Originally Posted by
sewred
If you plan on selling her down the road cleaning her up will reduced the value greatly.
Yeah, I'm going to have to say no to this one. For extremely rare machines (and I mean RARE) that is true. If the machine has a history that the patina reflects it is true. But for 98% of the old machines out there. conservation cleaning is a good thing. Even museums do conservation on the super rare machines to arrest rust growth and prevent future deterioration. (I sold one to a museum on the east coast for over $4000 that is in that process right now)
Machines like this W&G are really not very rare. There are over 200 listed for sale in the US right now...... In this case a clean functional machine is FAR more desirable than a rusty dirty one. There is even a person on the big auction site that is stripping, repainting, and re-decaling old machines and those are selling. Mostly to folks who are not collectors of course, but they have significant value on the market non the less.