AJ, not sure what you mean about "keeping slides to one side"? When I removed the slides, I sanded off the plastic slide grooves to bare wood, then glued the blocks directly to the back of the faceplate. At that point, you can just throw the slides in the trash. It does make it a little more trouble to tune, but not bad. I've done it two ways, a strip of tape on the faceplate under the flappers on the 3 rows not being tuned, or 3 smaller pieces of tape on the inside directly on the 3 reeds not being tuned. I prefer the small tape on the reed method (I put it under the reed and reed valve), because the tape under the flappers leaks enough for me to not trust the tuning much.

I removed the slides from a H114 and made new reed blocks for the 2 up 2 down config like in Cajun boxes, but the holes don't like up. You can either put a thin plate inside, glued to the back of the faceplate, or make a new faceplate with correct hole placement. I did the former, the flapper covered all the holes.

Thanks Bryan, I'll relay this on to the fella who is fitting and tuning for me. It must leave space a bit tight between the blocks though once they're glued in, do you reckon it will still be possible to fit and wax in the reeds? Would it hurt to enlarge the sound holes slightly with a file?

The space between the reed blocks will be the same if you put them in the right place, and yep, it's kinda tight, but not so bad. I don't think it would hurt to open the holes some, I didn't, but wish I had.