OMG What have I gotten myself into -- 10 MORE CABS!

[smalltownguy]

This thread makes me want to track down my old arcade repair manual from my days working at an arcade.

Good luck on this project, do you plan to restore cabinets as well (paint/body work) or just get the games playing right?

KagatoAMV, as much as I would like to strip, bondo, repaint, and redo each cab, unfortunately, I'm not superhuman. My wife is casting me sideways glances, and has laid the gauntlet: clear the garage by the time the snow flies. I'm on a deadline here. But, I'm also willing to move them into my 'man cave' if need be. (that's where my MAME cab is) It's just a lot tighter in there, since it's doubling as my woodworking shop too.

So, short answer, get them playing right. Fix stuff that should be fixed to allow them to be ready to be in the field with teenagers beating on them.

[MaineEvent]

This thread makes me want to track down my old arcade repair manual from my days working at an arcade.

Dream job!

I'll be checking in often...Good Luck!

[smalltownguy]

Anyone in the US have an Arkanoid II marquee they'd like to part with? I found one on the 'bay, but it's in Canada, and shipping is WAY too much.

Thanks in advance!

[smalltownguy]

I just wanted to take this opportunity to give a shout out to Dr Zero for his instantaneous PM with GREAT info on my lesser known WG monitor. Dr Zero, you ROCK!

 

[Dr Zero]

I just wanted to take this opportunity to give a shout out to Dr Zero for his instantaneous PM with GREAT info on my lesser known WG monitor. Dr Zero, you ROCK!

 

Well thank you but ya know even a blind hog finds an acorn once in a while happy to help cant wait to see them all up and running.

[smalltownguy]

Damn, I hit a road block on 1 of my monitors.

It's a WG 19K7602. This one came out of the Golden Tee cab. Right after I took the monitor out, I could tell that the flyback was blown, so I ordered a replacement from Bob Roberts. I was all set to go at my soldering bench when:



In this picture you can clearly see the blown flyback, but you can ALSO see something that doesn't look right. I circled it in red. It appears that someone has installed some components to either bypass something, or jumper a connection. Either way, it doesn't belong I don't think?

Then I turned the board over and it just got worse:



Wow, that's ugly. I don't even think it's worth trying to recap this board and/or replace the flyback. There's no way I'd feel comfortable putting power back to this chassis again. Does anyone have a spare chassis that will work for a 19K7602 I can have/buy?

Grrr.........

[abzman2000]

nonsense, if you can find the schematic and follow the traces around the modifications then it might become apparent what the hacks were for (and maybe you can clean up the soldering a bit while you're at it)

[IG-88]

Get a new chassis from 8liners perhaps...?

[Ond]

Hey STG,

Add my own best wishes to those from other folks, it will be interesting to see what you do with them.  Seeing any real cabs in the wild these days is pretty rare, one place there are quite a few are airports.  I spent a happy hour the other day checking out a bunch of cabs and pinball machines while waiting for a flight.  Keep the detail coming (I need the motivation  )

 

Ond

[smalltownguy]

Hey STG,

Add my own best wishes to those from other folks, it will be interesting to see what you do with them.  Seeing any real cabs in the wild these days is pretty rare, one place there are quite a few are airports.  I spent a happy hour the other day checking out a bunch of cabs and pinball machines while waiting for a flight.  Keep the detail coming (I need the motivation  )

 

Ond

Oh my gosh! The great and powerful Ond!!! He commented on my thread!!!

[atomikbohm]

I never realized it but if you but a flame pot on either side of Ond's avatar and add some flying monkies you totally get with wizard of Ond ... um I mean the wizard of Oz

[opt2not]

Looks like this thread should be moved to Restorations, amongst the other glorious resto threads

I'm assuming you're keeping that Robotron cab as a Tetris?
Wondering if you could transplant that Tetris kit into another cab, and restore this one as a Robotron?  Though that might push you over-budget.
Just seems like a shame to have an original high-action game cabinet like Robotron kept dormant as a puzzle game. No offense to Tetris (the greatest selling game of all time), it's just that Tetris can be thrown into any cabinet really...Robotron cabs in the wild are very few and far between. Also, it's my opinion that the Robotron cabs were built for rough-housing. The way the side panels jettisons out in front, creating more squared stability for rocking and shifting leads me to believe that they knew this game would get pretty physically intense.
I don't know how intense Tetris can get...I usually fall asleep after 5-10 mins of playing (I kid you not, when I was younger I suffered insomnia and the only way I could fall asleep was to play Tetris on my gameboy, or read...who the heck wants to read??)
 

