Having established himself as an organ-builder in Paris, Abbey became extensively employed in the construction, renovation, and enlargement of organs in France and elsewhere. Amongst others he built choir organs for accompanying voices for the cathedrals of Rheims, Nantes, Versailles, and Évreux, and for the churches of St. Eustache, Saint-Nicholas-des-Champs, St. Elizabeth, St. Medard, St. Etienne du Mont, and St. Thomas Aquinas, in Paris; and large organs for the cathedrals of La Rochelle, Rennes, Viviers, Tulle, Châlons-en-Champagne, Bayeux, and Amiens, and for churches, convents, and chapels at Saint-Denis, Orléans, Caen, Châlons, Picpus, and Versailles. He repaired and enlarged organs in the cathedrals of Mende, Moulins, Rheims, Évreux, and Nevers, and in the churches of Saint-Étienne-du-Mont, Saint-Philippe du Roule, the Assumption, and St. Louis d'Antin in Paris. He also built many organs for Chile and South America. In 1831 Abbey was employed, at the instance of Meyerbeer (who had introduced the instrument into the score of his opera "Robert le Diable", then about to be produced), to build an organ for the Grand Opera at Paris, which instrument continued to be used there until it was destroyed, with the theatre, by fire in 1873.