Considering to purchase an HMV 163

[soundgen]

Good news. Another dealer has one for sale. And he's located only about 20 miles from my address. And what's even better: He's asking considerably less than that other dealer. He's sent me a couple of photographs, and except for the grille cloth, that's not in pristine shape anymore, it looks good. Of course I'm going to check it out in person first. He's asking EUR 575,- for it, that's about GBP 442,-.

It looks refinished to me on the outside. Note the colour of the turned feet and the inside compared to the rest of the outside?

Now that you mention it. I initially thought it was caused by the lighting. The outside looks like oak, and the inside looks more like mahogany. That's a real shame, because I've received several offers in the mean time, but almost all of them are above the price range you mentioned (GBP 500-600), and for the price this one seemed like a really good deal.

Looks like oak to me and oak is easily refinished a bit of oak stain and some Black Bison polish and will look great , give it a try and you will be pleased and proud to get back its original looks !

[bart1927]

Looks like oak to me and oak is easily refinished a bit of oak stain and some Black Bison polish and will look great , give it a try and you will be pleased and proud to get back its original looks !

I thought the inside was the original colour. The usually don't refinish the inside, because you will likely loose the decal. The inside looks quite dark, it may be mahogany.

Or do you mean that when I apply oak stain and Black bison polish to the outside it will end up looking like mahogany?

How exactly does this stuff work? I don't have any experience with woodworking. I once polished up (is that the right word, polishing?) an HMV 130 with HG antique wax. I applied it with a brush and then rubbed it out with a soth piece of cloth.

So how does this procedure you mention work exactly? Do you first apply the stain and then the polish? And how do you apply it? Do I have to sand it first? Do I need a turpentine or a water based stain?

Sorry for all those questions, but I'm really a novice in this area.

[Steve]

Bart,

That machine is DEFINITELY oak, inside and out. What Soundgen is saying is that you can relatively easily polish up the outside using an oak stain finished with some Black Bison wax paste (made by Liberon) of the same "medium oak" colour. Unlike say a cellulose spray applied mahogany finish which is near enough impossible to replicate.

With that said, I'm still 99% convinced that the 163 in the picture HAS already been refinshed. Depending on the material already used, it might not be quite so easy to add the stain and wax paste ie. if the previous restorer used a lacquer or varnish sealant. Anything applied over THAT will just wipe straight off!

The solution offered by Soundgen only works well on the old unrefinished surface where the original varnish has worn off. It is east to BLEND the new stain / wax into the surviving finish.

HTH

Steve

[Retrograde]

It looks refinished to me on the outside. Note the colour of the turned feet and the inside compared to the rest of the outside?

A question about this particular machine, I see that the HMV, "163", and "close lid wilst playing" decal are in locations I'm not used to seeing. Is this correct or at least one of the possible correct placements?

[bart1927]

It looks refinished to me on the outside. Note the colour of the turned feet and the inside compared to the rest of the outside?

A question about this particular machine, I see that the HMV, "163", and "close lid wilst playing" decal are in locations I'm not used to seeing. Is this correct or at least one of the possible correct placements?

I see what you mean. But I did a quick Google search for pictures and video's of the HMV 163 and found this (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xOxqmeT-THg) video on Youtube of a 163 with the decals in the exact same places. Maybe this is a really early 163? After all, when you compare HMV 101's from different years you also see small differences.

[bart1927]

Bart,

That machine is DEFINITELY oak, inside and out.

It looked a bit dark in the pictures, but you're right, of course. The mahogany 163 also has a completely different grille.

[CarlosV]

To me it looks like someone tried to clean it and overdid the job. As it is near you the best thing to do is to go and look at it in person. If it is the case of an overdone cleaning that ended up removing the varnishing, it should be restorable relatively easily.

[bart1927]

I mailed with the seller, and he tells me that in fact both the inside and the outside of the gramophone have the exact same color, so it may indeed be a trick of the light. It could be, since even the colour of the outside isn't the same on all 3 photographes. I did a Google search for pictures of the HMV 163 (also, because I was curious about those decals being in different places on different machines) and those refinished machines are pretty easy to spot, unless whoever did it did a very good job.

Check out for instance, this one:



That one is pretty obvious, since the lid and the grille are an entirely different color.

The next one looks a lot better, but you can still see a color difference when you look at the grille.



On the photo's "my" dealer posted, the grille at least seems to have the same colour as the rest of the machine, so perhaps it's the right color after all. Unless of course the grille was refinished also, but in order to do that, they would have to remove the grille cloth , otherwise you risk getting sawdust and stain all over it. And since removing grille cloth is a real pita, wouldn't they have replaced the damaged cloth with undamaged stuff?

So I still have a little hope it could be the real deal, so in order to know for sure I'm going to check it out next week. It's just a 1 hour trip from my home, so it won't take much time.

[bart1927]

Today I visited the dealer to check out the 163 in person, and I'm sure glad I did. What I already suspected was indeed the case: the machine was not refinished on the outside, it was just a case of really bad lighting, causing overexposure. It had been photographed standing in a dark, unlit garage, with lots of sunlight coming through the opened garage door. The outside had in fact the exact same color as the inside. The only faults I could find was some damage to the veneer on the backside of the lid, also some lifting veneer on lower back side of the machine (the panels you can remove to see the back side of the horn), and a tiny damaged spot on the inside of one of the doors. It looks really nice and clean, and there were no strange motor noises. Only thing was the reproducer was a 5B (a really nice one, though, without cracks) while it should be a 5A I guess. But that's not really a thing that bothers me. So except for the reproducer it all looked original and in pretty decent shape. So I think I will go for it. I will probably swap the reproducer, though, while it sounded allright to me, the rubber flange was rock solid.

[Steve]

Today I visited the dealer to check out the 163 in person, and I'm sure glad I did. What I already suspected was indeed the case: the machine was not refinished on the outside, it was just a case of really bad lighting, causing overexposure. It had been photographed standing in a dark, unlit garage, with lots of sunlight coming through the opened garage door. The outside had in fact the exact same color as the inside. The only faults I could find was some damage to the veneer on the backside of the lid, also some lifting veneer on lower back side of the machine (the panels you can remove to see the back side of the horn), and a tiny damaged spot on the inside of one of the doors. It looks really nice and clean, and there were no strange motor noises. Only thing was the reproducer was a 5B (a really nice one, though, without cracks) while it should be a 5A I guess. But that's not really a thing that bothers me. So except for the reproducer it all looked original and in pretty decent shape. So I think I will go for it. I will probably swap the reproducer, though, while it sounded allright to me, the rubber flange was rock solid.

Sounds like a good move! The current reproducer will be CHROMIUM plated whereas the machine predates the use of chrome and should therefore have entirely nickel plated fitments. When you finally do hunt down a 5A (which is the only correct sound-box for a post-1927 re-entrant machine) make sure it is nickel plated. Most Ebay sellers can't tell the difference and they will usually say "the chrome looks good" etc, even if it is actually nickel.