[Alan Douglas]

Refinishing is a lot of work, and often doesn't look any better than it did at first, though of course nobody wants to admit that, after investing all the time and effort.

It's actually less work to repair the damage. It seems very tedious while you're doing it, but overall it doesn't take any more time. I remember a 201X that a friend loaned me so I could do an on-the-air comparison with a Stromberg-Carlson from a few years later with the Acoustic Labyrinth speaker (the Philco won hands-down by the way). This thing was a disaster, with deep gouges in the finish. But, with the use of a touch-up marker to color the light wood, the rest of the surface was so smooth and shiny (you could shave in front of it) that from a few feet away you hardly noticed the damage.