Help with movable controls on a 'stealth' table cabinet.

[DisFanJen]

Hi!

Before I get to the question I want to just say that this site is awesome!  I've been a lurker for ages and it's helped me alot.  Now I have a question so I finally joined.

Anyhoo, I'm looking at building a 'stealth' table machine that looks like a coffee table until I'm ready to play it using two of these to make the carcus.



The idea being that we use one as a base and the second one (cut down) given solid sides where all the parts live.

So with any luck it'll look like a coffee table with a solid upper section (maybe made to look like drawers), with the only noticable thing being the screen mounted in the top.

Now for the most part I know what I want to do with this, but I could do with some ideas for the controls.

I want to have them hide away when not in use in that top section we talked about, but I want the option to play in both cocktail mode for classics like galaxian, etc, but also play in landscape mode.

Now I could get 4 sets of controls and set the system up so that it's 2 x palyer 1 & 2 rather than player 1 - 4, but that's an extra expense.

What I'd like to do is have a way to move the controls from the long edge of the unit to either end, giving the best of both worlds.

The wiring isn't an issue.  Just wire it to a plug on the back of the control boxes, then a wire from the arcade machine plugs into it (might have to be a big multi way plug like an old serial port but it's doable).

The issue is a way to fix it securely to the arcade machine but be removable\movable. 

I originally thought of something like this:



But given the abuse the average arcade keys get I'm thinking these won't last long.

So ideas?