Other stuff

The fun process of repairing/restoring an old accordion

It all started on May 13, 2026. I was browsing eBay for used accordions as one does, and I found this Galanti Bros. accordion for just $70. Now if you know anything about accordions, this price seems suspiciously low. But I was looking in the bottom of the barrel, so I bought it.
And I waited, and waited, and waited for it to be shipped. After a couple of days, one of my friends joked that I probably got scammed. So I contacted the seller and turns out that they just forgot. Then came the long process of waiting for it to be shipped from California to Minnesota. It finally came on Wednesday, May 27, 2 weeks after I ordered it. But it wasn't that big of a deal.

A troubling beginning

When I got home from school that day, I jumped right into the restoration. I brought the accordion down into my office and tried playing a couple of treble notes to see what would happen.
Nothing.
I was starting to realize why this thing might been $70... but I had to open it up first to see what was really going on. The image on the left is what I saw. The reed blocks were literally falling out of their typical places. I noticed that some reeds were missing and I began to feel a sinking feeling... but I noticed that they had just fallen to the bass side. They were all still there and intact! To prevent any further damage from happening, I took all of the treble reed blocks out and set them aside for later.

The keyboard dilemma

I decided that the first order of business would be removing the keyboard and cleaning both the keys and baseboard. Given that there were cobwebs on the keys, this was probably the best course of action. I removed the cap at the end of the rod so I could pull it out with pliers. When I tried to twist and pull it out, nothing. It didn't budge at all. It really didn't help that the hole the rod was in was only about 5mm in diameter and the rod didn't stick out at all. After trying this for about 30 minutes, I realized that I wasn't going to get anywhere. I could just leave it alone and not remove the keyboard, but that would make cleaning much harder. Plus, there were some keys with the celluloid keytop coming off, so I would have to glue them, which would be hard without removing them. So I took to Reddit with my issue, and some people suggested I use a Dremel to carve out enough space around the rod to grab it with locking pliers. Now I didn't have either of these tools, but I'd have other uses for a Dremel so I decided to get both. I spent a night carefully carving out extra space around the rod, which went pretty well given that it was my first time using a Dremel. I got my locking pliers, gripped the rod as hard as I could, then twisted and pulled slowly.
Nothing.
This was really not looking good. I had one last resort that I could try before I would have to get very invasive. Someone online suggested using a power drill to spin the rod and pull it out. Seemed like a good idea. When I tried, I couldn't get enough of the drill around the rod, and I really did try. I was desperate. Still nothing. At this point, I had to resort to the invasive option. Yet another person online had used a hacksaw to cut the keyboard rod into small pieces (only a couple inches long each). These small pieces could be removed much easier because there would be a lot less friction.

The invasive option

At this point, I had to resort to the invasive option. Yet another person online had used a hacksaw to cut the keyboard rod into small pieces (only a couple inches long each). These small pieces could be removed much easier because there would be a lot less friction.