Mountain's MAME project COMPLETED WITH PICTURES 8-16-07

[javeryh]

Thanks for the interest javeryh! You have motivated me to get down there and get some good shots of the cab. It has been a very busy summer with the kids sports, vacation, and business trips. I can tell you that the cab has been getting a work out. The kids love it and everyone who plays it wants one. I think I will be building a full size machine for my brother and a bartop for my father this fall.

Awesome!  The best reward for building these things is the fun other people get playing it I think.  Summer has definitely been busy - I've got a new family member to take care of so I've been a bit stalled as well.

It's funny the reaction from everone who sees one of these cabs is "can you build me one?"  My brother-in-law wants me to build him one this fall as well but I'm not sure I want to.  He offered to pay for everything but I'm nervous doing something like this on someone else's dime since they are so expensive.  Plus, I'm in the designing stages for a full-sized (based loosely on yours) that will go in the living room at my in-law's beach house.   

[mountain]

OK, I finally took some pictures. It is really hard for me to get a good shot but these will have to do.











The coin door panel that nearly killed me! 



This shot shows the curve in the control panel base.



Close up of the admin panel.



World Class Bowling, currently the family favorite 



Power button lit up with the VFD behind the smoked glass. The power button lights up when power is off and turns off when machine powers up. Sort of an arcade beacon 



The VFD is programmable and will display about anything you could want. It ties into Media player and Winamp, it will tell you if you have email, processor speed, fan speeds, temperatures, upload speeds, download speeds, and a lot more. The display is a bit more blue than the picture represents.

As far as the artwork is concerned, I want to change the look of the marquee and side art, I just don't know what to do yet. Any suggestions? Anybody interested in designing something? Shoot me a PM.

[mountain]

Woops, almost forgot the best pictures.

My daughter playing her favorite, Dig Dug
(monitor glass not mounted yet)


My son playing his favorite, Galaga

[Dudeman]

The coin door panel that nearly killed me! 

Yes, but it was worth it wasn't it?

[javeryh]

Wow!!  Awesome job mountain - definitely one of my favorites around here!  Time to start the next one!   

[Kaytrim]

mountain, you have something to be proud of there.  Very clean lines and color scheme.  Enjoy this one for a while then build something different

TTFN

[ARTIFACT]

beautiful work!

i love how your admin buttons are away from the cp on the screen area.

thanks for the inspiration
happy to see how the whole family is enjoying it!

dig dug is one f the favorites here too

[Donkey_Kong]

OUT...STANDING!

[The Chugnut]

Simply...  ...stunning!

[(+_+)]

The coin door panel that nearly killed me! 

Yes, but it was worth it wasn't it?

If it doesn't almost kill you, you don't appreciate it as much. You must love it then. 

I think it's amazing and I believe you've just raised the bar when it comes to clean and organized wiring. Are you an accountant by any chance? 

[leapinlew]

 

[mountain]

Thanks guys! I had a lot of fun building this machine. I originally just wanted to build it as a project to do with my son and then obviously to have fun playing it. I never realized I would be pulled into a hobby I never even knew existed. Now, it seems that I spend all of my free time searching for bargains on the pieces needed for a project I have yet to decide on. I think I’m going to build a bartop for my Dad’s bar as a gift for Christmas and an upright for my brother’s kids (5 of them  ).

The response and feedback received here in the Project Announcements is awesome. It really makes the building process more fun and is a great motivator. Thanks for all of the kind words.

 

[psychotech]

Oh, well...

Comes a little late, but what can I say? Maybe just this:

  Awesome!

psychotech

[AMDman13]

Outstanding! I just spent 10 minutes marveling over your skills! I hope I didn't miss it in your posts, but I got to ask... Where did you find the power switch (button)? It looks awesome!

I think it's time to add an admin panel to my cab! Dang it.. ! Darn Cabinet bug.

[mountain]

Where did you find the power switch (button)? It looks awesome!

Check out posts 75 and 76 

Oh, well...

Comes a little late, but what can I say? Maybe just this:

  Awesome!

psychotech

Thanks psychotech

[mountain]

I found a picture of the original cabinet as I found it in the previous owners garage. I put it in the first post on the front page.

Kind of hard to believe it's the same cabinet.
 

[Zebidee]

Mountain, I just discovered this project thread and I simply have to say

AWESOME!!!!   

I love your control panel & the rest too. Inspirational stuff.  I know it has been said before, but sometimes it just has to be said again.   You are the MAN.  The Mountain MAN.

