At what point do you decide repair is too much work?

[crashwg]

As some of you may already know, I recently got a defender cab for free from another member of the boards.  I've been working on it here and there for the past week or so and I've come accross a few problems, which makes me wonder "will it be more work than doing a scratch build?"

The cab doesn't have a back door, the roof of the cab needs to be replaced along with the part that one would kick while playing.  The cab must have had some sort of water damage at some point in time because the bottom 2" have been cut off and replaced with 2x3s.  I think I'll have to cut off another

[DrewKaree]

From reading what you've said, the only piece that isn't in rough shape is the board just under the marquee!  

It seems to me that if you have work to do on every panel on the cab, then that's telling you that you should buy a few sheets of MDF and lay the cab down and trace the shape of all those pieces onto your MDF....then you'll "fix" every bad piece.

Hey, did I just say start from scratch, but without using those exact words?  I guess I did  

At least you have a DYNAMITE starting point and won't have as much measuring to do  

[whammoed]

I say if you can't bring it back to like new condition, and it sounds like thats not feasible, then start over from scratch and just use it as a template.

[RayB]

Wow, I didn't know the sides could even bend like that... I wonder what kind of extreme exposures it takes for that to happen...

[Crazy Cooter]

I'm with Drew, use it as a template.  I'm assuming it's going to be inside your house, so spend an extra couple bucks and make it look nice.  By having the original cab, you've got a great "plan" to follow.

[SirPeale]

I'll say this: the monitor that was with that cabinet was completely encrusted in filth and dirt.  Little rusty too.  Must have seen some serious weather, or something.  I'm suprised it works at all!

[fredster]

They made more than one of those cabs.  If you want to restore it and the guts are good, there are lots of defender/stargate cabs laying around.

I have one in a garage myself.  It was SHINOBI when I tore it apart.

Save the internals.  The cab is just another "part" to the cab.

If the restoration makes you happy and you feel good about doing that, then by all means, work on it.

If you have the intention of re-selling it, it's worth going price of used cabs.  Restored cabs with non-original parts are not worth as much as the original.  It's like a '67 mustang.  It's worth a whole lot more as with the original parts than it is with bondo all over it.

I have a stargate cab I used to make a mame machine.  I have another defender cab that's "vigilante".

Working Defenders run between $400 and $900 working.  If it's mint, who knows, maybe $1200+

Put more than that in it, and you could have bought one.