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AR4-xa; what to look for?


VintageMan

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Upon first glance at those cabinets, it was apparent that trying to strip black paint over white paint on top of who-knows-what was a brewing formula for disaster. The chemical approach was bound to be a total mess or even worse, doomed to fail. The preferred approach for getting these cabinets back into restorable shape would have been to use abrasive methods - - i.e. sandpaper and/or coarse pads in order to tame that messy paint application and prepare them properly for a new topcoat.

Even though I have once stripped a very heavily painted pair of 4x cabinets back to bare wood, I would not automatically recommend that prescription - - - it is a messy procedure and a whole lot of work. IMO, there was little chance of effectively getting those heavy black cabinets back to any "natural wood" appearance, which is exactly why my hints at restoration efforts were suggesting an alternative approach (soft black) that still has roots and connections with AR production history.

Despite the unfortunate prior paint application, I believe those cabinets are fully re-useable without even needing to possess any special trained skills. For me, that is the enjoyment of these "find and restore" projects, and I'm often left with a bad taste in my mouth when I see fully operable and intact speakers get plucked for parts simply because there is a minor stumbling block along the re-building effort. :angry:

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Upon first glance at those cabinets, it was apparent that trying to strip black paint over white paint on top of who-knows-what was a brewing formula for disaster. The chemical approach was bound to be a total mess or even worse, doomed to fail. The preferred approach for getting these cabinets back into restorable shape would have been to use abrasive methods - - i.e. sandpaper and/or coarse pads in order to tame that messy paint application and prepare them properly for a new topcoat.

Even though I have once stripped a very heavily painted pair of 4x cabinets back to bare wood, I would not automatically recommend that prescription - - - it is a messy procedure and a whole lot of work. IMO, there was little chance of effectively getting those heavy black cabinets back to any "natural wood" appearance, which is exactly why my hints at restoration efforts were suggesting an alternative approach (soft black) that still has roots and connections with AR production history.

Despite the unfortunate prior paint application, I believe those cabinets are fully re-useable without even needing to possess any special trained skills. For me, that is the enjoyment of these "find and restore" projects, and I'm often left with a bad taste in my mouth when I see fully operable and intact speakers get plucked for parts simply because there is a minor stumbling block along the re-building effort. :angry:

Behlen makes a water-based non-toxic paint remover which I plan on trying out soon. http://www.shellac.net/pde_paint_remover.html

Heat guns, infrared strippers and sanding can be used also with the usual caveats if there is a possibility of encountering lead based paint coatings. Charring the base wood is a possibility when applying heat though.

Roger

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Upon first glance at those cabinets, it was apparent that trying to strip black paint over white paint on top of who-knows-what was a brewing formula for disaster. The chemical approach was bound to be a total mess or even worse, doomed to fail. The preferred approach for getting these cabinets back into restorable shape would have been to use abrasive methods - - i.e. sandpaper and/or coarse pads in order to tame that messy paint application and prepare them properly for a new topcoat.

Even though I have once stripped a very heavily painted pair of 4x cabinets back to bare wood, I would not automatically recommend that prescription - - - it is a messy procedure and a whole lot of work. IMO, there was little chance of effectively getting those heavy black cabinets back to any "natural wood" appearance, which is exactly why my hints at restoration efforts were suggesting an alternative approach (soft black) that still has roots and connections with AR production history.

Despite the unfortunate prior paint application, I believe those cabinets are fully re-useable without even needing to possess any special trained skills. For me, that is the enjoyment of these "find and restore" projects, and I'm often left with a bad taste in my mouth when I see fully operable and intact speakers get plucked for parts simply because there is a minor stumbling block along the re-building effort. :angry:

I get your point; but I tried the sandpaper and paint-scraper approach today as the weather is beautiful this 2nd Easter day.

The stripper fluid I have is especially for painted over veneer and used by restoration of old furniture that has been painted over.

I used it to get a black painted veneer cabinet of a Luxman T50 tuner back to original condition.

The AR4xa cabinets are painted with horrible black paint, a paint scraper is not getting the paint of, nor is the sandpaper.

Using a small sanding machine ended up with the sandpaper flooded with black paint in seconds.

Like you I would rather get the cabinets back to "new" but it is to much work and I have other things planned.

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Well, since VM has tried both chemical and mechanical options, that pretty much exhausts most common practical techniques available to the home hobbyist. Based on the thick, gloppy paint in the pics, my starting point would probably have been to find a coarse, non-clogging disc pad for a small grinder or random orbital sander that was not so aggressive that it would eat into the cabinets. If successful, work into finer grit abrasives.

Just trying to offer some cheerleading here from 1000's of miles away..... :D

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The suggestion of taking it to a professional is a good one - we have a couple of local furniture "strip-n-dip" places that we've used with success - paint-stripping by hand is a miserable job.

Otherwise, find the most dangerous chemical stripper that you can, and go to town - using all possible precautions, of course.

But I'd bet that you could get both cabinets stripped of paint for 50 bux, or so, and then you could have the fun of refinishing the veneer to your liking!

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The cabinets where picked up today by someone who also has a set AR4-xa with completely destroyed cabinets.

I've seen images and they are really destroyed :(

Looks like they where installed or mounted in or on something; holes everywhere and missing cabinet parts.

Technical they are in good working order, complete with fronts, so I'm happy with this ^_^

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