Apple IIc Restoration

I found a dirty but otherwise good looking Apple IIc listed on ebay. Maybe because of the grime, it was not attracting bids, so I made a low-ball offer and got it for a substantial discount from the initial bid.

A few days later this package arrived:

This is a great example of how NOT to pack fragile equipment! The picture shows all the padding that was used: An old shirt! Yes, that's right there was only an old shirt wrapping the computer.

And, off course, the delivery company must have kicked it out of the truck. There were plastic bits all over the place. How damaged were the contents ? Let's see.

The monitor plastic is shattered in many places. The front bezel has a big gap, so does the main body, there are cracks everywhere, the mounting posts inside are all broken too.
I was able to find most of the broken pieces, specially the large ones.

So, and what about the computer:

One of the keys (V) is broken, but it was not lost. This can be fixable with some superglue. BTW, you can see that the machine is absolutely filthy, and grimy, but otherwise looks nice. It does not seem to be very yellowed. It is hard to tell with all the dirt.

Time to glue the monitor back together.

I started by disassembling the monitor to remove all plastic parts. The standoffs for the screws that attach to the plastic case were all broken. This is probably a good thing. The standoffs absorbed the energy from the fall and the metal, glass, and electronic components seem intact.

I glued back the large pieces using a two-part epoxy glue. There were some gaps due to missing small pieces, so I used some wood filler that I happened to have in the house. Next time I'll probably use some more appropriate epoxy filler. I reinforced all the cracks in the inside using epoxy and strong hot glue.

After gluing all the pieces and filling missing gaps, it was time for sanding.
I started with a coarse grit, 80, and made my way up to 120, 300, 600, 3000. When it seemed smooth to the touch, I applied some spray primer spray. I use a high contrast gray that makes all imperfections stand out. It needed more sanding.
You can see in one of the pictures that removed the rainbow Apple logo, I also masked the slanted LED, and the information panels in the back, and in the inside wall of the case.

The top panel seemed intact, but on close inspection there were many cracks along the grid. Then I accidentally dropped it and it split in half. This plastic is some 36-years old, and very brittle! Ok, a little superglue along the pieces got it back together.

After all the gluing and sanding, I applied a coat of gray primer, and a few thin coasts of beige.
It is hard to tell what the best color would be. The plastic has yellowed, even inside, and it is not a good representation of the original color. This is from the "snow white" design period at Apple still, after looking online, I could not find a reliable specification of the color. I happened to have a can of Valspar Satin Churchill Hotel Vanilla, I tried it on a piece of paper, and it was a good match to the base of the monitor (original painted metal, that should not have yellowed with age).

So, how does it look now ?
Like this:

Much better.  The texture came out better than expected, the original surface texture was sanded away, but the spray paint brought some of it back. The LED is not showing. I need to disassemble the monitor sometime to fix it. I think I might have painted over the transparent light guide, and I'll need to clean it with some acetone. When I do that, I'll give the monitor another coat of Satin Hotel Vanilla, and I'll try spraying an additional clear protective coat.