[smalltownguy]

Lots to share today...I spend several hours in the shop / garage last night.

I finished and sent out the Ms Pac Man cab last night -- the owner was very happy to have a nice looking screen again, as well as working coin mechs. I very much wanted to ask him who the toiled paper roll engineer was, but I bit my tongue I ended up pulling the Electrohome G07 out of the Mortal Kombat cab and using it in the Ms Pac. The monitor that I pulled out of Ms Pac needs a cap kit that hasn't arrived yet (ordered yesterday from Bob Roberts), but I wanted to get this cab back to the pizzeria ASAP. There's a big town festival this weekend (Wheels and Wings) and the pizzeria will be very busy, so he didn't want to miss out on the chance to have it place to make $30 or $40 over the weekend.

My plan was to recap the G07 from the Ms Pac later and swap it into another machine when the time was right, but after I extracted it, I noticed that there had been a hood with smoked plexiglass installed on the front of the monitor. Removing it revealed some SERIOUS pac man screen burn. This monitor won't be able to go ANYWHERE but right back into a pac cab when it's recapped. I informed the owner of that, and he said it would be fine for me to swap the monitors on site some time after I'm done with the cap kit. I think what I'll do is swap it for a 'no burn' Wells Gardner from my own collection, and keep this one for a possible tube swap later this winter. I'll just keep my eyes open for a compatible CRT TV to show up for free on Craigslist, and swap in a new tube. This site lists the donor TV's -- I'll keep my eyes out for one.

The Arkanoid cabinet is also finished, with the exception of a new tube in the marquee fixture, and a marquee, which I have already ordered from EMDKAY. When those parts arrive, I'll send this one off. I'm considering changing out the monitor plexi to clear, though to aid in being able to see the bezel.

The Tetris cabinet is ready, with the exception of a new tube in the marquee fixture, and locks for the coin doors. The joystick needed a cleaning -- other than that just a wipe down. I am considering replacing the monitor plexi with clear plexi though, instead of the smoked plexi that's on there. You really can't see the bezel at all.

So that's 3 down, and 6 to go!

Here's the status of the remaining 6 cabs:

1. Mortal Kombat II: dead. Won't power up. Currently without a monitor, as it's donated to the Ms Pac Man cab temporarily, and I can't use the swapped G07 b/c of screen burn. Not sure what to do here -- I will ponder it a bit more and work on the other 6 cabs first.

2. Donkey Kong: works, but has sound issues. Parts on order from Bob Roberts.

3. Final Fight: Monitor has been pulled and needs a capkit, bad. Color is way off, and can't be adjusted. I'm hoping to get this done tonight. I won't be putting the 19K7951 back in there, though, I'm going to try and re-use it for the Golden Tee 99 cab. I've started my 'planting of the seed' with the owner on this cab to persuade him to let me have it. "You know, I'm really concerned about this cabinet, I really don't feel it's worth trying to get going again....it looks pretty rough....." hee hee.  *note* I may have already bought This replacement Ms Pac Man CP on a whim.......... am I putting the cart before the horse? Hmmmm....

4. Neo Geo: Some progress here! I re-examined the edge connectors inside the League Bowling cartridge, and re seated in in the slot. Next time I fired it up, it worked! I still have no picture b/c it's got the major PITA (= pain in the arse) WG 19K7302 monitor in it, but my cap kit just arrived yesterday, and I plan to cap it tonight. Hopefully I can get the monitor back up again so I can see the Neo Geo LOVELINESS! I'd really like to get a few Metal Slug cartridges and try them out if I can. Maybe I'll try my new monitor extension cable when it arrives and see if the picture will come up on a nearby cab.

