UPDATE - TURNING BAD! found orig. side art under paint - now what?

[SirPoonga]

I FINALLY found the 3M Safest Stripper stuff and followed the directions  - but most of the black paint still isn't coming off, and where it is the PacMan art is coming off with it!

See, I was wondering about that.  I don't know how paige got his millipede to work.  The art is paint too.  

Well, if you want pacman back on it, like I said, you can always go to twobits.com.  It's expensive but would work.

[paigeoliver]

Sand it, paint it Pac-Man yellow and get the multicade graphics, it will be very nice, believe me, it will be.

If you already started messing up the Pac graphics then they are horked. Forget them. Remember, this IS the second most common game in the world, and the single most common cabinet. There aren't enough REAL Pac-Man boardsets floating around for all the cabinets anyway.

This can still be a very nice machine for you. Not every painted over stripped cabinet is meant to be restored. There is no shortage of Pac-Mans in this world, not by a long shot.

[RayB]

You could paint it black and turn it into the most wanted game in the world: Galaga!

 

[megashock5]

Okay, but now my problem is that many of you are saying that this wouldn't make a good 2-player multicade cab. I'm talking two 8way sticks, one 4way stick, trackball, spinner and all the buttons. Obviously the only way to do this is to put a frankenpanel on it, but now I'm wondering how hard that would be.

I'm seriously considering just building from scratch using the plans in the Project Arcade book.

Besides the fact that someone might be able to restore it, can someone tell me the main reason this cab wouldn't be a good choice? Other than the fact that I don't know how I would attach a big CP to it - whereas I could probably follow Lusid's plans (I'm not too bad if I have instructions to follow!) The other attractive thing about building is the ability to make the front open and add a keyboard tray much easier.

I really don't have the time/energy/money to do a restoration. Just want an all-in-one emulator station.

I think at this point I'd let the cab and the monitor (and it's chassis) go for 50 bucks so I could buy some MDF. Is that an unreasonable amount?

thanks to everyone for all the helpful input - the people here really go above and beyond to help each other. Know that it's appreciated

[Chris]

Besides the fact that someone might be able to restore it, can someone tell me the main reason this cab wouldn't be a good choice?

The design of the sides enclosing the CP area is your biggest issue to solve.

Here's something to note: I have a cabinet that started life as a SuperContra and went through a couple of conversions, coming to me as an empty black hulk.  It's now a two-player MAME cabinet with everything you described but a spinner, but every time I work on it I wish I had just built it myself... if you have the skills, the time, and te money, you'll probably be more satisfied in the long run building it yourself.

Here's an idea, though: Can you handle TWO cabinets?  Make this one a vertical (using the real arcade monitor) one-player cab with a real 4-way joystick or a T-Stick Plus with a ball top and two or three buttons, and make the scratch-built cabinet your two-player everything cab...

--Chris

[megashock5]

Interesting... don't know if I have the room. And I'd need to get another PC (I still don't even have ONE! )

Also not sure how to hook up the original monitor to a PC, but I'm sure some people here do.

A quick question about building though - you mention money...
Would it really be much more expensive if I can borrow the tools? I know the MDF is some money, but my father has just about every tool I can think of and would let me borrow them. So I'd need the wood, plus the stuff I'd need even if I were converting a cab (controls, ipac, wiring, etc.). Is there anything I'm not thinking of?

[RetroJames]

First of all, I am too lazy to read above, where is this cab located?

Next,

Don't get frustrated.  

1. Is the 3m stripper a product that only reacts with latex paint?

2. Is the black paint latex and or spray paint?

If 1=no and 2=yes,

I suggest you find a product, it is at home depot called Goof Off 2.  I just finished a moon patrol rescue with this product and I could not be happier.

I am including a  snippet about how I stripped the cab below as well as a link to the thread with pics of the process.  I picked all of this up from Oscar's work on a Sinistar cabinet and it worked great.  

Good Luck! And if the cab is near Atlanta I might take it off your hands.

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Sure, the stuff I used is Goof Off 2 (GO2) .  It is the water based, citrus smelling, indoor friendly, version of Goof Off (which is more pungent, etc).  The GO2 that I used came in a windex type spray bottle and was not a paste, but a liquid.  Same consistency as water.  I had to strip the cab indoors hence my choice.  Goof Off (1) may work the same way?

