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Craigslist bonanza!

Started by Pourme, April 28, 2016, 01:18:18 PM

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Pourme

Quote from: WEBellSystemChristian on April 28, 2016, 11:15:41 PM
What a great lot! The Pekin Red alone is worth $400!

Definitely enter it for FOtM! ;) :o

Thanks Christian...I'm organizing the post as we speak. :)
Benny

Panasonic 308/616 Magicjack service

Dan/Panther

Great find, I paid twice that for my Peking Red 302.
darn.

D/P

The More People I meet, The More I Love, and MISS My Dog.  Dan Robinson

Pourme

Quote from: Dan/Panther on April 29, 2016, 12:17:10 PM
Great find, I paid twice that for my Peking Red 302.
darn.

D/P

I couldn't believe my eyes when i saw the ad with that red 302 (304) on that table...when I called and he still had it I stopped breathing!...Ha!
Benny

Panasonic 308/616 Magicjack service

oldguy

I glad for you Benny, great find. A little jealous but glad one of us on the forum got it. I agree it's hard to believe it was on craigslist for 25 days. I check craigslist daily & rarely find anything. 
Gary

Pourme

#34
Quote from: unbeldi on April 28, 2016, 02:04:33 PM
Yes, it is Pekin Red, dash code 20.

It looks in nice condition, this red plastic polishes up to very nice gloss very easily. Nice to get the red mask number card too.
The ivory seems in similar good condition.  The brownish spots are mold that develops predominantly on the ivory plastic, but it also polishes off well.  Don't hesitate to use something like Fantastic kitchen cleaner on it for a first cleaning. It contains some bleaching agents too, and will give great first results, at least so you can evaluate how much yellowing the surface has undergone. If too much, it can be easily bleached with house-hold bleach, Chlorox.

The Ivory set definitely needs the bleach treatment you described in this post:


Offline unbeldi
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Re: 1955 Ivory 500:What a difference a day makes... along with some chemistry
« Reply #6 on: September 04, 2013, 12:00:39 PM »
Quote
I actually did very little myself, and I certainly wasn't going to get into heavy sanding labor on Labor Day!

Initially I scrubbed the plastics clean with a toothbrush and plenty of Fantastic kitchen cleaner--from the makers of "Scrubbing Bubbles", as the ad says.
Getting the surfaces mechanically clean and removing any oily films, residues, even fingerprints is a prerequisite to chemical treatment for achieving an even color.

For the treatment I simply bathed the plastics in a solution of approximately 30-40% Clorox bleach in hand-hot water. The elevated temperature accelerates the chemistry. Increasing temperature by only 10 degrees Celsius doubles the rate of many reactions, although I am not sure that Arrhenius' law is an accurate model for this kind of chemistry, but the chemistry seems simple enough.

I continued the bathing until the surfaces were homogeneously colored as some unexposed surfaces inside the handset and inside the housing. All in all I used perhaps 7/8th of a 121 fl oz. bottle of Clorox in three baths. I tried leaving the baths in the daylight sun as much as possible, but Monday was kind of overcast and rainy. I estimate that the plastic parts were exposed to the solution up to 20 hours or so in case of the housing. Handset, caps, and dial face much shorter.

The final procedure before reassembly was a couple rounds of polishing with Novus #2 and #1 which brought about better gloss.


I have the main body striped down and the handset..almost.....The wires are very suborn...I don't fee comfortable pulling on them, (pic to follow)

Can I bleach the handset with the wires in tact? I love this piece and want to do it right.







Benny

Panasonic 308/616 Magicjack service

Pourme

Hanset pic
Also will the stamped dates survive the bleaching in tact?
Benny

Panasonic 308/616 Magicjack service

WEBellSystemChristian

The stamps should survive a dip in Bleach (if you use liquid bleach) but don't wipe a towel over the stamp after you bleach it (let the stamped area air dry)!
Christian Petterson

"Whether you think you can or think you can't, you're right" -Henry Ford

unbeldi

Quote from: Pourme on May 01, 2016, 06:29:40 PM
Hanset pic
Also will the stamped dates survive the bleaching in tact?
I doubt it.  Even if some remains, the color will likely be much faded.  That's what bleach is supposed to do.

So, I would not expose them to the bleach, but cover them with petroleum jelly (Vaseline) for protection.
Metal corrodes very quickly in bleach. It forms a thick fluffy layer of oxides very quickly. Remove the silver plated contacts and cover the screw sockets embedded into the plastic with petroleum jelly too.  If the wires can't be pulled out (likely), also cover the spade tips.


Doug Rose

Agreed....Vaseline over the dates or they will be gone. 50/50 bleach and water, they may take a few dips to get it right....Doug
Kidphone

Pourme

Thanks guys! How did people restore phones before the Internet?...
Benny

Panasonic 308/616 Magicjack service

andre_janew

I think it helped to get a telephone repairman among your friends!

Pourme

I have cleaned the Pekin Red 304 somewhat. I haven't sanded or even used the Novis 3 on it, although there are a few places one may say need it. In my next post I will show close ups of the worst places on the device. I added a white cord for now just to test it until I locate a more suitable cord.

As I go through the lot I will post pics here...The Ivory 304 is in the process of basic clean up now.

I will start with a "before"
Benny

Panasonic 308/616 Magicjack service

Pourme

There is a barely noticeable crack on the front panel. I think someone may have over tightened the front screw? The handset took a beating at some point. Bad news from a boy/girl friend? The "crack" looks odd. I don't think I will try to sand the damage on the peak of the top of the hand set because it would result in a deformed character line. What you see is the result of a 66 year old telephone, it's called "character".

Final pic is Pekin and her little sis, Ivory in the middle of her clean up....
Benny

Panasonic 308/616 Magicjack service

WEBellSystemChristian

Holy cow, that looks beautiful!!!
Christian Petterson

"Whether you think you can or think you can't, you're right" -Henry Ford

unbeldi

#44
Quote from: Pourme on May 03, 2016, 10:59:39 AM
There is a barely noticeable crack on the front panel. I think someone may have over tightened the front screw? The handset took a beating at some point. Bad news from a boy/girl friend? The "crack" looks odd. I don't think I will try to sand the damage on the peak of the top of the hand set because it would result in a deformed character line. What you see is the result of a 66 year old telephone, it's called "character".

Final pic is Pekin and her little sis, Ivory in the middle of her clean up....

Whatever crack there might be, it is not discernible on the picture, I don't think.
Sometimes tiny cracks can be somewhat cured with tiny drops of acetone applied to the crack, the idea being that some of the solvent penetrates the crack and welds it.  But then you have to be prepared to let it dry for some time, a few days at least, to polish the area. While acetone dissolves the plastic very quickly, it takes a long time to escape a solidified crack. On a bigger scale than just a hairline fracture, I have found even after a year some bulk contraction was still in progress due to solvent evaporation and I had to re-sand and polish areas.

Hairlines are quite common in these plastic sets.  After 60+ years, probably always even in perfectly intact sets, the plastic develops enormous internal stress, which can, and often does result in cracking.  Often it can be seen in warping of the shell, and especially in the rear when the line from corner to corner is a slight arc, as if the shell were split in the center where the cord exit is.  As a result, hairlines develop in the rear surface below the cradle hand-hold.  They are most visible in the ivory sets, where they show up as brownish lines, they are much harder to spot on the darker colored sets.  Handset caps are another example where they are vey common.

Your sets look beautiful. I think the ivory and the red are really prettiest of these.  Having the correct number card mask in the finger wheel, is the ultimate detail.