Newbie here looking for advice jbl 250ti

Ally

New Member
Hello everyone, i inherited a set of jbl 250ti speakers and i'm looking to restore them. I have the speaker end of it handled, having new foams and one cone professionally installed. It's the cabinets that i'm leary about restoring and i really don't know what to do. They have some imperfections, chips on the base, and color loss where something was spilled down the side of one, and where i used goof off to get crayon marks off of the bottom of one. I'm afraid to just start sanding on them, and then trying to match the color to their original factory color seems like it will be difficult (i think they are teak???). I've included pictures on the post, so if you guys have some tips it would be much appreciated.20170314_185818.jpg 20170314_185803.jpg 20170314_185818.jpg20170314_185813.jpg 20170314_185825.jpg
 
You lucky dog! There are plenty of restoration threads here and some of the best minds and hands I've seen bringing really hard cases back to life. Welcome.
 
Are mine the oiled teak cabinets? And is the wood actually teak? My questions are going to be totally ameturer, so please bear with me lol
 
Are mine the oiled teak cabinets? And is the wood actually teak?
They look Teak to me and it's veneer, the only solid wood is the bull nose @ the 90 degree turns. I'm a furniture finisher by trade and you look like you pretty handy so I can guid you to do a easy and very nice finish.

You might want to buy a spray mask, and a box of latex gloves that can handle being in lacquer thinner.

The cabinets now have teak oil on them, you can wash it off fairly easy with lacquer thinner and lots of rags. Two gal. of thinner will be plenty, and you''ll want to do it outside for fresh air. I say lots of rags and thinner because your washing off the oil and as the rags get dirty you get new ones. When the rags don't get very dirty anymore, you have successfully washed 98% of the oil out of the wood and your done with the stripping.

The next step is to steam the wood....this will pull a bit more oil out but the main thing is to lift the dents and most the scratches. Clean rags, a bucket of water and a household iron is what you need. Taking a side at a time, wipe water on it with the rag, lay the wet rag flat on the wood and iron...lots of steam, do the entire surface of the outside of the cabinets. This swells the pours of the wood and soft dent will pop back up as it dries to the level of the rest of the veneer. It's only going to do so much though, don't over steam and expect it to lift very bad damage. As your rags and water get dirty doing this change them, as with the thinner and rages, keep getting rid of the dirty so your not just spreading it around.

Now one thing I would not!! do is sand them with a machine. People who don't finish or just have in their mind that they are going to do a supper sanding and make them perfect really only loose all character that took years to get. Just hand sand them with 180 grit, with the grain no need to over do it, they will get smooth enough.

We can talk about the rest of the step when you get to this point...
 
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If you don't want to undertake a big project, you might try Howard's Restor-A-Finish.

It accomplishes a LOT with little effort. "Cherry" looks like the color to choose.
 
Welcome to AK - lotsa JBL 250 fans in here
(I don't own any, but my friend Opimax does!)

Go to your user settings and set your hometown so maybe someone local can give you some tips!
 
Welcome to AK, this will be a fun project for you. Listen to 4-2-7, he knows his stuff. He has helped other members restore these before. Hopefully you inherited other gear that is just as nice to use with the JBLs.
 
Are mine the oiled teak cabinets? And is the wood actually teak? My questions are going to be totally ameturer, so please bear with me lol
I've seen the teak cabinets before.... yours do look to be teak-ish. I second Sqls suggestion of using a Howards Restore-a-finish product on them.... But I would choose "Golden Oak" color. Follow up with their Feed-n-wax. Then give it a couple of days and check it out. They will look marvelous, but if you don't like the look, you can always get more invasive. good luck with the project! I envy those.
 
Hello everyone, i inherited a set of jbl 250ti speakers and i'm looking to restore them. I have the speaker end of it handled, having new foams and one cone professionally installed.

As the cone kits for all the drivers in these are NLA (as far as I know, some odds and ends do pop up), it will be interesting to see how the recone matches up with the existing driver.
 
They look Teak to me and it's veneer, the only solid wood is the bull nose @ the 90 degree turns. I'm a furniture finisher by trade and you look like you pretty handy so I can guid you to do a easy and very nice finish.

You might want to buy a spray mask, and a box of latex gloves that can handle being in lacquer thinner.

The cabinets now have teak oil on them, you can wash it off fairly easy with lacquer thinner and lots of rags. Two gal. of thinner will be plenty, and you''ll want to do it outside for fresh air. I say lots of rags and thinner because your washing off the oil and as the rags get dirty you get new ones. When the rags don't get very dirty anymore, you have successfully washed 98% of the oil out of the wood and your done with the stripping.

The next step is to steam the wood....this will pull a bit more oil out but the main thing is to lift the dents and most the scratches. Clean rags, a bucket of water and a household iron is what you need. Taking a side at a time, wipe water on it with the rag, lay the wet rag flat on the wood and iron...lots of steam, do the entire surface of the outside of the cabinets. This swells the pours of the wood and soft dent will pop back up as it dries to the level of the rest of the veneer. It's only going to do so much though, don't over steam and expect it to lift very bad damage. As your rags and water get dirty doing this change them, as with the thinner and rages, keep getting rid of the dirty so your not just spreading it around.

Now one thing I would not!! do is sand them with a machine. People who don't finish or just have in their mind that they are going to do a supper sanding and make them perfect really only loose all character that took years to get. Just hand sand them with 180 grit, with the grain no need to over do it, they will get smooth enough.

We can talk about the rest of the step when you get to this point...

Some folks here are recommending the Howards restore-a-finish, how do you feel about trying that first? Seems like a lot less work and less time consuming... would a light sanding and wipe down with this stuff maybe be a good option? If it fails them get more invasive?

Could you just give me a quick rundown of what the next steps would be with your process? I appreciate your previous detailed response, but i just want to know how much more involved it's going to get after the first few steps of your process.
 
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