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[Nick Collis Bird]

The desk under my computer is made of an old recovered kitchen, itself a recycled 1950s school  chemistry lab - "ironwood" I'm told.

But you can only plumb in square sinks 

A really good source  of Mahogany  and Walnut can be found very cheaply in old Victorian wardrobes.
 I broke one up recently and was astounded to find solid wood and not veneer. 

[Steve_freereeder]

The cutting out of the reed block seals can be a tedious job at times, there are different ways of doing this job but over the years of trying most I have found this way the best.

I`ve only done it once , to a Hohner using Charlie Marshall's self adhesive reedblock gasket material - I stuck it to the fondo and carefully cut out the circles using a scalpel (with the action removed of course ;-) , fiddly but did the job nicely . I guess a Template helps , with circular holes like in Hohner a sharpened pipe of the right diameter and a hammer would make the perfect punch (thanks for the tip Graham) after laying the material on wood ..  I hadn`t a hohner template so used the scalpel after sticking the stuff down way

I use hollow leather punch* tools for jobs like this. Ideal!

*Do a google search, or see here (warning - link may not always be available).

[JohannPascher]

I have made my own oval and triangle punch tools for leather used for pallets. You my have a look at my workbench in attached picture.
I glue the leather fist to the felt before punching. For square Pallets i use a knife.
@ Peter Stormy, thank you for reply all you information on the subject.

[Prestidigitator]

The gasket stuff for the reed block bases, as supplied by Charlie Marshall, is called OLOVISC.

I shape it by cutting the piece to fit the reed block base; then I use a small jewellers hammer with a copper and nylon interchangeable head, to lightly "dress" the gasket against the block. This gives an imprint of the hole locations.

I then, like Steve, use a suitably sized "wad punch" (part of an old Eclipse set I've had 40 years or more), to punch the holes.

[Peter Stormy Hyde]

It is now time to start assembling and gluing up the frames, at one time I used to clamp the whole thing together, but it was very hard to get all the corners at 90 °. I have made up a jig that is able to take one side and one end at the same time and then I clamp them together using a picture frame clamp, I have a corner protector on the top corner as the strap can collapse the corner as it will exhort a lot of pressure. Once you have a pair of these then clamp them together, depending on how good your jig is you will then get all the corners at 90 °.

[Owen Woods]

That is a beautiful grain. Can't wait to see it finished.

[Adam-T]

Looks Fabulous Stormy - thanks for sharing this series with us, it`ll be something for you to look back on in many years also (as we all know, Melnet is timeless and will be here fovever  )

On a side note - I have to be honest . I prefer the look of the bass end without the contrast colour button riser , that grain as Owen said is Beautiful, It`d be a shame to cover ANY of it up

[Peter Stormy Hyde]

Thanks Mates for the feed back.
Many years ago I was at the National Folk Festival in Canberra and as I was walking into the bar area pree session time and two blokes were walking out, and one said to the other "what brand of accordions were they", the other person said " a well known Italian brand", when i got into the bar there were only 3 of my customers within playing my accordions together.

From that point I made very sure that mistake is not made again,  I use 3 timbers the main timber, on the frames, then a highlighting timber on the end plates and treble mechanism then a contrasting timber to box it in. 

[Peter Stormy Hyde]

Cutting out end plates can either be hard or very easy, the main thing is to have all the right tools in place before you start, that is; V support, good fret saw, or piercing saw as some call it, very good blades of various TPI, compressed air, and candle wax.

As I have already given the end plates a coat of the lacquer I need a glue that will stick the template down and good enough to hold it down during the whole cutting process, for this I use good quality stick glue. I then go through and drill small holes into the waste, then I just sit there and take my time, and with a little bit of patience it dos not take to long to master the use of the saw, each treble end plate takes me about 45 minutes to cut out. I have a small jet of air that is directed to blow away the sawdust so I can see the lines. The template can be washed off with a damp cloth without lifting the veneers, but far more care has to be taken if there is no finish on the veneers as they will very quickly lift off with the moisture, it is surprising how fast this can happen.

To me the good quality fret saw is the most useful hand saw in the workshop as so much work can be done with it, with good quality blades you could keep the breakages down to a minimum. There was a maker of electric scroll saws in Europe who sold blades to be used with it and I made the mistake of buying them once. I used a bakers dozen blades just cutting out one end plate, whereas with the good quality jewelers blades I may break one per plate. One thing that helps is candle wax on the blade or rubbed onto the template, but without the compressed air it will cause the sawdust to accumulate in front of the cut making it hard to see the lines. I have also tried cutting the end plates out using a router but I was not happy with the result, and by using templates and hand saw the templates could easily be adjusted to correct size required on the computer.
 All my templates are on Excel spreadsheets, as it is a fantastic stable program that will take and adjust big images without crashing.

[Peter Stormy Hyde]

The corner blocks I now fit are not designed to give the frames strength they are for the end-plate screws to hide within, I try to keep all screws on the outside of the instrument to an absolute minimum. I feel it after all the work that goes into the woodwork I do not want screws spoiling the effect. At this stage I drill down through them and the bulkhead with a small drill.

