Thanks for the info.

Unfortunately, I am not able to get everything off, ie the black stuff. It's as though someone used a black stain to cover up areas that had black paint chip off. Now there are areas on the soft wood, especially on the upper and lower ribbing, that have black wood, and it is into the grain. I don't know what I am going to do there.

It's almost like certain places had black shoe polish applied in spots. It's a real bummer.

You might try a wood bleach. This is a liquid that is applied to wood to remove stains prior to final staining, so the final finish doesn't end up blotchy. If the black is just paint, this probably won't help at all, but it's certainly worth a try.

You can probably find it at woodworking sites or stores.

this looks to me like a 1930s rig due to the styling of cabnet -great find-looking good -good restore in progress-year of my guess 1936.

No, it's a 1941 model, most likely made in the few remaining months of 1940. That is why it has the "41" in the code. You can tell the model number years, with most Philco products back then, by that prefix number. In that series are the "40-180", "41-280", "42-380", and after the war, "46-480". Basically, they all look pretty much alike. If you go to the PhilcoRadio.com site, and check out the "Gallery", you will see what I mean.

Thankyou for the info-I have an old Philco cathedral it powers up and the speaker hums-it will promt me to give it another go-have the caps for the ones inside -was a few years ago that I worked on it and have left it alone .

My philco is 1932-33

Can you take a picture of it and post it here?