Happs clear trackball s/ any feedback on scratching your balls?

[rackoon]

Working on my 7th cab, going to keep this one and put it in my cabin's living room. I'm going with a Jack Daniel's label themed cab but with different wording on the label

I put in white, black, and translucent trackballs, but never a clear one. I am going to light it a shade of orange so it reminds people 0f glass with whiskey in it

The Happ's clear 3" trackballs are hella expensive; after shipping its like $57 (we are talking for just he ball) But I can buy a knock off for around $20

I have done some research and it seems the knock off are nice and heavy and roll nice, I'm OK with the expensive Happ's if it lasts

My question is do these things scratch and look crappy after a lot of use. Bottom lit balls make scratches just glow  Anyone out there put these to the test to see how they hold up or know someone who has? My other balls didn't get scratched from playing, it was from students rolling them around before install.

And yes I did consider the fact that a question about scratching balls sounds bad

[pbj]

Get one of the frosted ones, it won’t show scratches

[rackoon]

That would siplify things but I already have a bunch of IL clear buttons that have been sitting around for ever and I bough a bunch of GGG's button inserts for them and I would like to make the buttons and trackball match

Plus, I wanted to make the buttons and trackball look a little like a glass bottle and I accualy like the fact that they wont glow perfectly even that way they look like a particial full whiskey bottle

I suppose I can just go for it and swap it out for a black one if it looks a scratched up after some use. My trackballs get a lot of use from me playing GT and my kids playing millaped and some kind of sonic the hedgehog game

[seawolfgoo]

Based on data from my balls (happ #55-0200-22 blue 3" translucent, happ #55-0200-24 white 3" translucent, and a compusa 2" clear pc trackball).  When illuminated the scratches on the 2" ball are highly visible.  You mentioned wanting an orange whiskey look, so I put the 2" clear inside a 3" happ enclosure with the rgb set to orange, it's too bright, the scratches are magnified, and it isn't a smooth color.  However, holding the 2" clear on top of the 3" white translucent in the enclosure is great.  It produces a calm half orange half clear look, and the scratches are faded.  With a diffuser the clear ball should look great.  I'm in the middle of comparing a $5 rgb led (with remote) in the incandescent bulb holder under the 3" blue translucent trackball vs a happ rgb with a 3" white translucent, so it was easy to experiment. 

[rackoon]

Hmmm,  so what your thinking is that a thin piece of white translucent plastic between the trackball and the led will make the ball look good and not make any scratches stand out or as much. Thanks for the input I will test this out my self

Im going with the RGB leds for the first time on this build. i got to be honest; I dont even know how to test a RGB LED becasue of all the wires. I was just going to hook them all up to my IPAC and figure it out later. I got some standard white led's I can use to test this out

thanks for the input

[seawolfgoo]

I tap into my pc power supply for two 12v lines; one goes to the coin door incandescent bulbs and one goes to the rgb led for the trackball.  Depending on your power supply, a molex splitter or a sata to fan splitter can make for a quick modular setup.  An ebay/amazon search on "12v t10 remote" will get you lots of cheap color changing 12v rgb leds with a 10mm base that will slide right into the happ trackball bulb mount #91-1224-00.  You could also skip the bulb mount and solder right onto the rgb led bulb and hot glue the led to the trackball.