I love the sound of this project-- eliminating effects is an interesting twist.
I think "aging" all the footage might not be necessary-- because work-print tends to be damaged in portions-- not all the way through. So the original "lost cut" would have had scenes that were dirty and scratched as well as scenes that were clean and new.
It would take some research to figure out what dogfight material to use for the space battles. Is there any resource for seeing what was used?