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Garrard 401 re-painting

awl

awl

pfm Member
I have a Garrard 401 which I'd like to get repainted. The deck is in good mechanical order, but both the chassis and platter have suffered to some extent from being in stored in a loft. Does anyone have any experience of doing this and/or recommendations please? I should add that I'd like to get as close as possible to the original colour and finish.
Thanks, Andrew
 
I just had my 401 painted.
I stripped it and had it vapour blasted
I took the deck to a place that matches car paint and they matched the colour and made up some enamel lacquer for me. I got it sprayed by a car painter, 3 coats of lacquer and 3 coats of clear .
Looks great
 
That's interesting, thanks. I hadn't heard of vapour blasting, but it sounds less likely to cause damage to the alloy casting compared to other types of blasting process. Did you repaint the Garrard face plate to the right of the controls as well? This looks more tricky as there's a chrome (or similar) finish to the raised lettering. The platter also needs refinishing on mine - here's a pic of its current condition:

Garrard401_0143.jpg
 
I had my Garrard fully serviced and re-finished by Ray Clark at CTC. They shot blast the chassis and finish it by powder coating. https://www.classichifi-shop.co.uk/servicing-page/

When I took mine to him, it's an early flush strobe window model, it was a "greyish" colour and he said that when it left the factory it would have been chocolate brown! He also said that at that time there was also the option to have it finished the 301 cream colour. Guess what I went for?
 
I had Ray at CTC refurbish my platter and then I had a balancing expert here in Auckland balance it to 600rpm, I also purchased a full replacement face plate (with chrome knobs) off Ray as well. Mine is a very early push button strobe 401 and it was in pretty sad condition when I got it, I paid $600 NZD (around 300 quid) for it over here and totally rebuilt it using the CTC rebuild kit. If I can work out how to post a photo I will. Also once you strip the table down give the paint a cut and polish (like a car) before you get the paint matched, the factory paint has a bit of depth and sparkle that comes up with a cut.
 
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I have gone down the path of an SPH bearing and Audiosilente idler wheel as well (factory units are tucked away), I am just waiting for Carl Ellis to finish my plinth (should be soon) and SME have just sent my 3012R back to me after a full factory rebuild, I had SME rebuild a 3009 S2 fixed headshell for me last year and I am going to run that in the left hand position on the plinth with the 3012R on the right.
 
I had good success painting the face plate, using good quality masking tape over the letters. It takes a bit of patience but surprisingly easy to cut round each letter to leave it masked off. Any imperfections in the masking wasn't a problem as the unwanted paint scraped off easily with a craft knife.

The platter, I sprayed with Matt black without masking it. Then span the platter against a very fine sanding block to remove the paint from and polish the strobe markings.
 
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Unless you're an accomplished refinisher/painter, I'd remove all the mechanicals and send the baseplate to a professional refinisher who has a track record with the 401. Most of the labor in restoration is taking everything to bits!
 
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