quote: "Yeah, I've seen that said about alcohol but haven't had that particular problem. I think that old japanning is pretty tough stuff."
More specifically,
alcohol is a solvent for shellac. Shellac is the clear coat (Japanning) on the old
black machines. Alcohol will remove the the clear coat on a
black machine. Later machines (and modern machines) that are painted other colors do not have a shellac clear coat.
You can refer to Glenn's post on repairing the clear coat on black machines at the top of this forum for further information.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shellac
bkay