Mellotronists

'yello troniacs...

Here's one that I'm sure has come up before, maybe prior to my joining the
list, and I'd be eager to hear what this most esteemed group would have to
say. I'd like sugggestions on how to go about restoring the original white
finish to an M400.

I'm doing a cleanup/repair/re-align on an M400 belonging to a local musician
friend. It's a Sound Sales M400, that got spray-painted black long ago. He
said to me the other night "please make it white again, if you can!".

My thoughts:

Strip off the black spray paint, with a solvent TBD by experimentation
(thinner, remover, etc.).

Remove the guts.

Fill in rough spots with filler.

Have it painted (or maybe rent a sprayer and do it myself).

My questions:

What kind of paint was originally used? Laquer?

Should I even try to stick to the original type if there's something better?

Is there a standard name for the tone of white used? There are about 1,000
whites out there...

Anybody have a trick to removing the serial number tag so it can be
re-applied after a re-finish?

Tips on wood filler types or techniques specific to trons?

This is something I'm sure I could work my way through eventually, but I'd
love to hear stories and maybe get advice from others who may have done this
in the past.

- Gene

M400S #1023
M400S #1213
M400S #1289