Where were you when I was looking for an empty cab? It was on ebay, and I was the only bidder. The monitor had bad burn in and the glass was badly scratched. I sold the board to someone who needed it to get their machine up and running. I just recently sold the original manual for about the cost of the paypal fees and postage to someone who bought a cocktail. I had been holding onto it for a couple years with the hope of doing just that.
The machine I bought may have died, but others were brought back from the brink. I recently got an empty Mad Planets upright for free, and I'm turning that one into a MAME cabinet too. The guy who gave it to me was trying to get rid of it for about a month with no takers. Who knows, it may have ended up in the dump if I didn't get it.
On the other side of the fence, I have taken two converted Tempest cabs and restored them back to working Tempests. Each one cost more to restore than the value of the completed cab, and I sold them for about $250-350 loss each.