It's a beautiful example of the game, but in my opinion I have no idea why you would powdercoat over those beautiful brass habitrails. That's an extremely personal choice and brings the value of the machine down a bit, or at least severly limits the pool of people who would be interested in your game.

Understood. But you asked about value and I think unless you find someone that also likes blue powdercoated habitrails, you'll have to find someone willing to redo them...and that costs money. Which means a potential buyer will factor that into his offering price, which lowers the value.

I put 17k all in on mine (game, Mike Chestnut brass/nickel plating, HEP, Pinsound, etc., etc.). Had to pay 2k for Chris to put in a NOS playfield (no idea how he got that). But it's my all time favorite and I know it won't ever go anywhere so it was worth the cost for me.

I think an HEP would definitely be around $15k. Again...I knew I was burning money when I did it and would never recoup my loss, but with IJ it didn't matter to me since I didn't plan to sell.

This just jumped out at me...why do you think it's an amateur restoration? Because of the playfield issues? It's not an HEP, certainly, but I think the cabinet looks pretty nice, although I'd want to see inside the cabinet, backbox, and under the playfield before buying anything.