How To Restore Speaker Grill Fabric
 

I have enclosed a picture of the grill fabric on my '60 RCA tv. Is there any way to restore or get rid of the dark appearance of the fabric in front of the speakers? Is it dust/dirt or is it actually discolored permanently? Any ideas would be appreciated. I would like to keep the original fabric if possible.

I wonder how that oxyclean stuff would work on it.

Funny you should ask. I am in the middle of trying an experiment on a Zenith 17" BW set with side speakers and the usual discolored cloth.

There was a previous VK thread which I cannot find as to how the cloth got to where it it. Smoking and grease frying are the usual suspects but the thread gave a great explination of the in-out action of a speaker and how it would eventually pull in all the dirt on it's inward pull. Makes sense.

Now what to do. I have had luck with Tilex Mildew Remover on some antique car upholstery and decided to give it a whirl.

What I did was spray the left side grille with the Tilex and let it dry. I did this with the cloth in place on the set. If I don't like it, I can unscrew them and either tint the cloth or change it completely.

What I got was mostly clean but looking for another spray. It is distinctly lighter than the other original side. Pix attached.

I am not sure if the bleach took me too far, but it can be darkened back with some coffee or same.

This is just an experiment on my part on a low value set but I had to try. Let us know if this is folly or something to look at,

Dave A

Pix attached to above
 

Now for the pix. Dave A

I've had good luck with leaving the cloth on the speaker board and spraying on carpet cleaner. I let it sit for a while, then rinse it off and dry it with a blow drier right away.
http://farm3.staticflickr.com/2705/4...98fd8509_m.jpg http://farm5.staticflickr.com/4026/4...629bb3a4_m.jpg

I did remove the cloth once on another set and let it soak in carpet cleaner + warm water in a sink. Unfortunately, it shrunk before I reattached it :(

I have had good luck with OxyClean. But the process is not easy. I remove the speaker and then the speaker board that the grill cloth is attached to. In most cases the cloth is stapled, and sometimes it is also glued to the speaker board. Obviously you first remove ALL the staples, and if the cloth is also glued, CAREFULLY peal the cloth off of the board.

Then I make up a strong solution of oxy clean in HOT water. Fold the grill cloth so it will fit into a shallow rectangular cake pan and fill the cake pan with the solution of OxyClean and water. Let the grill cloth soak for about 15 minutes, and slosh the crill cloth around in the mixture every few mintutes to help loosen the dirt and grime. AFter about 15 minutes, pour off the grungy soultion and do this all over again. You can rinse with clear cold water after the second soaking and rinse until the water runs clear.

Block the grill cloth on a bath towel to soak up the majority of the moisture. And while the grill cloth is still damp, you will need to re-staple the cloth to the speaker board. If you wait till the grill cloth is dry, you will find the grill cloth has shrunk and may be too small to cover the speaker board. So be sure to re-attach to the speaker board while it is still wet. AFter the grill cloth dries it will shrink making the grill cloth nice and tight on the speaker board.

The one caveat is that some grill cloths will also bleed the dye in the material and it is possible that you will lighten the color of the cloth. But most dark color grill cloths have been sun bleached anyhow by the time we get them so they are no longer the color they were when they left the factory anyhow. In some cases I have also re-dyed the grill cloth after cleaning, but it is hard to match the old colors and if there are metalic threads in the cloth, I don't recommend dying because the metalic threads have been known to take on the dye and you will lose the metalic effect those threads provide. Also many old grill cloths are woven from several colors of threads, and if you try to re-dye, you will lose the muti-color look of the grill cloth.

Thanks for all of the helpful advice. Outstanding website Bob!

Good results on those pictures. Another thing you can use is K2R which is a dry cleaning spray in a can. Shake up, contains chalk. Spray on and leave for half an hour. The dry cleaning fluid dissolves the dirt and the chalk absorbs it. When dry you just brush the chalk off with a brush or vacuum.

That is a fine looking Zenith. Is it restored?

I just got it last Saturday and have only cleaned the dust with my leaf blower. Whatta cloud of dust. Chassis is clean. Seller had powered it up so I did too. Got about 3/4 of a pic. CRT is medium strength. Everything needs Deoxit. 17A30 chassis. Pulling the chassis later today.

I've had great luck using a steam squirter ($20 @ walgreens) and then running a damp microfiber cloth over it. Of course you don't want to put much pressure on the unsupported areas since the cloth gets fragile with time. In those areas use the steam squirter to blow the dust and dirt out of that area into a more convenient area for pickup with the microfiber. Seriously it does work.