[Fred Taylor]

I am not a big fan of "interpretive" jobs on radios, but that is a fine job and a nice looking set! 

Bravo Zulu!!!    

Fred, what you really should do is find an original ebony finish '30s Zenith and do the same thing.  AND then take it to the next VRPS meet. I think this would result in another award. 

I don't use the paste-type compounds when finishing my sets, as it is such a pain in the _______ (rhymes with "grass") to clean the remnants of the paste from the joints, etc... Instead I either dry/wet sand with finer and finer grades of paper to #2000 grit, OR I use pumice/paraffin  oil and then rottenstone/paraffin oil.  I use soapy water when I wet sand. Dick Oliver, bless him, taught me that during one of his many (many, many, many) lectures to me. 

Funny thing... Dick would start asking questions about what I was doing on a project. He would keep asking them until I gave the "wrong" answer, and then the lectures would start. IF I kept answering "rightly," he would change the subject to "are you still using stain and poly finish on your sets?" (I had not transitioned to lacquer back then.) 
THEN the lecture would start. 

BUT thanks to Dick and Henry Harmony, a Great American, I did eventually go to lacquer finishes and have never looked back.   

Old Henry has a original ebony zenith that he may have me redo, I really was going to do mine in a satin finish but a number of people talked me into piano high gloss finish. That model zenith are as common as dirt and this one was messed up bad enough not to go back to factory because all the photo finish was shot. At least I didnt do a shabby chick or butcher job on it, I could have painted it army green ( olive drab ) and said it belonged in the U.S. armys air corps dining hall.