5. Golden Tee 99: I tried pulling the monitor out of the Final Fight cab to test it on this one, but that's when I realized THAT monitor needs a cap kit real bad. So, I tried the monitor from my personal Double Dragon cab, but the horizontal size is just a touch too big, and I already know I can't adjust the width coil on that monitor, b/c I've tried. So, last resort is to fix the monitor that was in the Golden Tee cab. Unfortunately, that's the one where the flyback sizzled and I'm really not that confident about my ability to repair it given the pictures I've already posted. Dr Zero (thanks man!) pointed me to All Good USA and I spoke to Carl who says they can fix it. So I may send that chassis in to him to repair it. In the mean time, I found a friend over on the KLOV forums who was kind enough to sell me a pair of K7xxx chassis' for a good price. Thanks, Chris25810! So, by next week, I should have a working monitor in this one and it will be ready to roll.

6. Head On: *yuck*

That's where I'm at for now. This weekend I'll have a bunch of free time to get some cap kits done, so I should be well on my way to 4 or 5 cabs ready by next week.

Thanks for reading!

[smalltownguy]

Looks like this thread should be moved to Restorations, amongst the other glorious resto threads

I'm assuming you're keeping that Robotron cab as a Tetris?
Wondering if you could transplant that Tetris kit into another cab, and restore this one as a Robotron?  Though that might push you over-budget.
Just seems like a shame to have an original high-action game cabinet like Robotron kept dormant as a puzzle game. No offense to Tetris (the greatest selling game of all time), it's just that Tetris can be thrown into any cabinet really...Robotron cabs in the wild are very few and far between. Also, it's my opinion that the Robotron cabs were built for rough-housing. The way the side panels jettisons out in front, creating more squared stability for rocking and shifting leads me to believe that they knew this game would get pretty physically intense.
I don't know how intense Tetris can get...I usually fall asleep after 5-10 mins of playing (I kid you not, when I was younger I suffered insomnia and the only way I could fall asleep was to play Tetris on my gameboy, or read...who the heck wants to read??)
 

I may actually buy the Tetris cab from the owner. He's not that crazy about it, and my wife loves the game. So do my kids. It'd be nice to have the conversion kit to slap into another cab. And yes, it would also be nice to get my hands on an original Robotron cab. If I did try to restore it, though, it would come 2nd to the Ms Pac resto. That's MY 2nd fav game (behind Double Dragon, which I already have).

[newman117]

Dude there's a pizzeria here in my town that has 2 cabs effed up! Do you think I should talk to the owner? Anyways what's up with Ond replying? He replied on my thread giving me advice about a girl. Hahaha the great and powerful Ond? He's a cool guy.

[smalltownguy]

Dude there's a pizzeria here in my town that has 2 cabs effed up! Do you think I should talk to the owner? Anyways what's up with Ond replying? He replied on my thread giving me advice about a girl. Hahaha the great and powerful Ond? He's a cool guy.

Ond replying to your thread on the BYOAC forums is like The CREATOR reaching down from the heavens themselves to stroke your ego. I'm humbled.

/endB.S.    


 

[Dr Zero]

WOW you are really cranking 

Your going to give the rest of us slackers of the world a bad name LOL all kidding aside congrats on the good job!

Carl is great fellow I highly recommend him and his work!

[smalltownguy]

Crap.



That's what happens when you're rushing and not being careful. One of the back panels of a nearby cab toppled over on the monitor from my Final Fight cab when I wasn't looking. Heard the tell-tale 'hisssssssssssssssssssss' -- that means bye bye tube. Dammit. Now I have to find a donor tube.

Oh well, Lemonade, right? I decided to pull the chassis off this broken monitor, and swap it in place of the ugly chassis from the Golden Tee monitor. Both 19K7xxx monitors, so there's a pretty good chance it would work just fine.

And here we go:



Yee Haw! One more cab up and running! This one is super exciting because I own this cab, so now I can sell it. I'll need the money to support my yoke snapping habit.  

[BadMouth]

D@&!  YOU ARE KNOCKING THEM OUT!!!!!!

Downright inspirational.
That pizza shop owner has to be overjoyed. 

[Bender]

D@&!  YOU ARE KNOCKING THEM OUT!!!!!!

Downright inspirational.
That pizza shop owner has to be overjoyed. 

I say you get free Pizza for life!!!
man you are cranking. I initially though this would be a multi year thread, not a couple of days

[smalltownguy]

BadMouth and Bender, thanks so much! Your kind words are very encouraging. I hope to have the Tetris cab totally done today, and that will be it for a day or two, unless I can get around to recapping the 19K7302 from the Neo Geo. If I can get that monitor working, then I may try to move it to the Mortal Kombat cab.

