Pictures of 1924 San Francisco Guerrini and Corona III R

[ike milligan]

accordiondoc.home.mindspring.com/pictures/GuerriniSF ... This just in...

Several pictures. Blocks are rubber stamped P. Petromilli & C. Piatanesi
Feb. 15 1924. Black strip on front of accordion is where nameplate of
owner removed.


Accordiondoc.home.mindspring.com/pictures/CoronaIIIR

Useless Chrome trim on grill was missing so I had to strip off the
damaged red pearl plastic and paint the grill gold. I think it needs to
be a different color there. Any suggestions on how to paint it short of
putting mother of toilet seat back on?

[ike milligan]

Post by ike milligan
accordiondoc.home.mindspring.com/pictures/GuerriniSF ... This just in...
Several pictures. Blocks are rubber stamped P. Petromilli & C. Piatanesi
Feb. 15 1924. Black strip on front of accordion is where nameplate of
owner removed.
Accordiondoc.home.mindspring.com/pictures/CoronaIIIR
Useless Chrome trim on grill was missing so I had to strip off the
damaged red pearl plastic and paint the grill gold. I think it needs to
be a different color there. Any suggestions on how to paint it short of
putting mother of toilet seat back on?

Clickable link http://accordiondoc.home.mindspring.com/pictures/GuerriniSF/

[Alan Sharkis]

Post by ike milligan

Post by ike milligan
accordiondoc.home.mindspring.com/pictures/GuerriniSF ... This just in...
Several pictures. Blocks are rubber stamped P. Petromilli & C. Piatanesi
Feb. 15 1924. Black strip on front of accordion is where nameplate of
owner removed.
Accordiondoc.home.mindspring.com/pictures/CoronaIIIR
Useless Chrome trim on grill was missing so I had to strip off the
damaged red pearl plastic and paint the grill gold. I think it needs to
be a different color there. Any suggestions on how to paint it short of
putting mother of toilet seat back on?

Clickable link http://accordiondoc.home.mindspring.com/pictures/GuerriniSF/

Ike. am I reading this wrong, or do you want to change the color of
the grill? If you are, I guess somebody in the electroplating
business can tell you what can be done with it. I'm not sure that
paint on metal will be all that permanent.

Alan

[ike milligan]

Post by Alan Sharkis

Post by ike milligan

Post by ike milligan
accordiondoc.home.mindspring.com/pictures/GuerriniSF ... This just in...
Several pictures. Blocks are rubber stamped P. Petromilli & C. Piatanesi
Feb. 15 1924. Black strip on front of accordion is where nameplate of
owner removed.
Accordiondoc.home.mindspring.com/pictures/CoronaIIIR
Useless Chrome trim on grill was missing so I had to strip off the
damaged red pearl plastic and paint the grill gold. I think it needs to
be a different color there. Any suggestions on how to paint it short of
putting mother of toilet seat back on?

Clickable link http://accordiondoc.home.mindspring.com/pictures/GuerriniSF/

Ike. am I reading this wrong, or do you want to change the color of
the grill? If you are, I guess somebody in the electroplating
business can tell you what can be done with it. I'm not sure that
paint on metal will be all that permanent.
Alan

It's enamel, so almost a permanent as the plastic. Thanks for the
suggestion, but I only want to make the color less clashing before I try
to sell it. Electro platers are bandits around here. Anyway I doubt if
you can electroplate aluminum that well.

Hohner revived the III R in Germany just now, so the prices of the
classic ones might have suffered. idk how good the new ones are. Classic
with the chrome on the grill not missing on ebay are priced less than I
had hoped for.

[DoN. Nichols]

[ ... ]

Post by Alan Sharkis
Ike. am I reading this wrong, or do you want to change the color of
the grill? If you are, I guess somebody in the electroplating
business can tell you what can be done with it. I'm not sure that
paint on metal will be all that permanent.

Or -- if it is an aluminum grill, (check with a magnet), then it
could be anodized to the color of your choice, after the previous color
was stripped off (along with the anodization) by a bath in a strong NaOH
(Sodium Hydroxide) solution.

Likely not the thing to do at home on a onesy-twosey basis,t
though it *can* be done at home.

"gold" color is one of the anodizations possible.

Good Luck,
DoN.

[ike milligan]

Post by DoN. Nichols
[ ... ]

Post by Alan Sharkis
Ike. am I reading this wrong, or do you want to change the color of
the grill? If you are, I guess somebody in the electroplating
business can tell you what can be done with it. I'm not sure that
paint on metal will be all that permanent.

Or -- if it is an aluminum grill, (check with a magnet), then it
could be anodized to the color of your choice, after the previous color
was stripped off (along with the anodization) by a bath in a strong NaOH
(Sodium Hydroxide) solution.
Likely not the thing to do at home on a onesy-twosey basis,t
though it *can* be done at home.
"gold" color is one of the anodizations possible.
Good Luck,
DoN.

Thanks for all the great answers. The question was really about painting
and what color would not clash with the red pearl. I knew the grill
was aluminum: somehow I deduced that without using a magnet. I want to
sell the accordion, so I am not about to go to a metal plating shop, and
at this stage of my career, I doubt if I will set up an electroplating
operation at home, and risk being suspected of operating a meth lab.

