The Promised End....(Major Havoc)

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Arroyo:
I have wanted to own every game since I got into this hobby. I got pretty comfortable with GroovyMame and knew that long term I could build my dream cab for raster games. But the more that I got into researching vectors I knew I needed to go another route. I’ve been collecting a number of them but what really caught my eye was Major Havoc. This was going to be one of the handful of games that was going to get a dedicated cab.

Right around the time I was doing research (2020) a number of guys on KLOV were gearing up for the same thing. There was a push for re-producing the roller controllers, that kicked off a push to get the cabs and metal ears recut, Shilmover was doing a run on Amplifone clones for the color vector monitor and before I knew it the pieces were starting to come together. Last real hurdle was the game.

There was a member on KLOV named Tronic who had reproduced blank Major Havoc PCB’s. Although he seemingly had none left I PM’d him and he had one he was holding on to that he was willing to sell. I jumped on it and had it in my possession for over 2 years before last August when I finally got the energy to give it a go.

Thankfully I had a Build of Materials to reference, and I had already acquired a number of components I knew I was going to need (quad pokey, LETA chip, AVG chip) that weren’t as easy to locate.

Let the soldering begin.

I bought this (and another wider variant) lead bending tool. Really helps to keep the bends uniform and consistent:

Even after putting in a seemingly few amount of components it still translates to a lot of legs to cut and solder:

For soldering bperkins01 and MikeA turned me onto the Hakko set that can be found here:

Solder and Reel for easily pulling is here & here.

Making slow progress over a number of days:

Put in a number of sockets (dual wipe) for components that either need to be removed (ROM’s for burning new versions of a game), or components that can fail (RAM, analog chips).

Here is most of the components installed:

And now with ROM’s burnt (marked with blue masking tape) using a chip burning tool found here.(again thanks bperkins01 & MikeA)

There is a ton of left over flux when soldering all those legs:

Spray some Isopropyl Alcohol and use a mild bristle tooth brush and it comes right off:

To hook this up I needed to get a wiring harness. I didn’t want to put the time into that so I outsourced it to Golden Age Arcade and Ken put it together in a couple of weeks:

To test it out I needed to get power. I had bought an original Atari Vector Power Brick and AR2 sound and voltage regulation PCB. I also needed something to check the visuals. So I picked up an old analog oscilloscope. They can handle any input and are a great way to check vector game PCB’s without worrying about damaging your monitor.

Connected it all up and……

Success!

It’s kinda cool to see in action on the oscilloscope:

With that out of the way I decided that with everything else being new and shiny the old power brick was going to need work:

You can see how pretty it once was by looking at the bottom:

Thankfully I had purchased some replacements from Takeman on KLOV and got to work:

With all the components out you could see just how bad the rust damage was:

After buying replacement screws for the ones that were too badly rusted and carefully taking pictures to get everything back it cleaned up good:

After putting all the stickers in place and protective cardboard it was all ready for install

Good place to stop for now.

bobbyb13:
I found the whole thing astounding BEFORE I discovered you put the board together yourself.
Whoa-
:applaud:

Mike A:
Yeah. He is kind of insane.

This was one hell of a project.

You can see the effort in the final product.

Arroyo:

--- Quote from: bobbyb13 on April 06, 2023, 12:30:27 pm ---I found the whole thing astounding BEFORE I discovered you put the board together yourself.
Whoa-
:applaud:

--- End quote ---
It was a fun challenge. I'd recommend it if you get a chance.

--- Quote from: Mike A on April 06, 2023, 12:33:32 pm ---Yeah. He is kind of insane.
--- End quote ---

Just kinda?

Mike A:

--- Quote --- I'd recommend it if you get a chance.
--- End quote ---

I thought you liked Bobby.

Don't do it. It's a trap.

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