This is just my opinion, but I believe that both playfields are salvageable, can be hand painted back to great condition and will always...always look better and play better than an overlay.

The first playfield is more work as you need to repaint the whole central area. The good part is that it is all geometric shape and is actually not too difficult to redo, using acrylic colors and a brush or an airbrush.

I have installed an overlay once (Flash Gordon) because the playfield was too damaged and too complicated to be repainted by hand. Eight Ball is easy and you should at least try your artistic skills on one of the two playfields.

Overlays are a mess to install, will rarely fit, lights are barely visible underneath and the way the ball rolls on them is not pleasant. With time they will become dull, lose their colors and show balls marks all over the place. Finally, once an overlay has been installed in a machine, its value goes down to almost zero....unless the buyer has a replacement playfield for it.

Give your current playfield a chance instead of sanding them down to the wood.

By the way, this overlay is not a of very good manufacture. The overlay I installed on my Flash Gordon had all the holes for the rolling switches, pre-cut. If you have to do these holes manually, it is going to be very tedious and somewhat imprecise.

Yves