490 inside, with a stylized "N" on the inside of the bellows as the only markings I can find.

Pictures attached, but it's more for posterity. It looks awfully similar to a number of Art Deco and 1920s styled instruments I've seen on Google Images.

Thanks for looking!

 

[Ben-jammin]

Welcome to the forum. The 49 makes me think it was owned by a music school and loaned out to a student for their first few lessons until they convinced mom and dad to buy an instrument with more comprehensive set of features.

Hopefully dried out wax means there isn’t rust on the reed tongues. But also probably means stiff dry leathers. While waxing the reeds back in it would be wise to replace the reed leathers with new.

 

[werewolf255]

Welcome to the forum. The 49 makes me think it was owned by a music school and loaned out to a student for their first few lessons until they convinced mom and dad to buy an instrument with more comprehensive set of features.

Hopefully dried out wax means there isn’t rust on the reed tongues. But also probably means stiff dry leathers. While waxing the reeds back in it would be wise to replace the reed leathers with new.

Thank you!!

Yeah, the number on the back does seem more like something a music school would do. I'll check around the area and maybe see if I can find a lead.

The tongues are overall very good. A few were stuck, but all of them voice now, to some degree. Two of the bass reeds don't sound quite right, but the evidence and fit show that they're in the original spots. That being said, they may have been swapped during a prior repair job since a number of plates are quite crooked. It's also very likely that they just have bad leathers.

All the leathers are getting swapped, and I had the vague thought of putting the the metal parts through an ultrasonic cleaner. Gonna do more reading up before I go that route though.

 

[werewolf255]

Alright! Got the first set of reeds off the block that's attached to the accordion itself and scraped off most of the wax.



The only casualty so far has been the air register key. It was almost broken on first inspection and just pulling it out caused it to snap. Do you think I can solder it? I'll cross post as well, but figured it didn't hurt to ask.

 

[werewolf255]

Progress update:

Revalved and waxed in the reeds on the bass side and on the bass reed block.



Getting the treble side blocks cleaned up and in working order now.






Manufacturing a new bass strap this week and figuring out a vinyl color scheme to re-cover the ends.