The Talking Machine Forum — For All Antique Phonographs & Recordings

Congratulations with this great find, Roger.
It will be very interesting to see this project moving ahead. There are obviously some work waiting in repairing veneer, matching the grain, and later on matching the color etc, but I know you will get good help too adding to your own expertise, so the machine is in the best hands.

Curt A wrote: Wed Sep 01, 2021 11:00 pm What I'm referring to is the unusual (at least to me), dark striping on the veneer. I can see the oak wood grain (red line), which angles on the sample shown, but what are the vertical dark stripes (green line)?

Screen Shot 2021-09-01 at 10.53.58 PM.png

The green line is still the grain pattern if you look very closely. Its a column of grain markings as you go down the furniture where damp has got into the veneer and opened the grain up and it subsequently goes black and gives it that smudged appearance. In reality its mold or fungal spores.

Steve wrote: Thu Sep 02, 2021 6:07 pm

Curt A wrote: Wed Sep 01, 2021 11:00 pm What I'm referring to is the unusual (at least to me), dark striping on the veneer. I can see the oak wood grain (red line), which angles on the sample shown, but what are the vertical dark stripes (green line)?

Screen Shot 2021-09-01 at 10.53.58 PM.png

The green line is still the grain pattern if you look very closely. Its a column of grain markings as you go down the furniture where damp has got into the veneer and opened the grain up and it subsequently goes black and gives it that smudged appearance. In reality its mold or fungal spores.

That is weird... I have never seen that on oak veneer before. The smudged/black stripes seem too uniform for mold, but what do I know? If it's mold, then that finish needs to be stripped as part of the restoration - black mold is not healthy...

That is a nice machine! I have the Lumière version, the 510, also in oak, but its tinge is much lighter than this one in the photos.