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Defender using Turnarcades bartop kit (Finished!)
LeedsFan:
Well it's taken me longer than I anticipated to get across the finish line on this one. Mainly because at the last push I decided to make a separate panel to play the classics using the Wico leaf joysticks. But it is now finally complete.....
I don't think I'm gonna bother with any sideart to the cabinet either as it is quite narrow. I'm thinking along the lines of "less is more" with this. I kinda like the clean profile it has now without any art.
Here is the underside of the Wico panel. It's a bit rough and ready under here. :P
I had to recess a 2mm aluminium plate into the panel because the Wico units are quite chunky. They just fit in the bartop with this method. Those metal strips along one side are just carefully placed to wedge against the inside of the front panel so that there is zero movement up/down when playing.
I went for an all black "classics" panel. I did think about some artwork but in the end I wasn't even sure how I would like these sticks.....
The Wico leaf joysticks took quite a bit of time to get set up correctly. At first I wasn't getting good contacts at all and the controls were just performing really awful. In the end I got the gist of how to set them up and they are great. Pacman is lovely with the 4-way and I'm really getting the hang of Robotron with the dual 8-ways. That toggle switch on the left hand side of the panel is to select between 8-way and 4-way. When one is active the other becomes inactive so any accidental knocks won't affect gameplay.
The two start buttons are just plain Happs affairs but the action buttons are Ultimarc gold-leaf buttons. They are really nice and match the look of the Happs products perfectly. I'm a bit of a Japanese Sanwa lover when it comes to buttons for that classic look these buttons are excellent and are a great replacement to original leaf buttons.
Overall I'm really pleased with how this has turned out. The finish of the cabinet is not as good as my DK. I just don't have the patience with painting. It is nice but I didn't go that extra mile with this project as I did with the DK. I'm slacking. >:D
But now for more slacking as I get stuck into Defender and actually try to get some reasonable scores after all these years.....
opt2not:
I think it looks wonderful dude. Very nice bartop rendition of Defender. I'm also glad you went for proper controls (i.e. 2way joy for defender, and real leafs for robotron). The japanese style buttons are a good compromise for size and play-action.
Overall, great job! :applaud:
BobA:
Looks great. You did a fine job on that bartop. :applaud: :applaud:
Malenko:
amazing. I need to stop converting cabs and actually make one from scratch
emphatic:
The lack of mini-frankenpanels is awesome! I just wish more people would go the multiple panel types route instead of ruining their panels with everything they can make room for. :applaud: