[Fred Taylor]

I picked this Philco 118 cathedral up last November at the Dallas Radio auction convention and have been looking forward to working on it and started today . The cabinet was in decent shape other than some cracked veneer lifting and very bad finish which was original . The chassis is a deferent story with its rusted surface from mouse piss and rubber mounts dry rotted on tuning condenser, just a real mess, so I took it apart and lightly bead blasted chassis except for the cans which I will polish. I guess I will paint the chassis so it will look very nice and be protected from the elements for the next 100 years or so. 

[Fred Taylor]

More pics, I am guessing that the grill cloth is original so will have to fine something close or use a deferent pattern of some kind, any suggestions? . The speaker also is a real mess, was caked with mud dabbers and coil is open, trans I think is shot and cone is shot with open voice coil, there goes 150$ for parts replacement and repair will consist  of bead blast speaker frame and paint and put all together , it will be worth it having a restored k-12 speaker for this monster 8 tube cathedral

[mikethedruid]

Wow ! You have quite a job on your hands. Once you have the chassis bead blasted clean, you might consider having it plated rather than painting it. I think the grey ones were mostly zinc plated or galvanized steel. Best of luck on this project. I look forward to your future progress both here with the cabinet, and in the electronic section for the electronic restoration.

[Arran]

Fred;
  The chassis in your 118 looks much better then the one in my 3118, I think that yours would have cleaned up pretty decently with my standard TSP chassis wash at the height of summer, followed by a spot treatment of navel jelly or phosphoric acid for the bad spots. My chassis has some thick crust in places, thanks to rodent activity most likely, which will require the phosphoric acid treatment as I think that these are like a Philco 60 or 81 in that there are aluminum cans that you can't remove. One common failure point in these sets is the big wire wound resistor across the inside rear apron of the chassis, it's a bleeder resistor used for regulating the B+ supply, which this set needs because of the class A-B power output stage. The speaker voice coil could likely be rewound if need be, or it may just be a case of a broken lead wire.
Regards
Arran

[SteveG]

Fred,
Send me your bare chassis and I'll get it zinc plated for you!
Steve

[Arran]

Fred,
Send me your bare chassis and I'll get it zinc plated for you!
Steve

Steve;
  Ordinarily that would work for a chassis restoration, but with several Philco models there are aluminum shield cans that are permanently attached to the chassis. Rather then use threaded studs and nuts, clips, or even rivets, they inserted the cans into corresponding sized holes and then rolled the bottom edge over so you can't take them out. The coils inside these are attached to a bracket which is screwed onto the chassis from the underside and those can be removed for repair or replacement. Maybe someone can figure out how to remove these cans without destroying them, but then you would also have to figure out how to replace them? Perhaps I or someone else can experiment on a junk chassis.
Regards
Arran

[Fred Taylor]

Fred,
Send me your bare chassis and I'll get it zinc plated for you!
Steve

Steve;
  Ordinarily that would work for a chassis restoration, but with several Philco models there are aluminum shield cans that are permanently attached to the chassis. Rather then use threaded studs and nuts, clips, or even rivets, they inserted the cans into corresponding sized holes and then rolled the bottom edge over so you can't take them out. The coils inside these are attached to a bracket which is screwed onto the chassis from the underside and those can be removed for repair or replacement. Maybe someone can figure out how to remove these cans without destroying them, but then you would also have to figure out how to replace them? Perhaps I or someone else can experiment on a junk chassis.
Regards
Arran

Thanks Steve for the kind offer, if I knew electrical and how to read a schematic real good then I would gut it out and plate it instead of painting. That's a whole lot of work redoing all that , I wouldn't know how to put it all back together, my specialty is cabinet refinishing and repair although I do know the basics on the chassis,s and like Arran said those aluminum coil cans are pressed in and cant be removed with destroying them. Thanks again Steve

[SteveG]

Arran & Fred,
No problem. I wasn't sure if the chassis could be stripped to that point or not. If someone ever gets a chassis stripped to that point, I'd be happy to plate it to show what it'll look like. Understand that if it's pitted, it will still be pitted once plated, but the rust will be gone. If the chassis isn't rusted and pitted, it will be real nice.
Steve

[Fred Taylor]

The cabinet looks Bad to the bone I am very pleased with this philco cabinet. The cathedral radios are becoming more and more of my collection one reason being that I am running out of room for more consoles . I am thinking of building some nice wall shelving to display my cathedrals and tombstones. I think I hit it right on the money with the toneing but I sure I will here something from Ron regarding this cabinet. The speaker coil is open so I am going to send it out for a rewind and then have it reconed, in the mean time I will be working on chassis, the knobs I believe to be the hex nobs and I do have a good set of those. 

[Nathan Slingerland]

Wow Fred - that cabinet looks simply amazing!

Incredible job. My 118 will need to be refinished at some point and I would be proud if it looks half as good as yours!

[Nathan Slingerland]

And.. if you don't mind, can you give any more details on the toner colors and steps you took?

[Nathan Slingerland]

BTW - this is the set of knobs that are on mine:

   

One large, three small hex knobs.

[Fred Taylor]

Hello Nathan, I had used Mohawk medium walnut stain on cabinet except for the front center section and the butter fly wings. The center and wings were left raw and were toned with light golden oak spray can toner by Mohawk. Grain filler was used as all my cabinets are. Also I mite add that the front panels minis wings and center were toned darker along with the bottom moldings and the arch had a little fade out using extra dark walnut using my airbrush. Hope that helps you. Let me know if there's any thing else.

[Eliot Ness]

That cabinet is gorgeous Fred, absolutely gorgeous!

[Nathan Slingerland]

Hello Nathan, I had used Mohawk medium walnut stain on cabinet except for the front center section and the butter fly wings. The center and wings were left raw and were toned with light golden oak spray can toner by Mohawk. Grain filler was used as all my cabinets are. Also I mite add that the front panels minis wings and center were toned darker along with the bottom moldings and the arch had a little fade out using extra dark walnut using my airbrush. Hope that helps you. Let me know if there's any thing else.

OK great!

Just to be sure which products you used - are these right?
And it was stain rather than lacquer for most of the cabinet?


Cabinet (other than front center section and butterfly wings)
Wiping Wood Stain, M545-02054
http://www.mohawk-finishing.com/catalog_...ictNbr=177

Center and wings:
Ultra Classic Toner Aerosol, M100-0415
http://www.mohawk-finishing.com/catalog_...ictNbr=171

What product do you use with the air brush? How commonly do you use an airbrush for cabinet refinishing?

Thank you very much for the info.