[ciao_accordion]

yeah that's a neat old box

the Eagle grille was sure popular back then, and has something of a
resurgence in recent years - i guess the metal style grille was used
through the 20's - did metal grilles survive into the 30's or had
plastics taken over by then? i kept one old Gallizi metal front
as a wall decoration

the reedblocks show some class! it looked like aluminum was used
rather than Zinc? at that date would that make them among the
early adopters of Aluminum?

and yes the decals are consistent, so they likely were
decalcomania typical of the times - not much different
usage than the Potteries in East Liverpool Ohio who
also adopted Decals in a big way before the depression hit

it was a method which, especially after silk-screening
was incorporated, to have great detail and coloring made
simple and consistent and inexpensive to use on all
kinds of things (furniture to teapots)

ciao

Ventura

[ike milligan]

Post by ciao_accordion
yeah that's a neat old box
the Eagle grille was sure popular back then, and has something of a
resurgence in recent years - i guess the metal style grille was used
through the 20's - did metal grilles survive into the 30's or had
plastics taken over by then? i kept one old Gallizi metal front
as a wall decoration
the reedblocks show some class! it looked like aluminum was used
rather than Zinc? at that date would that make them among the
early adopters of Aluminum?
and yes the decals are consistent, so they likely were
decalcomania typical of the times - not much different
usage than the Potteries in East Liverpool Ohio who
also adopted Decals in a big way before the depression hit
it was a method which, especially after silk-screening
was incorporated, to have great detail and coloring made
simple and consistent and inexpensive to use on all
kinds of things (furniture to teapots)
ciao
Ventura

The Zinc was mainly used in Germany for reed plates, as far as I know,
no one else used them much, but what do I know?

The American eagle was the trademark of Guerrini S.F., but of course
others were using it, for example Crucianelli, and there are others
still using it.

My 1919 Guerrini chromatic with the Belgian reverse bass system has a
pearl inlay eagle identical to the ones on the Ghirardelli chocolate. At
some point I will post a link to that graphic. By the way it has both
aluminum and bronze reedplates.

Yes, nickel plated metal grilles most definitely were used a lot in the
1930's.

I think piano accordions were very rare before 1920, when it seems that
the industry woke up and decided that there was a market for them among
people who knew how to play piano.

I have seen at least one that had been a chromatic that had a piano
keyboard put on it. Not the fake piano-looking chromatic with the dummy
black keys.

[ciao_accordion]

also curious, this build is 1924,
and it's a full 120 bass, full 41 key

so was Guerrini an early adopter of this standard?
and does this suggest 120/41 originated in America?

it wasn't easy sharing "ideas" between Italy and the USA
considering shipping and communication time factors, but
neither was it easy to go back and forth between New York
and San Francisco (even if you were wealthy and had a lot
of time free to spend traveling by train and loved the
Harvey girls to death)

therefore, i imagine at times in San Francisco you could
identify where they figured out something "in a vacuuum"
that they may have heard of, or seen a rough drawing/etching
of, or simply thought up for themselves to solve a technical
problem they wanted to improve.

it seems a lot of other companies didn't work their
way up to 120/41 till years later, or even all the way
to the diminished row

How about the pivot on the treble for this accordion?
one rod or two like the Frassati, which seems to be a
near vintage

i would love to see inside a Patti Bros. (Chicago) from
the 20's for comparison... how much did they "borrow"
from east and west coast accordion hotspots?

ciao

Ventura

[ike milligan]

Post by ciao_accordion
also curious, this build is 1924,
and it's a full 120 bass, full 41 key
so was Guerrini an early adopter of this standard?
and does this suggest 120/41 originated in America?
it wasn't easy sharing "ideas" between Italy and the USA
considering shipping and communication time factors, but
neither was it easy to go back and forth between New York
and San Francisco (even if you were wealthy and had a lot
of time free to spend traveling by train and loved the
Harvey girls to death)
therefore, i imagine at times in San Francisco you could
identify where they figured out something "in a vacuuum"
that they may have heard of, or seen a rough drawing/etching
of, or simply thought up for themselves to solve a technical
problem they wanted to improve.
it seems a lot of other companies didn't work their
way up to 120/41 till years later, or even all the way
to the diminished row
How about the pivot on the treble for this accordion?
one rod or two like the Frassati, which seems to be a
near vintage
i would love to see inside a Patti Bros. (Chicago) from
the 20's for comparison... how much did they "borrow"
from east and west coast accordion hotspots?
ciao
Ventura

It wasn't the Stone Age, and there must have been quite a lot of copying
and cross-fertilization between between NY SF, Chicago, Milwaukee, and
Detroit, since the guys making these were either related by blood or
origin in the Castelfidardo region. If some makers were slow adopters of
the standardization 41/120 they just failed to get on the bandwagon
either from rugged individualism or egotism, or just inertia, and
therefore did not "run with the big dogs".

Did you just now mention zinc? My previous reply got eaten up by the
servers. Nowhere have i seen zinc except from Germany and of course in
the 1930's some Italians were making with German parts, and even in
Chicago Lakeside was making a Hohner clone, as was Ancona.

As for the double spindles, that was not a huge departure from the
multiples in the Chromatics. I have seen a Chromatic that Bednarz in
Chicago stuck a 41-key piano on.

Then of course were there chromatics with dummy black keys to look like
a piano. My 1919 Guerrini 3 row chromatic with dummy black keys with
the Belgian reverse bass system has both bronze and aluminum reedplates.
And speaking of iggles, that one has inlaid pearl American iggle
identical to the one on Ghirardelli chocolate logo. Will evwentualy post
a picture(s) of that.