[ratzz]

Absolutely AMAZING!

What a fantastic project -- not a single thing overlooked.

QUALITY>QUALITY>QUALITY

Well done.

[rockin_rick]

Very, very nice.

If I had to give constructive criticism it would be - perhaps you could find a blue filter for the VFD, then it would change the color from green to blue and it would blend in perfectly.  But even without it, yours is definitely one of the best I've seen.

Rick 

[Encryptor]

Mountain,

Did you hook up that nice power button to power on everything at once?

If so how did you make it work? Got a diagram?


Encryptor

[mountain]

Very, very nice.

If I had to give constructive criticism it would be - perhaps you could find a blue filter for the VFD, then it would change the color from green to blue and it would blend in perfectly.  But even without it, yours is definitely one of the best I've seen.

Rick 

Dang it, someone noticed it  When I read about this particular dispaly, it was said to be blue. I was quite surprised when i powered it on to see that it was green. I have another one that I need to power on and test, hopefully it will be blue. If not, I have some blue plexi that I may try to install in front of it and see if that helps.

Thank you for the kind words.

Mountain,

Did you hook up that nice power button to power on everything at once?

If so how did you make it work? Got a diagram?


Encryptor

Yes

The momentary contact of the switch is wired to the power switch input of my motherboard. I hacked into a power strip with a relay powered from the computers power supply to switch A/C for my marquee. The power switch has seperate leads for the LED inside of it. It is powered on all of the time when the cabinet is off. I used a small 5 volt power supply I had laying around for this. The LED power goes through another relay using the normally closed side so that when the cabinet is turned on the light goes out.

Sorry, I don't have a schematic of how I wired it. What exactly are you looking for? There many threads on how to wire a cab to power on with the single push of a button. Try doing a search for it, yo should be able to find something.

[rockin_rick]

I believe that most VFDs are colored via filter.  I got a home stereo that looks orange, but is green VFD underneath.  Check out -

http://www.noritake-elec.com/colors.htm

Perhaps they could get you one via the email link on that page.  But they might not want to deal with end users (aka single qty orders), but perhaps they could lead you to a distributor...

Rick

[arcadefever]

 

very impressive, one of the best Mame build arcade ever ... 

[hatrick]

I just read through your thread and wanted to say GREAT JOB. Your attention to detail and quality is inspiring. 

[mccoy178]

Wonderful skills.  Very impressive to say the least!

[dgordon86]

You rock. Everything about this cabinet is top notch.
planning, color scheme, attention to detail...bravo!

This truly is a beautiful cab. Excellent!!
I'm surprised how much you have, but while keeping a single theme down (and simple).

again, bravo!

[nipsmg]

Ok, this is VERY late, but I just posted on the main forum looking for superb CP wiring examples, and someone came up with this.

I have to say, AMAZING. 

This cabinet is just a display of beautiful craftsmanship, especially that panel.  Wow.

I only hope I'm able to come up with something as beautiful as that when I re-do my cabinet.

WELL DONE!!!

[dmworking247]

As they say (at least in Australia)

"Mate, it looks like a bought one"

i.e. Very nicely done, its so professional I'd believe it was a commercial product. 

Well done, you've given me yet another reason to be dissatisfied with my original build 

[Epyx]

So I am searching for clean wiring examples and stumble on Mountain's work...WOW is all I can say. The wiring and attention to detail are just stunning and sorry I know its from Jan 2008 but still...amazing....

[Franco B]

Awesome isnt it, it gave me sooo much inspiration for all of my future wiring projects. I never new wiring could look that good 

[Epyx]

Indeed. I wonder if he has resumed work on his scratch cab yet? 

[mountain]

Thanks guys! I never thought I would see this project thread revived. The cabinet is at my brothers house now being enjoyed by his kids. I miss not being able to play it. 

I have a few hurdles in my way with the Fantasy cab. I know what I want to do but I am having a hard time figuring out the best way to go about it. Starting back up is the tough part. Once I start I will hit it hard and knock it out pretty quick, I just need to get motivated.

[Epyx]

Well at least your cab is being put to good use...a new generation to enjoy what we did. 

No cab to play should be motivation for the Fantasy Cab! 

In all seriousness though I go through the same cycle with interests...you will be back...

[Aval0n]

So I have no idea how dead this thread actually is now, but all I can say is holy smokes. 

