Bezel and Marquee Mounting

[Peeper]

Hey all, super lurker here!

I've been lurking the boards while building my cabinet, for quite a while now. I've got the control panel 90% done, and some of the 3/4" plywood pieces cut for the actual cabinet.

Before I started assembling the thing, I tried to figure out how I'm going to mount the bezel and marquee. Unfortunately I can't come up with a solution I'm happy with.

Any advice would be appreciated...

Thanks!

[1UP]

The bezel should be easy.  Paint or make a contact paper bezel on the back side of your front glass, router a groove behind your control panel and another groove at the back of your speaker panel, and put in your glass.

For the marquee, get this: http://www.happcontrols.com/amusement/acesor/49100000.htm  It's $12 for a 10 foot strip (should be enough) and you should be able to just screw it in, one strip on top of your cabinet, another in front of the speaker panel, and it'll hold your marquee in place.

[cdbrown]

The bezel should be easy.

[1UP]

OK, so make a groove in the bottom (just wide enough to hold the glass) and use something like a bathroom mirror retainer at the top to hold it in from the inside with screws, or you could put in a wooden frame behind the glass that's screwed into the sides--use your imagination!  I don't know if you really need much support on the sides, since 1/4" Lexan is pretty rigid.

I would definitlely use Lexan instead of glass if you're actually planning on hitting the machine at some point...    Myself, I'm planning to treat my machine a little better, since I've put a lot of time and money into it!  For most people playing at home, I don't think it has to be as indestructible as a machine that's made to be left anattended at an all-night laundromat.

Maybe someone else has a better idea, just a few suggestions from me...

[cdbrown]

Thanks for the help 1up.  I can just see my brother getting slightly annoyed and hitting the glass.  Just wanted to make sure that it is going to be strong and secure for those one of knocks.

Thanks again.

-cdbrown

[Peeper]

Thanks, 1UP. That is basically how I plac on mounting the bezel: Groove at the top and bottom, and maybe some siderails on the backside. I was just wondering if there was a better way.

One Question about the marquee retainer, though. How does it look on the sides? Do the sides of the marquee plexi show at the edges? Or should I recess the top and speaker panels so that the sides of the cabinet hide the edges of the plexi? I'm assuming that if that's the way to go, then the retainer is flexiable enough to 'give' a little to get past the edges of the cabinet...

[Steve Johnson]

....snip...
One Question about the marquee retainer, though. How does it look on the sides? Do the sides of the marquee plexi show at the edges? Or should I recess the top and speaker panels so that the sides of the cabinet hide the edges of the plexi? I'm assuming that if that's the way to go, then the retainer is flexiable enough to 'give' a little to get past the edges of the cabinet...

For my marquee mounting, (which is a custom print at kinkos mounted between two pieces of lexan), I used marquee mounting material from HAPPS for top and bottom noted in previous post.

For the sides, I acquired a plastic edging material from Home Depot (which is sold for mounting bathroom panels together). I only found white and beige colors so I took a white and just spray painted with a semi gloss black. This makes a nice neat "frame" on the side edges and slips under the marquee mount on top/bottom.

This also allows the right/left to be nice and snug so there is no light leak from the 24" flourescent fixture backlighting the marquee.

Hope this helps.

Steve