You all know what I mean - that great looking gold flecked stuff. Does anybody know where I can get it? Love to hear some info.

Cheers

It's not as easy to locate as it seems but a good source, when available, is stereo speakers from the 1960s and 1970s that have been put on council clean-up piles. A lot of this cloth, with or without flecks is suitable for many radios, particularly timber ones.

The big problem is that not a lot of clean ups in metro Sydney yield this sort of stuff any more. These most often include old kitchen cabinets, whitegoods and Chinese-made fitness gimmicks from home shopping shows - why to people waste good money on this garbage? Seriously, if you have rocky abs or 20 inch guns after the age of 50 then it's only good genes allowing it, not by using this crap.

I was driving through Cattai, Maraylya and Pitt Town over the weekend and saw many huge old fashioned clean up piles - the sort that could once be found in metro Sydney. I didn't see any radios or anything else of particular interest to me but it may be worth a look if the piles haven't been swept up yet.

One other thing though, as it is semi rural area you may want to watch how you go. A lot of people out there are a bit fussy and some do look like the Swamp People from Channel 1 - weird haircuts, eyes and teeth missing, etc, and they look game enough to hunt and eat crocodiles if they were swimming in the Hawkesbury River. At best, leave piles as they are found. I think generally speaking, people don't mind their piles being raided providing no further mess is made and no noise is made.

If in doubt, it may be worthwhile to ask the landlord too. I once had to return a gearbox I found on a clean up pile in nearby Riverstone around 25 years ago - it wasn't a clean up pile! Fortunately the owner was understanding. At the end of the day what may well seem like crap to one person is indeed someone else's treasure.

Evatco in QLD has a range of essentially guitar amp grille cloth that might suit:

http://www.evatco.com.au/product-category/grill-cloth/

And there are US sites, such as:

http://www.radiodaze.com/grille-cloth/

http://www.richmonddesignsinc.com/grille_cloth_product_page

https://www.tubesandmore.com/products/grill_cloth_tolex_piping

These people might be of use, I have got speaker cloth from them and they are very helpful if you contact them. Quality is good.

Postage is quite high but if you get the cloth sent folded it is very reasonable.

http://www.ebay.com.au/usr/q-masters?_trksid=p2060353.m2749.l2754

Thanks to all for your help

Guys, think out of the square! It is only furniture material and a haberdashery store like Lincraft has all sorts of weights and weaves and plain to bling flecked cloths. I am sure the radio manufacturers purchasing department did not go the "speaker cloth factory" they went to mill that produced heavy furniture cloth and maybe ordered the type, weight and dye colour and any trace of fleck colour. I'm not paying out of the nose for so called "speaker cloth" when I can go the Spotlight and find something that looks and feels the same and a yard costs a little. But then again if you are a 100 point restoration man that has to be historically correct then I guess you have to have the "real" cloth?? Have a look at a "Lincraft" or similar and see what they have.
Fred.

Not entirely correct, as the weave was made to order by quality radio manufacturers.
I suppose later many would have used standard weave material.
I have raided my wife 's quilting stash on several occasions .
JJ

Have a look at a "Lincraft" or similar and see what they have.

I did that recently looking for speaker cloth for a resto. Found nothing suitable, and I hated hanging around in that place, too, but as the Americans say "Your mileage may vary".

I had a 1962 JVC Nivico Radiogram where the complete front of it was covered in Gold fleck grill cloth, !but stained badly ,i searched for months trying to find something that looked right,,i went to every type of shop I could think of trying to get it or a repo of it,, In the end ibought some in the usa from a place that sold it for Fender type Amps etc etc.

Anyway I put it on and I hated it , To me new repo cloth never looks right ,so I got the old stained grill cloth and I bought some $2 cheap wool wash and I washed it in the bath with this cheap wool wash, it came up great , no stains,so while it was still damp I put it back on the radiogram and when it was dry it was all tight again and look great.

You know sometimes in life we sell things we shouldn't, ,boy I regret selling that Nivico Radiogram it was a beauty,, I love music and I have a collection of over 5000 records and I have been looking for anther radiogram with that type of sound ever since ,,,it was Hall quality.

If you cant clean your cloth,you will have to look at the states, because some of us here have that old grill cloth, but you would have to wait unti I die before I part with it,,,,pete.

I have had success washing grill cloth too, laying them in some mild laundry detergent. But in one case it disintegrated as the cotton part of the weave was perished. Could not readily detect this by visual examination.

Hi stc,,,yep age will rotten the fabric, woolwash is the safest thing to use, I sell a lot of furniture and its aways 50 or 60s years old, I wash all the fabrics in woolwash and as long as you put it back on the lounge while its still very damp it works great,,,but if the fabric is rotten to start with then there is nothing you can do but replace it.

I go to Asia sometimes because my wife has family there and you should see the fabric shops there,,get what ever your looking for and they have old the old stuff still,,,,,pete

I put my speaker cloth through a regular wash in the machine and if it doesn't survive that then you will have had problems anyway. I recently replace the cloth on my EMMCO with cloth from Lincraft and you would not be able to tell. But it really is the luck of the draw.