It is my pleasure to help Sunflowerzz, thank you. P;ease feel free to ask if you need any help.
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I have so many questions about finishes. Glenn, you've been very helpful. Thanks so much. I have a couple of other machines that I'm working on. One has a beige enameled finish and the other is a gorgeous old machine that appears to have been lacquered over and is now blistering.

The beige one is having its chips and scratches filled in with Testors enamel. How should it be finished off? With a clear coat of...what? Or, should it just be buffed with polishing compound?

The old machine (1890s) has some pretty amazing decals that I don't want to disturb. There is some blistering on the bed and at the crease where the bed meets the neck. The other parts of the machine look pretty good. I'll have to take a closer look at it though.

Perhaps these topics need to be started up in a new thread. I don't want to hijack, or get readers confused about the shellac process with these processes.

I have Qs about cabinets and cases too, but that is definitely another thread...LOL. :)

Thanks, Cindy

We really need to tap into Grant's expertise when it comes to the non-black sewing machines and their finish. We do have a thread about the finishes on the cabinets and Joe has posted info on the cases.

Yoo, hoo...Grant? Where are you?

You may have to go to Grant15clone's profile and then read what all he has posted. http://www.quiltingboard.com/members...ne-u73934.html I think he may have a blog or facebook as well.

Glenn please help, I purchased a lovely Centennial Featherweight on ebay it was in pretty good condition but it was filthy. I started to use nephta and as soon as the rag with the nephta touched the surface the shellac reacted and became gold flaked, I looked at the rag thinking something may have come off on it and the rag was perfectly clean. I tried in other areas and the same thing happened. We tried getting rid of the gold flake with compound, shoe polish, WD-40 and nothing worked. Do you have any idea what happened and what I should do next???? I only had this machine for a few hours when this happened. I will try and attach pictures.
Thank you in advance for any help you can give me.
Sharon
NH

Smorris
I have never seen this before, it appears that the Fw was painted to cover up this problem and the naptha cleaned off this bad paint. It was not protected with a clear coat of shellac. I want you to take sewing machine oil and soft rag(t-shirt) and clean the gold flaking area to see if it turns black again. Then test a spot with the french polish tech in my tut and let me know what the results are. Naptha will not react with shellac so there is something else going on here. I see scratches that was in the finish to. I think this problem was hidden by someone to make it look pretty. I see the decals are in good shape so it had some shellac over them. Let me. Stay away from the decals for now.
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I also clean with sewing machine oil first to see if it needs anything else to clean the finish and sometimes sewing machine oil is all you need. Always test your chemicals in an area that will not be seen to see how it will work.

Thanks for your quick response, did what you said and we'll see what it looks like in the morning, I'll send you a picture. Looks good wet but when it dries out I'm afraid the gold will pop out again, we'll see.
Sharon
NH

WOW, shut the door, this is amazing!!!!! I oiled all the black the whole machine rubbed it in for 5 min or so with my fingers. Most of the black disappeared. Than on tje back of the column under the spool pin I used the french polish on a small section. You can see in the pic where it's still a bit rough, but I am very pleased with the results. It really went from boat anchor to wow in a matter of a few minutes.
SO how do I finish her up? A light french polish all over or thank my lucky strs and leaver her. Or Do I do any other top coat???
Again Thank you so much
Sharon
NH