The rest of my projects will need to wait until Monday until my care package from Bob Roberts arrives.

FYI, the Golden Tee cab is up for sale now:

http://forums.arcade-museum.com/showthread.php?p=1333863#post1333863

[sstralkowski]

Dang, dude!  You're a beast!  Great job, btw.

[smalltownguy]

I found some more free time during Badger's halftime, so I decided to get a look at the Tetris cab quick. I didn't like the way the buttons felt when playing the game. Sure, I'm not going to be toally restoring EVERYTHING on these cabs, but one thing I'm a stickler on is the controls and coin mechs. They HAVE to work. Especially the controls. There's nothing worse than walking up to a cab and finding semi/non functional controls. I'll walk away in a heart beat.

After pulling the buttons off the control panel, I quickly found out why they were giving me trouble. They were VERY VERY dirty:





No wonder they don't work right. Ick.

So, a few minutes in the sink with a toothbrush and warm soapy water, and they look great!



I put them back in the game, plugged it in, and began testing. All was well until *poof* the game shut off and wouldn't come on. 

After a few swipes with the multi-meter, I determined that the power supply had failed.

So, I pulled the known working one out of the Neo Geo cab, and moved it over. Problem solved. Tetris is alive again!

I also replaced and adjusted the coin reject lights, and gave the mechs a good spray silicone treatment.

Since this is an old Williams Robotron cab, it uses the lesser common 15" tube in the light fixture. I considered widening it, but I'll just order a 15" tube.

Once the tube arrives, Tetris is done!

[Roo]

Ond replying to your thread on the BYOAC forums is like The CREATOR reaching down from the heavens themselves to stroke your ego.

Unless of course, it's the evil side of Ond...  Trust me I know from experience

All kidding aside, Ond is a great guy

[Ond]

@STG- Bummer about the back of that CRT, reminds me of a time years ago when our TY needed a replacement valve (yes that long ago) and my dad acidently elbowed the tube and sssssssss it was ages before that TV got fixed.

@newman117 & Roo - I've heard tell of this "great and powerful Ond"   but I know the guy and he's a crap artist.   .  Take STG's comments with a grain of salt, he's a regular (and loyal) attendee at the church of 'The Retro-Futuristic cab' - all said in fun.

[dlbagna]

Finally got to read up on your project... (great archiving by the way )

Looks like your cranking through them...  Good job...

What's the stronger motivation... keeping your wife happy or saving a few bits from the 80's?

I can't believe I missed out on a few games on the Ms. Pacman.     Did the pizza man pick it up?

(Garage doors were closed when I picked up the car... I figured that was a sign that you might be tending to other things)

[smalltownguy]

Finally got to read up on your project... (great archiving by the way )

Looks like your cranking through them...  Good job...

What's the stronger motivation... keeping your wife happy or saving a few bits from the 80's?

I can't believe I missed out on a few games on the Ms. Pacman.     Did the pizza man pick it up?

(Garage doors were closed when I picked up the car... I figured that was a sign that you might be tending to other things)

Bout time you read up! I'm nearly half done! You know, I'm not sure what possessed me to take on this project. I can tell you that I have a new respect for the operator's job back in the day, though. Getting these done is slow, tedious work. I do feel that I'm making progress, though.

Yes, Ms Pac has already been whisked away back to the pizza joint. She's standing proud next to Centipede and Super Mario Bros. Soon she'll be joined by a few more friends....

You, my friend, NEVER need to worry about ringing the doorbell, at any time. But I'll see you tomorrow. Thanks for the note!

I'm off to pull a chassis in preparation for my cap kits arriving from Bob Roberts on Monday........

[smalltownguy]

So today I turned my attention to some of the 'trim' details on the games. While it's my opinion that the controls and coin mechs MUST work in these games properly, I'm ambivalent about the coin lamps and marquee light fixtures. But the owner wants them done, so I'll be digging in.

The Tetris cab uses the old Williams (Robotron) fixture, which is a 15" tube. I haven't tried sourcing this tube yet. Anyone know where I can get one? If I have to, I'll re-work the fixture to accept 18" tubes. I'm still stewing on this one.

