Operation of this unit is rather odd:
To play 78RPM records:
Open the front slit-door and slide the record in. Close the door and it will play the record then stop when finished. Open the door and you can remove the record.
Condition:
This tabletop unit is in great condition. It is clean, looks great and works good. It wasn't always this way.
History: We got this unit from a local antique junk dealer. It was cheap for its terrible former condition.
Repair:
When we got this unit:
- Cabinet paint and veneer was split and peeling
- Mice waste turned entire phono into rust. An old record was rusted to the turntable.
- Nasty grille cloth
- Output transformer ripped off of speaker, missing parts
- So generally nasty that Des wouldn't let it into the house
First thing we did was to refinish the cabinet.
The original finish was chemically stripped. After drying for a couple weeks we applied a staining wax.
Veneer on one side was split. We used a long hollow needle and injected glue underneath then clamped it for a few days.
Then we applied 2-3 coats of varnish to seal and finish the cabinet. We masked appropriate sections and painted the top panel face.
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 Next we tackled the phonograph. A record was originally glued to the turntable with rust and mice waste, and we had to crack/break the record to remove it. Words can not describe the nastiness of this mechanism, and we had to completely disassemble it, strip it all down to bare metal, prime and paint it.
Once we had that unit completely rebuilt we worked on the electronics. We fixed the broken transformer back onto the speaker, and recapped the radio chassis. Luckily the steel chassis was not rusty.
The built-in antenna parts were missing so we made an antenna coil and fastened it into the back. The radio works good with an external ariel antenna.
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