Rescue Violins: The Violin Rescue Centre

 These cheap Chinese Gear 4 Music violins are sprayed with a thick coat of cheap bright orange varnish - Stentor Style. There is no real purfing, it looks like its a transfer. I bought this model off eBay because I was after a 3/4size modern case, bow and modern fine tuners for a Victorian violin I intend to sell as a student kit. The table was very easy to remove. It had been glued on with hide glue The bass bar was glued on with white glue and does not fit very well as the photos reveal. The violin appears to have no graduations. It is fully lined and roughly fully blocked in the corners. I filled the crack with hot hide glue, clamped it together at the sides (gently so as not to bow the table too much) then clamped a few small cleats on the crack at the same time. Tomorrow I will reinforce the joint with thick brown paper soaked in hide glue so the repair is at right angles over the table and base bar since the crack is right up against the bass bar. 

 This is a 3/4 size Maidstone violin from my private collection  Also on YouTube  https://youtu.be/yZ0pS4f7cXg . . Images of violin

Many times, I see violins for sale described on eBay as having no obvious damage by people claiming to have no knowledge of violins. In reality, the photographs of some of these violins on eBay show clear serious damage that would most likely seriously effect the sound of the violin and only get worse. In the picture below you can see a 3/4 size Maidstone violin that has a serious crack on its back. The thing described as "something rolling around inside" is almost certainly the fact that the sound post has fallen inside, which most likely happened when the back of the violin was damaged.  Unless you know how to fix a crack on a violin and reset the sound post then this violin would cost hundreds to have a luthier repair it. That would be far in excess of he re-sale value of the instrument. A first class Maidstone 3/4 size violin should never be sold for more than £200. These are Saxony (late 19th century early 20th century lower-end 'factory violins' made for student

 I am currently trying to address an overloud and harsh A string on a basic 1/2 size 1970's Romanian violin where all the other strings sound very nice.  I hope this will help me:  https://josephcurtinstudios.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/bridge_tuning.pdf

 A very interesting heated debate  in the Global Village over Carved-In Bass Bars HERE

I am particularly interested in the story that German HOPF violins had their name changed to HOPE by makers/dealers in the early 20th century, after Word War 1, due to anti-Semitism.  There is an archived link to the story here .  The one below for sale here   This one on eBay on 29 November 2020 that led me to investigate the story  There were at least 50 German manufacturers of violins using the name HOPF in the 19th century. The orignal luthier of the name,   David HOPF of Klingenthal, (German) c.1790-1800 was a master violin maker. This issue is discussed by luthier experts HERE   1. Maestronet archive of comments on this issue:  (a)  https://archive.is/5xKyX (b)  https://archive.is/a11dG (c)  https://archive.is/ZPHHj (d)  https://archive.is/qWTZl

  Manby Violins  Here is a label from a Manby violin with his fretted fingerboard Here is the 1912 US patent for his invention ( here ). ( Archived ) A 1914 and revised 1918 price list with other useful information on the effect of the 1st world war on prices and places of manufacture of violins  here A useful research paper on the topic  here My daughter has a Manby violin. I purchased it on eBay for £67. It had areas where the face needed gluing to the ribs and there was a large part of the middle seam of back split open. I fixed it and re-varnished the back to my 11 year old daughter's wishes to have it tiger striped. In effect, the flaming of the maple on the back is artificially exaggerated by my efforts. She loves the violin and it does play and project very well indeed.