My Arkanoid II cab (Centipede conversion) appears to missing parts. I cannot find a ballast anywhere in the speaker / light fixture area. Has anyone ever heard of a marquee lamp that DIDN'T use a ballast and starter? I thought that was pretty much 'florescent lights 101' info. As I understand it, the basic layout of a florescent fixture is this:



The Arkanoid fixture only has the starter fixture, I don't see a ballast.

Anyone know how these things work?

[Dr Zero]

So today I turned my attention to some of the 'trim' details on the games. While it's my opinion that the controls and coin mechs MUST work in these games properly, I'm ambivalent about the coin lamps and marquee light fixtures. But the owner wants them done, so I'll be digging in.

The Tetris cab uses the old Williams (Robotron) fixture, which is a 15" tube. I haven't tried sourcing this tube yet. Anyone know where I can get one? If I have to, I'll re-work the fixture to accept 18" tubes. I'm still stewing on this one.

My Arkanoid II cab (Centipede conversion) appears to missing parts. I cannot find a ballast anywhere in the speaker / light fixture area. Has anyone ever heard of a marquee lamp that DIDN'T use a ballast and starter? I thought that was pretty much 'florescent lights 101' info. As I understand it, the basic layout of a florescent fixture is this:



The Arkanoid fixture only has the starter fixture, I don't see a ballast.

Anyone know how these things work?

If you cant find the tube in the local hardware shops cruise over to the pet department at wal-mart or the fish section pet-smart fish tanks use that size tube for their florescent light hoods also.

[Roo]

You've found something I know a little bit about!  

Yes, you've got it right.  It's 'fluorescent lights 101'.  You have to have a ballast if you want the pretty glow.

As far as I know arcade machines don't use anything fancy here, you can get a replacement at any electrical supply.

Inside standard FL fixtures, the ballasts normally look like this, but I guess they could look different in an arcade cab.  I'd be surprised if they did.

[smalltownguy]

My local hardware store had the 14" lamp I needed. Sure, it was $12, but I don't care. I'd rather give some money to my local hardware store than ship if off to Mr Sam Walton or some other thousand chain store. Sorry about the soapbox, but we just lost a 100 year old hardware store in the town 5 miles down the road last month. They packed up because of the big box stores.

I asked them if they had a ballast, and they took me to the aisle where they had them. I dug around a bit on the back of the shelves, and lo and behold, I found a dusty old box in the back behind several other boxes. Inside was a perfect replacement for the ballast I needed on my fixture. There were on labels or anything on the box, and the ballast inside had been screwed down once, and there were cut wires on it. I didn't care. I flipped the store owner a fiver and took it home.

Wired everything up and:



Let there BE LIGHT!!

Now, for posterity, here's a shot of some fallen soldiers:

[Roo]

Excellent!  Now, let there be GUITAR!  






Sorry, got carried away there air jammin...

[DillonFoulds]

I'll keep an eye on this thread here and KLOV. I'm up in canada, but I've got an arkanoid clone cocktail I'm mame'ing, so i'll have an extra power supply floating around. I know, generic power supply, no big deal... but it appears to be brand new and i'd really hate to see it go to waste.

If you need a power supply, we'll work something out (something along the line of you pay the shipping and it's yours)...

[BobA]

Great thread.   Most guys have all they can do to take on 1 or 2 cabs at a time.  Keep up the good work.  Very instructive reading for cab repair.

[smalltownguy]

I took care of the audio board repair kit for the Sanyo monitor in the Donkey Kong cab last night.

When I turned it back on I was greeted with some very serious line noise. I realized the volume pot was turned all the way up on the monitor board. I'm not surprised, some of the caps just broke off in my hands as I was replacing them; they weren't held on by much.

I lowered the volume to an acceptable level, and the noise went away for the most part, but it's still there, just quieter. Game plays fine, but if you place your ear near the speaker when you're not playing it, you can hear the humm/buzz/rhythmic beeping Do I have a ground issue, I wonder?

[DillonFoulds]

If it's rhythmic, i'd almost suggest checking the caps on the audio board. ALMOST. I say this because I've got a set of desktop computer speakers that rhythmically charge up and turn off. Basically they sound like a heartbeat. I'll plug in the speakers and *Thump* (bright LED, audio slowly decreases volume, light dims) *Thump* (bright LED, audio slowly decreases volume, light dims).

