The Talking Machine Forum — For All Antique Phonographs & Recordings

Well, this is the result of Kotton Klenser, 0000 steel wool, Howards Restore a Finish, and Feed and Wax treatment.
I also replaced the shoddy electric motor with an appropriate 4 spring and misc parts.
It could probably use the mineral spirit treatment (Brad's method) but frankly I am concerned to use sandpaper considering my
limited experience. I already damaged some small portions while removing some white paint gloops from the lid.
Anyways, here are the pics...

Beautiful!!!! It looks great. It is amazing how well these machines clean up.

Enjoy and show it off to your friends!

It never gets old looking at these before and after pictures. Beautiful job!

Looks great!

Great job! A XVI is definitely worth putting some elbow grease into.

Thanks guys! Yeah, it was funny because I forgot how bad it actually looked before until I
checked out some older pics. I worked on it slowly over a period of several weeks and
did treatment with Kotton Klenser twice. My house is pretty dark too so I did not see much
of the wood grain until I used a flash on the camera. The motor is having some issues however, but
that is another story.

Surely you either refinished or replaced the motor board, however...no?

Looks fantastic now.

Yes, I bought a motor board and motor from a guy on Ebay. I have $360 in the machine total.

Very clever, switching machines on us and telling us it's the same one ; )
Fantastic job! I know what you mean about limited experience, I've only refinished one cabinet (Credenza, last month) and I stopped after shellacing it, didn't lacquer it yet. Family think it looks great now but I may lacquer it later. Don't push it if you don't feel comfortable, and get in some practice. So exactly what kind of damage did you get when trying to get off those paint drips?

Huge improvement. You took something looking like a basket case and made it "living room quality".

Kotton Klenser approach is great, especially for those items with a heavier finish.

I think you need to be more careful with machines like Operas, Victor VI and other earlier mahogany machines which often seem to have a thinner finish.