I have an interesting Czechoslovakian 3 Row 3 voice Helicon, Badged Ligna (short for Lignatone and part of the Kebrdle / Delicia empire) .
I Got it from Theo a while back and it needed a full ovehaul . Lester sprung his magic on the treble and Chord reeds (the Helicons are fine) and I`ve been tidying it up / sealing it, it didn`t need much work on the Celluloid, juist some strap brackets, new bellows straps, bass straps, grille re-lining and refurbishing, button clean, treble mech cleanout and a good clean all round ..
What`s interesting is that it conforms to regular 3 row Melodeon rather than Club or later Heligonka standards in all ways apart from One Gleichton on the inner row (3 row Steirisches & later gonks have two) , and like usual melodeons with 4th button start, it has low notes and accidentals at the chin end and Corona bass.. I`ve seen early heligonkas with this layout but minus the Accidentals (which are tuned totally standard GCF Melodeon) ...... I asked Lester to tune the Gleichton out so it`s now like a big fat Corona-III on steriods ..
what I`d like to know and hoping Paul Groff, Triskel etc may know is the age of the thing or the market it was designed for (unlikely the home market which seemed to live on orthodox gonkas) , it Looks very 1930s (Art Deco Grille, Burr-walut celluloid & the ugly Art deco helicon ports) which likely means 1960s but
Pic before the refurb - I`m still waiting for the bellows straps to arrive