I have been researching little by little for over a year on what to do with my cab.  I knew I wanted a black and blue color scheme with perhaps some purple.  I have googled to no end looking for different cabinets and have seen and read this site a bunch over that whole time.  I never saw anything that is close to what I wanted to do.  I just knew I wanted blue buttons/t-molding and some sort of very cool CP art that fit the color scheme.

Today I was searching this site for "bondo" to see what type of filler to use to redo my surfaces and I saw a comment from mountain man.  To my amazement that cab I had always dreamed of was sitting on my screen in the form of a thumbnail so I clicked it and found this thread.

The skill this guy has is truly impressive.  It saddens to me know that I'm way behind the curve on this and it's just sitting as his brothers house as a hand-me-down now. lol

I have a couple of questions if you're still alive and well mountain man to help me on my way. 

Do you still have your psd file from when you did this? I'm struggling trying to make the CP art.

Can you lend me some advice on how to make a 1:1 digital replica in digital form to play with?  I have no Idea where to start with this.

What kind of paint did you use on your cab? I was going to sand smooth my sides after applying a thin layer of bondo to make it smooth since removing the original side art caused a lot of blemishes.

How is your control panel plexi secured?  Is it just being held down by the bottons?

Thanks!!!
 

I picked up a Midway Mortal Kombat Cab that is pretty well trashed.  I used a heat gun to remove all of the old 3 paint jobs and original side art.

I think I have a control panel design I'm happy with. http://proxy2.ldproxy.com/aval0n/arcade/ 

Please let me know what you think of the CP.  I know it's extremely simple in comparison but I think it's all I need.

[dekar24k]

All I can say is.. Wow! That is one of the slickest control panels I've seen and the wiring is flawless. Great work!

[iAtoria]

Aval0n,

Do you still have your psd file from when you did this? I'm struggling trying to make the CP art.

Yeah, I would like to get my hands on the actual PSD too, but you can get the art itself at http://www.localarcade.com/arcade_art/details.php?image_id=373.  All that's needed is the little oval guys, but that's pretty easy to do in Photoship.  Just make a rounded edge rectangle with a transparent fill.

Can you lend me some advice on how to make a 1:1 digital replica in digital form to play with?  I have no Idea where to start with this.

Get Google Sketchup, I think it's free not sure.  I personally use Pro/Engineer or AutoCAD for most things.  You can get google sketup at http://sketchup.google.com/product/gsu.html.

What kind of paint did you use on your cab? I was going to sand smooth my sides after applying a thin layer of bondo to make it smooth since removing the original side art caused a lot of blemishes.

I'm pretty sure this project was done with laminate, but I could be wrong.

How is your control panel plexi secured?  Is it just being held down by the bottons?

If Mountain truly followed the Kneival design then the plexi is secured with only with the buttons and the t-molding.  The t-molding actually has a little lip, granted it doesn't do much, but it does something.

-- Trying his best to answer question -- iAtoria

[mountain]

Thank you for the very kind words.

Do you still have your psd file from when you did this? I'm struggling trying to make the CP art.

I can't give you my artwork, but I can offer my services. I can duplicate this CP for you if you are interested.

end looking for different cabinets and have seen and read this site a bunch over that


What kind of paint did you use on your cab? I was going to sand smooth my sides after applying a thin layer of bondo to make it smooth since removing the original side art caused a lot of blemishes.

I used laminate instead of paint. It is the only way to go in my opinion. Faster, more durable, looks better.......etc.

How is your control panel plexi secured?  Is it just being held down by the bottons?

It is held down by the buttons. The T-molding grabs it a tiny bit on the edges, it protects it from getting snagged more than anything else.

[deoblo85]

Man you got  mad skills 

[Yvan256]

First of all, I have to say this: amazing work, amazing details, amazing results. Seriously, I can't describe in words how good this cabinet looks like. And while it's all amazing-looking, what strikes me is the coin door panel. I wouldn't even have thought of such a nice design, let alone the ability to pull it off.

Here is a shot from the top showing the way they are mounted. Just need to make sure I don't use too long of a screw 

Probably a dumb question here, but where did you get those blue dust washers? And if they're custom-made, care to name your source? I could do my own too but yours seem to have a textured surface like a real arcade washer.

We can get lots of colors for T-molding, buttons and joystick bats/balls, but the dust washer seems to always be black...

[mountain]

Thanks...I miss this machine.

Those blue dust washers are from a set of blue Ultimarc magsticks that I initially purchased for the machine.