[stevehertz]

I have now finished the cabinet restoration. In fairness, apart from the veneer chip, the cabinet was in good condition. That is, apart from years of old wax polish (wrong..) that ruined the lustre. There was a loose strip of wood along the lower edge of the control panel, I glued that down. Then I applied Topps scratch cover polish all over and rubbed off after a few hours. Then, masking the dial and speaker fret with paper, I used silicon based furniture polish to remove the grime and wax build up and eventually to create a polished finish.

On the subject of polishes, it's been a marketing ploy for years for manufacturers to talk about oils and waxes in their products. The truth is, most of such polishes never 'see' any bare wood as they are applied on to various nitrocellulose and poly finishes - plastics basically. But your average 'houseperson' likes the sound of waxes in polish, it appeals to them in an old fashioned kind of way. So that's why I use Mr Sheen and that kind of furniture spray; it's actually correct for the job.

Anyway, here's the finished job, cabinet repaired and cleaned and knobs repaired (one) and cleaned. Just gotta restore the workings now. It does emit stations weakly, so at least it's not a dead set.