So I managed to bag myself a very cheap Sharp VZ2000 for the ridiculous price of £30 on ebay as it was collection only and listed really badly with rubbish pics and a vague description.  But as it was sooo cheap I reckoned it was worth a punt.

It was the sellers gran's and had always been in her house, never moved, which is a good sign.  But clearly gran was a very heavy smoker and didn't take her house cleaning too seriously.  So instead of the usual silver colour it was more of a brown as shown below before I did anything to it.

You wouldn't want to touch those keys!

You can barely see through the tuner window its so dirty inside and out.

This is the inside from where I removed the turnable, everything is really dusty and coated with tar.

This is the side of the speaker box from the inside...the clear bit at the bottom is the proper colour from where I removed the tape. This gives you an idea of how bad it is as this is an internal surface!!

After many many hours of scrubbing this is what the area below the deck looks like now!  Seems the coating of tar has acted like a protective coating!

Heres the main front after the cleaned speakers have been put back in again.

I will of course post full pics once its all sorted and try and do some outdoors so you can see how well its come out!  The red speakers are like new, no fading at all, not that you can see that properly in this pic.

I've got as far as rebelting the turntable so that now spins but not got the arms moving yet.  Cassette deck runs but is barely audible so will need to fettle that...was tricky to get to the record bar without taking all the workings out so may not have got enough contact cleaner in there.  Might try realigning the head instead as thats easier to sort if thats the cause.

Works perfectly on line in and radio and sounds pretty good to me tho obviously lacking in bass.  Got an order in to Bredgeo for the sliders and top bloke Lee/Stereomad is sending me a replacement tuning knob.

So its gonna be good when its all done!!!!!!!!

not sure i could of took that beast on in that filthy condition

that's gotta be one of the dirtiest smoked out boxes iv'e ever seen.

that old lady must of had serious breathing difficulties judgeing by the look of the pics.

now the positives eh you've done a great job so far Si and i take my hat off to you for your patience

it's looking grand now and i can't wait to see her finished, well done

Thanks Lee!!

Well I've never backed out of an ebay deal plus I could see it was all there just dirty. Tested it at the sellers and it powered up and radio worked etc so to be honest I grabbed it and ran off laughing manically to myself at bagging such a bargain!

I'm surprised if gran had a long and healthy life as its absolutely the foulest and dirtiest beast I've ever seen and I've put 11 hours into cleaning it so far!!...I must be mad.  I just love taking something that looks like a piece of non-working crap and getting it back to its former glory...really satisfying!

Can't wait to get some vinyl spinning!!!!!

without a doubt you got a real bargain Si, and i agree there is nothing like giving them a good scrub and seeing the fruits of your labour

From the Looks of that box, she more likely was a chain smoker, or someone that stay their? Something that sure have been stated in the listing, or a good closeup picture, so buyers knows what they are getting into to.   

The standard cigarette contains almost 4,000 different chemicals, chemicals include: nicotine and arsenic, both of which are classified as poisons; methane, which is commonly found in fuel; ammonia, which can be found in cleaning products; carbon monoxide. Cigarette smoke also essentially kills the air sacks in the lungs called "alveoli", which cannot grow back. Once they are gone, their gone!! These air sacks, named alveoli, are important for transferring oxygen into a person's bloodstream. A smoker will have harder time doing simple things as breathing and doing physical activity.

To be fair part of the reason I bid on it was that the listing was so rubbish I reckoned it would put most people off...I could see from the poor pics it was dirty but a bit of dirt aint a problem, i'm not afraid of a bit of hard graft me .  I'm strangely drawn to poor ebay listings as the good listings go for too much money!    I knew I didn't know what I was getting into, thats half the fun/gamble!

I don't smoke and never have for those reasons and reckon chain smokers shouldn't be allowed nice boxes!

amazing clean up man.

Greeeeat clean up Northener.

Nicotine and tar is really hard to get off a box.

I d like to see some pics of before and after.

You are doing a great job so far.

Seems the coating of tar has acted like a protective coating!

A priceless quote Northerner! And Doctors say it's bad to smoke...ppphhfft shows you what they know

Absolutely!...honestly its worked like a charm, there's barely a mark on the thing, the paintworks looks like new once I've cleaned all the crap off it

Hopefully I'll have time to have a go at the turntable tonight to see if i can get the arms moving then it'll be on with the vinyl!!!

We need action pics!

Great clean up!!!

nice one Si, the fruits of your labour have paid off big time, can't wait for pics, be sure to post up plenty a huge congrats once again

Yep, it does look rather nice now, so rewarding when a piece of vintage tech goes from Zero to Hero

Chuffed to bits with the way its come out and I can vouch for the belt from eBay seller microphonics as it fits perfectly and the turntable spins perfectly.  I hope you guys like it as its taken probably 14 hours work!!  

Even the back has had a major bit of scrubbing!

You can touch those keys now without catching something!

It appears the tuner dial is see-through after all!

and with the new tuner knob from my good pal Lee/Stereomad

What do you reckon then guys and gals?

 "wow" looks stunning mate, hard to grasp that it's the same box!!

you've done her proud Si, and the pics are of great clarity, real justice done there great stuff

Ha ha! Cheers Lav.  The missing sliders are on the way from Bredgeo just as soon as they've set properly so then it really will be

what's a couple of missing sliders after that transformation, nothing id'e say

still it will complete her fully and then you will be even more pleased with her.

congrats again mate well done

now you can tell us: you had 2 vz, a filthy one and a minty. you showed us the former, but this is the latter 

Wow that a good restoration! Look almost like it was new, nice attention to detail.

That`s dedication for you. Superb job. This, is what i miss most .

Freshshshshsh  !!

absolutely fantastic job !

Detailed pics are awesome.

looks the part now

Had a brief bit of sunshine so hauled it out for a daylight shot to show off those lovely red woofers

I think you bought a new box Northerner.....I'm calling you out on this one

What an oustanding cleaning job!

I guess the secret to keeping your boxes sealed from time is to coat them with years of nicotine and tar!

Scrubbed up well didn't it!

I'm thinking of taking up chain smoking when using my boxes just to preserve them!   Take a hell of a lot of fags to preserve them like this one though and I'd likely pop my clogs before they were coated to this degree!!

gotta say the yellow vinyl compliments the red woofers greatly, looks sweet Si

cheers mate!...in the bright sunlight its a colourful box so I thought I'd add a little more

crap music on the vinyl tho (from some 80's film called Lemon Popsicle!?)...only got it cos it was yellow

you guys are absolutely amazing at restoration. i wish i had even half the skills to do this! bought for almost nothing and now worth a million bucks........not quite but that's how it looks anyway.

Cheers

I came into this hobby with zero skills in this sort of stuff...I just read a lot of forum threads, asked questions, had a go, asked more questions and so on...you get braver as time goes on.

The VZ was a big job just because its such a large and relatively complex box, this one was also absolutely disgustingly dirty. It sits gleaming now and gets regular usage as I love a bit of vinyl

You did a hell of a job! It looks absolutely spectacular.

I won one of these beauties today & will be asking you some tips if that's ok.

looks awesome, nice job!!!