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All harps eventually get a belly. It has been said that the Irish harpers knew that a harp would only develop its mature voice once it was “pregnant with sound”. A lightly strung instrument with a reinforced soundboard will be slower to develop a belly than one that is solid wood and more heavily strung.
The Savarez flourocarbon strings for pedal harp that I have measured actually are less heavy than gut, and impart a little less tension, but I think the flat soundboard is a function of the soundboard construction, which makes it quite stiff.
A retired L&H employee told me that the Washburn harps were made before WWI so that a less expensive instrument could be sold through independent music stores. The regular L&H brand harps were sold only through L&H stores, of which there were several in major cities. The ones we have worked on were identical to the early Style 20 harps except that they had plain veneer instead of the figured maple veneers used on the more expensive harps.
From your description it sounds as if it needs regulation and some cosmetic work, which is not very expensive. The ones we have seen were not bronze unless someone has sprayed them with “radiator paint”, but were actually gilded with 22 kt gold leaf.
I’ve been stringing some modern pedal harps with the light gauge strings for several years, usually for harpists whose hands are failing from the stress of playing tightly strung, unresponsive harps.
An Erard Grecian weighs between 41 and 42 lbs if it is equipped with swell doors, and about 1 1/2 lbs lighter without the swell doors.
A couple of things worth mentioning on the old string gauges, some of which I wrote on another forum:
1) The original gauges are made of riveted brass.
A couple of technical observations on Sherry’s harp:
It has the original soundboard, and has been strung with light gauge strings that match the original specifications for a Wurlitzer harp.
Someone else had called about this harp, which was described as a double-action with Ram’s Head ornaments.
