What is the opinion on postwar steam, refurbish or respect the patina???

For me it would depend on condition. IF the piece has really bad paint, dings, etc, but it runs good (or can be made to run good), I would consider painting.  Once stripped is a good time to fix the dents and/or fill the scratches and file/sand smooth.

They're only original once, but if the thing is so beat up that I'm not satisfied with it, then repainting is in the equation.

Just be careful to not thin your paint too much or, you'll have to REPAINT and THIN no more.

Andre

It helps the value when you consider it wasn't worth much when it was all beat up.

David

Andre, that was a terrible pun. I agree with David, most postwar locos have lost a good amount of value, in the past few years, and if they are "runner class" locos, a paint job properly done, with fresh numbers is worth more, especially when you consider someone is going to run and enjoy the loco. As proof, I offer my 746 J, which had been stored in a damp basement. When someone tried to mask it off and respray the pilot, they took the masking tape off, along with the stripe and the black paint. It looked like it had measeles. A friend stripped it and repainted it, but it took he and I over a year to find replacement stripes. When I got the stripes from Olsen trains, it was a square of red with the yellow edges printed on it. They had to be cut out, and applied to the loco. I sat and looked at the stripes for an hour, my wife got tired of my moaning, and gave me her special craft scissors and told me to cut the stripes. I did so, and applied them to the loco. It looks so good that, at midnight I ran upstairs for the nose and the detail parts, and reassembled the loco, giving it a 1 a.m. test run. That was four years ago, and I am still enjoying the redone loco.

Its all personal preference. I would not consider refinishing anything in very good condition or better.
The few times I have refinished trains, I've done them in custom paint jobs.

I only repaint shells that are too far gone to be of any value. And when I do repaint, I keep as much of the old paint as I can. Completely stripped and repainted shells just don't look authentic to me.

I've seen "restorations" documented here and elsewhere that were not very well done. Amateurish hack jobs obviously decrease the value of the piece. But a well done restoration of a worn out train only increases its value.

I suppose3 if I ever had one that was in good original condition I would leave it alone, but every on e I've bought was scratched, bent, dinged or had bad paint for some reason.  I repaint them as close to original as I can, and work hard to make decals and all as true to the original as possible.

I have Lionel 224, 2-6-2 set from my childhood.  I beat it up badly as a kid; all the cars show a lot of abuse.  It still runs great.  Since I will be leaving this set to my son we discussed having it completely restored.  Mike, my son, said he would rather have it as is, with all of dad’s wear and tear.

That's my take on the subject.  It is different if it's a family heirloom too.  There might be more sentimental value to all the nicks and imperfections caused by use.  If you don't have any sentimental attachment to it and it's looking bad, it might not be a bad idea.

Good looking original is hard to beat; but if a beat up one is hard to look at; refinish it.

I bought mine to enjoy:  Repainting, adding handrails, bells and whisles, different tenders or tender shells, replacing the Lionel logo with a favorite railroad, converting hudsons to pacifics and renumbering, adding a cab interior, adding couplers to the front of steamers,,  selling the original boxes, converting to two rail...  Some are well suited for such action,,  But Collector quality postwar or pre-war locomotives should be guarded from such action by the Plasticville Police Department..   

I only repaint shells that are too far gone to be of any value. And when I do repaint, I keep as much of the old paint as I can. Completely stripped and repainted shells just don't look authentic to me.

 

I've seen "restorations" documented here and elsewhere that were not very well done. Amateurish hack jobs obviously decrease the value of the piece. But a well done restoration of a worn out train only increases its value.

Agreed! The accompanying Postwar NW2 was a basket case painted an ugly Amtrak silver with poor application of decals. I had NO issues with repainting it to this!