To remedy it, I plug them in turned on, then turn off the power switch, and slide it back on, and they work fine.

No idea what happens, but turning them off and on by switch works fine...

http://www.bestbuy.ca/en-CA/product/creative-lab-creative-gigaworks-2-0-speakers-t40-51mf1615aa002/10144694.aspx?path=1d6dc0b52b627baa0db39600a5fc2962en02

It's that set, and I got them for a great price (free) so it's hard to justify throwing them out.

[smalltownguy]

Yes, it's a fast paced rhythmic beeping (in a tone similar to part of Mario's jump) and a hum.

I can hear all of the other game sounds just fine while playing, and as I mentioned, the noise is pretty quiet when the volume is adjusted to normal levels. I only noticed it because the volume pot was cranked all the way up with I turned on the game the first time.

I'm beginning to think I should double check my solder joints to makes sure I don't have any cold joints or solder splash anywhere on the foil side the board.

[mgb]

Did you install the whole audio rebuild kit, including the transistor.
Because that sounds a lot like what I had and the rebuild kit took care of it.

I guess a ground on the audio line can also give similiar

[smalltownguy]

Yes, I did the whole kit, including xsisters.

Interesting...when I booted the cab today, I no longer get audio noise. I rebooted it several times. The sound is normal now ?? Oh well, don't look a gift horse in the mouth, right? I'm calling Donkey Kong done, save for a marquee light bulb, which I will pick up tomorrow.

I took some great strides forward tonight. I installed an under cabinet fluorescent fixture in the Tetris cab, and I also changed out the smoked plexi to clear:



Looks good! She's ready to go!

Here's a shot of one of my steps when cutting plexi for my monitors for the Tetris and Arkanoid cabs. I used a plywood board for clamping to the table (to prevent the plexi from cracking under the clamping pressure), used the original smoked plexi as my guide, scored my line with a utility blade, and gave the plexi a quick bend of the wrist to hear that satisfying 'SNAP.'



After getting the kiddies to bed, I turned my attention to the G07 monitor with the flagging. This was the monitor that I'd taken out of the Ms Pac Man cab, substituting the G07 from the Mortal Kombat in it's place as a temporary solution.

Ladies and gentlemen, I'd like to report that I have completed my first successful recapping of a monior! WOOT!  

I know, trivial to some, but a victory to me. Especially since my first attempt at recapping a monitor was the WG 19K7302, wich had over 2 dozen caps. Took me 2 hours to change them all out, and in the end the flyback was the issue. THAT chassis is currently on its way to Orlando to the capable hands of Carl Blessing at Allgood repair.

The G07 has like 12 caps. It was easy peasy. OK maybe 18 caps. I'd recap THAT monitor every day of the week.

Once I get the monitors swapped back, I'll be waiting on a marquee for Arkanoid from EMDKAY, and a few lights and locks.

Ok, status update:

1. Final Fight: currently without a monitor, since I smashed the neck on my tube. I called a TV repair place today and asked if I could pick through their boneyard to find an old 19" TV to rob a tube out of.
2. Donkey Kong: 90% -- just need to get a light bulb for the marquee.
3. Tetris: DONE!
4. Mortal Kombat: 90% -- just need to swap monitors with the Ms Pac at the pizzeria.
5. Ms Pac Man: DONE! (but I need to swap the monitor back)
6. Golden Tee: DONE!
7. Arkanoid: waiting on marquee, and I need to fabricate a retainer top bracket for it.
8. Neo Geo cab: needs power supply, coin mechs,  and monitor chassis (out for repair). Control panel needs a rebuild too.
9. Head On:  

[Dr Zero]

Awesome Job you have done here! 

You might just parlay this into a partime job for good and now that you have shown that fellow you can do it and the quality of your work Im sure will start to come your way, maybe put a card under the plexi offering your services or stating you buy games.

I'm sure carl will take good care of ya and the board, he was featured in replay magazine last month I think I was going to try and stop in take some pics when I was at the auction but missed it do to scheduling issues.

Congrats again on a great job and tackling new challenges like learning to recap a board!