Beogram 4002 (Type 5513): Restored Keypad and Plinth, a New Hood and Installation of the Beolover Commander Remote Control

A few weeks ago I completed the functional restoration of a Beogram 4002 (Type 5513). This post reports the work that was done. This is how the unit looked like at that point:

While performing like new again, there were two main cosmetic issues: The plinth had a strangely bleached area upfront. Also the keypad had the usual damage from touching the coating with bare fingers. The acids and fats from the skin seem to have adverse effects on the coating material:

My customer decided to let me replace this keypad with a refurbished one. Unfortunately, the plastic inserts that clamp the RPM panel down had cracks. This is a relatively common issue, causing the RPM panel to pop out occasionally. The cracked parts are shown on the right:

On the left are replacement parts that have become recently available at the beoparts-shop. They are exact reproductions of the original shape. All one needs to do is to remove the springs from the original parts and clip them into the replacements. This is shown here:

This shows the new parts installed on the left

and right side of the keypad frame:

This shows the restored keypad and the Beolover Commander Remote Module installed.

This shows the cosmetically restored Beogram. The plinth is the original plinth. The bleached area has completely vanished! Very awesome. This work was done by Vintage Hifi Nut. I am really impressed by his work. This plinth looks like new, like it never happened!

Upfront you can see the Apple Remote that can now control this deck via the small IR receiver that pokes out below the plinth. You can see it in the photo to the left of the remote if you look carefully.

I decided to celebrate this successful cosmetic restoration by playing a recently acquired CTI record from 1974, "Freddie Hubbard / Stanley Turrentine With Ron Carter, Herbie Hancock, Jack DeJohnette, Eric Gale – In Concert Volume One" (CTI 6044). Of course, this record was thoroughly cleaned on a CleanerVinyl ProXL System combined with a UC-3360 multi-frequency ultrasonic cleaner before listening. This restored the sound of this record to its original glory.

The final step of this project was to install the new hood. It also came from the Beoparts-shop in Denmark! These hoods are manufactured via injection moulding, exactly like the original hoods. This means there are no seams like you find them on previously available hoods made by fusing laser cut panels together. These hoods look exactly like the original ones.

This shows the new hood together with a new aluminum trim:

I used my recently developed alignment jigs to get the strip precisely centered. I usually align the strip, then make a small pencil mark across strip and blue tape that I put on to protect the pristine plexiglass while working on it:

The pencil mark allows an easy alignment once the glue has been applied and things need to proceed quickly.

The next step was to remove the hinge from the original scratched hood. In order to get to the screws one needs to lift the sides of the aluminum trim. I usually do that with a razor blade that I carefully insert between trim and hood:

This shows the removed hinge:

Then I bolted the hinge into the new hood and applied the aluminum strip:

Beautiful! This Beogram is ready for duty again and will soon be reunited with its owner!