[Peter Stormy Hyde]

Next stage is for me to glue the end plates down to the accordion frames. I then run the whole thing up against the router bench and router around the edge and give it a 5 mm radius. I then cut off the end plate using a fine slot cutter in the router, I cut about 10 mm below the end plate or around the red band area, by doing it this way you know the end plates will match the accordion frames.

[Peter Stormy Hyde]

Using an 8 mm drill bit I counter drill down about 7mm into the end plate corners and insert leather plugs into the holes, these make fantastic screw “nuts” as they do not strip the same way as if you were screwing straight into the timber.
I then drill from the bulkhead side up into the screw corners using a specially made drill bit, it’s a 7 mm drill with a 25mm in length 3.5mm leader drill, with this bit I know how far my screws will protrude into the end plate nut.

[Adam-T]

Fantastic - this box is really coming together ! . as I said before, it`s great to see this happening as a series on Melnet . thanks Stormy ...........

[Peter Stormy Hyde]

Fantastic - this box is really coming together ! . as I said before, it`s great to see this happening as a series on Melnet . thanks Stormy ...........

That's nice to hear, its easier writing about it than making it; at times!!

[blafleur]

I did forget to mention that Bryan Lafleur in Texas had tried the balsa, and the feed back I had from him was very positive, but my mind had been on the bigger European makers.

I did build one with some balsa.  The body was instrument grade spruce, and the reed blocks were balsa.  It was very light, and had a very rich, sweet tone. I showed it around a lot, with good reviews, but I learned to wait till the player tried it before telling them what it was made of, or they had preconceived ideas.  I always them I got the idea from a trail blazer in Australia.

Enjoying the photo series, Stormy!

[Peter Stormy Hyde]

G'day Mates Thanks for the feedback
I have a text problem with the next post, and Clive is looking into it.
As it turns out the photos were the problem so I re named them.
Treble Mechanism is now ready for fitting the ends.
I have cut the mechanism at the ends with a 5 deg slope inwards, if you go any further than that gluing the ends on can become more of a pain, as the ends will want to slide up on the glue. I tilt the mechanism back 15 deg and just put a couple of veneers underneath so when they are taken out after the glue up the treble mechanism ends are then resting on the frames. I have found by doing this it protects the bulkhead when the instrument falls from a great height off the stage, or some drunken bell hopper drops it.
After I have fitted the ends I then cut them back to about a 7.5 deg angle.   

[Peter Stormy Hyde]

The button rods on the bass side are made from 2.0 mm wire imported from Italy, I was using 2.4 mm bronze welding rods in the long distant past. It is very hard these days to get the older trade stock like wire and extrusions, so I got 10 kilo of each size wire that I needed 2.0mm 2.2mm and 2.4 mm, it is sold in 1-meter lengths.

I have a bending jig for each width of instrument, this picture is of my 150 mm wide jig, you can do each size on the same jig but you end up with far to many holes and you do not know if you are “Arthur or Martha”.

I have a few button shanks where I have drilled a 2 mm hole all the way through, I place the shanks within each bush with the wire passing through it, this allows me to line up the rod in the right angle before I cut off the excess, you should be able to see the shank and the excess rod within the photo.
Button shanks are fitted to the rods using Feraltite (used in Archery and Fishing) it is a hot melt resin and is better than glue.
Where the rod fits into the leaver holes I use the rubber spline to keep it in place, I just give it a little spit and that then holds on very well, just as well that I had 100 meters of it made at the time.

[Peter Stormy Hyde]

I’m now ready to look at spraying the job, the photo shows all the parts that I have made, ready for striping down and then fitted to holding jigs for the spraying.

Next photo shows the gear that I use when I’m spraying there is another two filters at the end of the yellow hose, here is the warning; I will not even open up a tin of spray without that gear being worn, two pack is highly toxic to the body and will track right into the blood stream, this also goes for araldite and plastibond type products, the hardener is very dangerous, and it is the same stuff that is used as a hardener within the spray, so always wear gloves and goggles when using that filler or synthetic glues.

Even when I sand down I use the breathing gear with a half mask so there is no way I get that dust within my lungs.

It’s a little ironic that I use full gloss and I do all my spraying within the dirty workshop with sawdust all around without a booth with doors open to the elements and sometimes it’s a little windy, but still I get a good clean job and I can get away with it “off the gun”.

[Adam-T]

Great to see it all in one place ready for spraying and assembly - looking forward to seeing the reeds being waxed in those foam blocks . I`m sure Nudiefish is also 

[Peter Stormy Hyde]

I forgot to show my corner fillets, these are put in on the corners of the accordion and bellows frames, I use the slot cutter on the router table to make the slots.  It is these that on the whole give the strength for holding the instrument together. I rely on the instrument springing apart if it is dropped from a great height, that way it does very little damage, as you do not get torn timber, except for the fillet. I can then re fit the fillets by using the router to cut them out and re gluing new ones in. But interestingly I had a customer whose instrument was placed on the kitchen table (during a very drunken party) on its bass side, I do not fit feet to the bass side so it rolled off and landed bass side down on a slate floor, and the bass strap caused a crack down the end plate, but all the frames held well.