Remember that NASTY, filthy, rusty, mouse skeleton marquee fixture? It looks a bit better now! The lamp holders were soaked in rust remover from home depot (prolly the same thing as evaporust) results were AMAZING! Ive been soaking all kinds of bits and pieces in it since the lamp holders came out looking pretty good compared to what they were. They still have pitting, but im happy to be able to use original parts. The outer fixture I sand blasted, primered and painted with appliance epoxy paint. I did the first coat of paint and it was looking good, but I decided to do a second coat, and lightly sanded the first coat. I learned the hard way. DO NOT sand epoxy paint for a second coat! It cracked and bubbled and looked like hell. I had to take it back to bare metal and start over. Let me tell you, epoxy paint is NOT easy to remove! My sand blaster didn't want to even think about removing it in a timely manner, so I resorted to scuffing it up with sand paper and dumping naptha on it, and then using a heat gun to get it good and sticky and scraping it off with a paint scraper. I came out good the second time around.
Then I dug through my box of long dead, hacked and incomplete wiring harnesses and found the closest color match I could find for wiring the individual lamp sockets. Turned out pretty decent. It took about an hour and a half to cut, strip, and solder all of them together. Going to get new screws to mount them.
I also finished the coin door. Outside looks good (no pics of it yet) not too sure of the inside yet. It just doesn't have that clean look to it. There is minor corrosion o some of the guts. I haven't decided if im going to srip the guts out of it and try to scrub them or just let it go. Ill save that decision for last after everything else is one.