Cabinet Rewiring Question

[GamingGreg]

My MAME machine was a conversion of an old cabinet, with a semi-working monitor.  Now I'm going to be replacing this old 19" WG arcade monitor with a standard 19" VGA computer monitor.  So as a result, I'm going to need to change (simplify) the wiring somewhat, as I no longer need the board with the isolation transformer.

So my question is will the proposed wiring scheme (as shown in the attached GIF) work?  Should the toggle switch be on the hot lead or the neutral lead?  Am I missing something?  I'll be hacking an old monitor cable and adding in some 16 or 18 gauge wiring, to do this.

I have mixed feelings doing this as I'd like really like to have an arcade monitor in there, but here are my reasons for switching:
1)  The monitor is 23+ years old and appears on it's last leg.  It still has a bit of vertical shake which I wasn't able to fix.  It also has some ripple anomalies that appear when a lightgun is in calibration mode.  It is also pretty faint, and has some minor burn-in.
2)  I haven't been able to get my two Act-Labs lightgun working well with that monitor.  They sort of work, but the accuracy is REALLY bad.  The shot could be right on or clear on the other side of the screen (not very playable).
3)  The computer monitor was given to me (no cost involved) and it does appear it will fit.  (If money wasn't an option I'd probably put a WG D9200 in there)
4)  Vector games, I'm told, do look better on a computer monitor also.
5)  It will allow for PC games at a higer resolution (not a big issue though, as the machine will most run MAME).


On the downside I will loose some

[GamingGreg]

Okay, I went ahead with this last night and it appears to work.  However after cutting some leads that went to the marquee and the toggle switch I noticed that the old wire was silver in color.  I'm guessing it's aluminum braided wire (about 18 or 20 gauge).  I can replace the leads to the switch with no problem, but the marquee lead has a special connector on it that connects to the marquee light.  Not as easy to replace.

So my question now is this.  What the best way to hook copper wire to aluminum wire?  I've heard that it can cause to issues later on due to a chemical reaction or oxidation or something like that.  Should I use solder instead of those twist connectors? or should I just find a way to replace that lead and connector with copper?

[krick]

However after cutting some leads that went to the marquee and the toggle switch I noticed that the old wire was silver in color.  I'm guessing it's aluminum braided wire (about 18 or 20 gauge).  I can replace the leads to the switch with no problem, but the marquee lead has a special connector on it that connects to the marquee light.  Not as easy to replace.

Are you sure that the wire isn't just "tinned" copper wire?   I really don't think that people have used aluminum wire since the early seventies.  Of course, I'm sure someone here will correct me if I'm wrong.

If it truly is aluminum wire and you want to rewire the light, you can get connectors for just about anything from Bob Roberts...   http://www.therealbobroberts.com/

You could also try carefully taking the existing connector apart and re-using it.  Remove the pins from the connector, uncrimp them with a very small screwdriver and or knife blade, remove old wires, re-attach new wires, crimp, solder to make sure it stays put, and then put it all back together.

I did this when replacing my marquee fluorescent unit with a $7 one from Walmart.  I was kind of impatient and didn't feel like waiting for a new connector in the mail.  Ok, I confess, I'm cheap too.  

[GamingGreg]

It could be "tinned" copper wire.  I'm not really sure.  As far as I can tell the cabinet was built in either 1980 or 1981, so it might not be.   I'll keep it as it is for a while, and then maybe rewire those leads later with copper to be safe.