I simply laid the cab on its side, the sprayed the GO2 on the entire area to be stripped.  Wait between 5 - 15 min (checking periodically to see how fast it is working).  When it starts to seperate from the cabinet use a soft to medium nylon bristle brush and wipe the stripped paint away.  On the areas that do not lift on the first round, reapply and wait a bit, repeat etc.  

Couple of notes:

The key trick here is that the paint used on the cabs from the factory must be oil based wheras the operators generally used latex spray paint for conversions.  GO2 is a latex paint stripper so it will not react with the oil based paint underneath the spray paint*.

* This is MOSTLY true, however, I did have a couple of spots that were stubborn so I brushed a bit more vigorously in those areas.  When I was finished, I saw that I had stripped some of the factory clear coat or shellac off and in at least one spot thinned that oil based paint underneath.  Brush lightly, and accept what you get (IMHO).

Use paper underneath the cabinet or a tarp, the little paint flakes get EVERYWHERE.

Lastly, when finished I used warm water and mild dish soap to clean the sides.  I wanted to make sure I did not have residual stripper anywhere continuing to react with the paint and wood.



http://www.arcadecontrols.org/yabbse/index.php?board=10;action=display;threadid=20395;start=0

[Chris]

Interesting... don't know if I have the room. And I'd need to get another PC (I still don't even have ONE! )

Yeah, but a PC to run just 4-way vertical classics can be found practiaclly free... an old K62-300 would do fine...

Also not sure how to hook up the original monitor to a PC, but I'm sure some people here do.

The easiest way is an ArcadeVGA card from http://www.ultimarc.com but if you use DOS there are other ways...

A quick question about building though - you mention money...
Would it really be much more expensive if I can borrow the tools? I know the MDF is some money, but my father has just about every tool I can think of and would let me borrow them. So I'd need the wood, plus the stuff I'd need even if I were converting a cab (controls, ipac, wiring, etc.). Is there anything I'm not thinking of?

Look through the examples pages... a lot of people itemize their expenses, and some are cheaper than others.  But it's certainly more expensive to build from scratch rather than use a cab you already have....

[pointdablame]

I think the point at which building gets more expensive is the incidental stuff and the stuff you get with a cab without thinking about it.

If you buy a cabinet, you may get a working monitor with it for very little money.  You may also get a game board that you can sell to recoup some losses.  Then you have to factor in the controls that can be salvaged, all the framing and hardware (while a relatively cheap bit of the cab) that is already there, and things like bezel glass you may want to keep, plastic bezels, etc etc.  If you think about it, a $100 generic cab with a game will usually have much more than $100 worth of parts in it if you are buying new.

With building, you get nothing "for free" so to speak.  $15 for a bezel here, $30 for glass there... and before you know it, your budget is toast, heh.

Just my .02    This is actually why I wound up buying a cab and not building.  My dad also has all the tools I would need, and you'll say... "hey, $50 in wood and I'll have a cab"  Not quite though, heh.

[megashock5]

Good points. My old cab has a working monitor - but it's vertical and al lot of what I want to run is console emulators, so I think I'm going to go the TV route. Unfortunately that makes the bezel useless as well. I can probably use the 4-way stick at least.

The cab also has a coin door, but if someone ends up buying it and wants the coin door with it I don't really need one on my final machine. Going to just use buttons anyway.

[paigeoliver]

Umm, you can turn a vertical monitor to horizontal on most all cabinets, except for a few oddball ones like Assault, Pooyan, and some cocktails.

Pac/Midway cabinets, williams cabinets, Nintendo cabinets, Stern cabinets, Atari cabinets, Cinematronics cabinets, Vectorbeam cabinets, Dynamo cabinets, Sega cabinets and Gottlieb cabinets will all take a monitor in either direction, and that my friend covers nearly everything.

[Tailgunner]

Umm, you can turn a vertical monitor to horizontal on most all cabinets, except for a few oddball ones like Assault, Pooyan, and some cocktails.

Pac/Midway cabinets, williams cabinets, Nintendo cabinets, Stern cabinets, Atari cabinets, Cinematronics cabinets, Vectorbeam cabinets, Dynamo cabinets, Sega cabinets and Gottlieb cabinets will all take a monitor in either direction, and that my friend covers nearly everything.

I'd add Toobin' to the list of dedicated vertical cabs. It's much too skinny to rotate the monitor.