1st Build and a few questions

[DynastyDJ]

Well, after reading many posts on here I decided to start my own build.  I was hesitant to post a thread as I certainly do not have the skills of many people on here.  In the end though this seems to be a very welcoming community so I decided it best to do so and hopefully get the insight from others to make my build even better.

I am attempting to make the OND Metropolis cab.  Thanks to  OND for putting this out there and to all who have posted on that thread.  It has been a HUGE help.  It is a great design and the instructions are fantastic.  One change I am planning is I modified the CP slightly to make it a bit larger.  I plan to have both a track ball and spinner, so I went 14”x30” with a slightly rounded front.  Here are the other details and my current progress.

I have most all of the wood work cut out and partially assembled.  To keep the costs down somewhat I am using a Dell XPS Laptop and 19" 4:3 monitor that I had lying around.  The rest of the parts I bought from Ultimarc as it was easiest to get from one place.   Andy was great and helped out a lot.

I-PAC ultimate
20 RGB LED Ultralux buttons
2 - J-Stick Joysticks with RBG illuminated Handles
Spin Track spinner
U-Trak  Tackball with LED
Coin door / Mechanism

I plan to use a theme similar to Chapels with the blue lightning as that is what my wife liked best.  And of course I needed her happy and on board to actually be able build this thing.    I will probably use Gameongrafix per the recommendations of others to get the marquee, CP and bezel art.  Still unsure what I want on the sides so I will wait a bit.

Ok, now for my questions.

1. - In using the laptop, I was unable to attach to the disk drive power that many mention in here, and in some of the supplied instructions.  I bought a 5v wall wart to plug into the I-Pac and power the LED's for the buttons, trackball and joysticks.  I am however stumped on how to power the coin mechanism (12v), LED for Marquee, and the LED's for the front to give a little glow down each side of the coin mechanism.  Is there some other thing I can buy to easily be able to plug these into an external power supply of some sort?  Splicing wires and such are not a strong suit for me.  It is one of the reasons for the choices I made with Ultimarc.  I just need to plug most of it in. 

2. – I hope to be painting shortly and have noted the comments on using bondo for filling the holes.   What type of paint and primer should I use?  Is Latex OK or should I used Oil based?  I plan to use a foam roller as I believe I read that was best on one of the other posts somewhere.  I worry about my ability to make it look good with canned spray paint. 

3. - I have the pc with Maximus Arcade mostly set up.  I still have to program the buttons and led's once I have the CP put together.  The only issue I have so far though revolves around Steam.  I purchased Pinball Arcade to play on the cabinet.  I have it set to offline mode as I do not want it updating now that I have everything working.  The only issue I have is that it has a popup asking it I want to stay offline, and I need to use the mouse to select this option.  Is there any way around this?  I have tried searching and come up empty so far.   It is very annoying    and I am not sure how this will work once the pc is in the cab.

That's it for now.  I have tried to attach a couple photos of my progress.  Hopefully I did it correctly.  I will also update now as I move along. 

Thanks for any help you can give.

[tigernut]

What type of wood did you use? Latex (water based paint) can sometimes negatively affect the surface of MDF.

I prefer to use oil based paint, it tends to be more durable, but have gotten good results with latex. A foam roller will put a nice finish on. Don't spray paint (cans), it would probably cost you more anyway.

Best of luck!

[yotsuya]

Look for a power supply with a molex connection on the end. Those usually do 12 volts as well.

[yotsuya]

http://www.amazon.com/Coolerguys-100-240v-Molex-Power-Adapter/dp/B000MGG6SC

[DynastyDJ]

Thanks tigernut, it was my thinking to use oil based, but wasn't sure as I have never used it before on anything.  I will give it a try though.

Yotsuya, thanks for the molex information.  I had heard the term on here before, but had no idea what it meant and didn't know that this is what it was for.  I just put it on order.

[yotsuya]

Thanks tigernut, it was my thinking to use oil based, but wasn't sure as I have never used it before on anything.  I will give it a try though.

Yotsuya, thanks for the molex information.  I had heard the term on here before, but had no idea what it meant and didn't know that this is what it was for.  I just put it on order.

No problem. I have one running a sound-reactive cold cathode board. It works great.

[DynastyDJ]

Was able to get some work done today.  Bezel finished and installed with a test fit of the monitor.  The remainder or my pieces are all cut.   Hopefully I can get the routing done for the t-molding this week, although 3 of the next 4 nights are booked  .  CP layout done on poster board so I can easily attach and cut out this week as well. 

[DynastyDJ]

I've made great progress so far on the cabinet.  We decided to change the theme to stay more in line with our basement decor in which many of our walls are lined with photos from baseball stadiums that we have visited.  As Mets fans we went with the Mets theme.  I have all of the games working with the joysticks and buttons.  I am hoping soon to get to working on all of the Led's. 

I can use some help on the following couple items.
             
            1. Right now I am stuck on getting the coin door to work.   I have it powered up and it is taking the coins ok (coming out the back instead of the front), but they do not register with the IPAC Ultimate.  The coin mech I am using is the HI-07S.  I have tried just about every combination I can think of between the coin speed switch and the NC/NO switch.  I have double and triple checked that it is plugged into coin 1.  I currently also have a button running to the same coin 1 slot and that is working fine.  I am using the zenner diode as it looked like I need to, and I didn't want to take a chance of hurting the ipac board.

             2.  I am also having trouble getting the spinner and trackball working for game play.  I am running Windows 7 and Mame .149.  I have looked at my mame.ini file and have the following settings:
Core Input Automatic Enable Options
dial_device                 mouse
trackball_device         mouse
positional_device       keyboard
mouse_device            mouse

also I have in the core input options
mouse   1
joystick  1
multimouse  1

I have tried researching these, but am not finding much other that the changes i have made to the above.  Any help would be appreciated.  Thanks.

[leapinlew]

Are the coin mechs connected to the iPac? If you manually operate the coin mechs, does it register as a keypress? Open notepad to see if it inserts a key in there. Should be a 5 or a 6 assuming you've used all the defaults.

[DynastyDJ]

I tried opening notepad and it does not register as a key press.  I should have mentioned that I also tested it on keyboard test.

[DynastyDJ]

I finished this up awhile back, but forgot to come back on and post final pics.   Everything is working now thanks to the notes from people and additional research on this forum.  I created some custom tokens to use and complete the theme.  I still need to do some side art and bezel art, but that will come in time.  Thanks to everyone here for making this a possibility.  We love the machine and are getting a lot of use out of it with our friends.  Hopefully next spring I can start my next project and make a virtual pinball machine.

[Frank Drebin]

Looks great.  Where did you get your tokens made up?  Those are really cool.

[DynastyDJ]

Thanks.  I made the tokens myself.  Our company has a laser etcher that we use on the products we sell.  I had one of our suppliers make me some 1" metal discs which I spray painted 2 coats, blue on bottom and orange on top.  I then laser etched the orange paint off using a template I made in photoshop.  I still have a bunch to make as they are a big pain to do and very time consuming, but I love the effect it gives.