[Arran]

  I would attempt to either restore it or pass it on to someone who will, it's nice, clean, complete, and free of butchering or rust. If you want to build a bar out of a console radio just ask for an empty cabinet, I think that most of the people on here have run into at least one that landed in their lap that they could never find a chassis for, or did not want to deal with. In terms of the cost of capacitors, well maybe $40-50 worth at the top end, depending on where you get them, and resistors too, I get mine from WJOE radio but Bob's, Radiodaze, and even Mouser are good sources for parts, Mouser for resistors and electrolytic caps. I don't really recommend disconnecting the front end and just using it as an audio amp, without the other tubes connected the voltages coming out of the power supply will be way to high greatly shortening the life of the tubes. While there were a fair number of these made the 38-116 was the best Philco radio that you could buy in that model year other then the flagship 38-690, which had 20 tubes as opposed to the 116's 15. Leaving the power output stages aside for a moment, these RF sections of these radios are about as close as you can get to a communications receiver like a Hallicrafters in the form of a living room radio. The biggest expense will be in how much time you put into it, the parts, other then some of the tubes, is pretty negligible, but at least you can leave the cabinet alone.
Regards
Arran