Has anyone found miniature scale arcade cabinet replicas?

[Justin]

Im a bot of a classic gaming freak like a lot of you here...  I dont have the money to build or buy dozens of classic fullsize games  (I do have one MAME cabinet of course), but one thing I've really been wanting is 1:8 scale replicas of a few of the classics  (Galaxian, Defender, Robotron, etc...).  Im referring to non-working replicas, of course... onlt the cabinet.

I have looked all over, and it seems THIS DOES NOT EXIST.   (!)  Impossible, I think, but there you have it.  Googling for hours reveals nothing!

Now I know I can build my own cabinets to scale  (fun project!), but I don't have the time.  I'd happily pay $100 for a nicely mass produces 1:8 replica.

Has anyone found anything?!

[Donkey_Kong]

My wife says she could give it a shot carving one. It might not be what you are looking for but would still be cool I'm sure.

Check out her other work here...
http://nicecarvings.com/html/gallery.html

[rlemmon]

Not quite what your looking for but there's the new frogger table tops. They actually play pretty well.

[nexus6]

if youve got no money to buy one, try this.

[RayB]

I've been contemplating making exactly this (making scale models to sell). I made one when I was 13. A Sinistar in a Centipede cabinet.

[somunny]

There was someone selling miniature machines (non-working) on ebay a while ago.  They had a bunch of them.  I didn't save any pictures unfortuately.

edit - Here's the thread regarding those (again, no pics  )

http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=50990.0

[Justin]

Another thought:

Is there any online service that will cut wood to my specs?  Small quantities?  I want high quality stuff... might be able to have them cut a few of these...

[Justin]

Thanks for pointing that out.  I found more info here!  Scroll down:

http://retroblast.com/index.php?scid=1349

Wow!

There was someone selling miniature machines (non-working) on ebay a while ago.  They had a bunch of them.  I didn't save any pictures unfortuately.

edit - Here's the thread regarding those (again, no pics  )

http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=50990.0

[melarky]

I cut our a mini donkey kong arcade on my CNC machine (to test the jakobud dimensions before I cut the bigger one).  It turned out so well, I ended up finishing it out into a lamp.  There are some pics and details at http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=55628.0

I have thought about making more from the jakobud plans, as it was a lot of fun to cut and put together.   I recently made another nintendo shaped one (same size as the lamp but with Mario Bros. artwork) to enter a valentines box contest (had to be video game themed and the prize was a nintendo ds lite).  I was able to cut it out really quick, and my wife actually ended up gluing it together and painting it the next day by herself (I cut grooves in the last one to make it easier to assmble).  She had a lot of fun putting it together (I'll attach a pic she made of the assembly process to this post).

Because we were on a strict deadline with the project (we learned 2 days before it was due of the contest), she opted to just spray paint the whole thing black (I know, it's not 100% accurate to the real cabinets), but I still think it turned out pretty nice.  I'll have to get a pic of the final box all put together, and post it so you can see the finished project, but I don't have any right now.

I was thinking of making a namco cabinet next (as that can be multiple games like the nintendo one as they used it for pac-man, ms. pac-man, galaga, galaxian, etc...).   Once the cabinet is programmed in, it's pretty easy to scale it up and down to any size (depending on what material you're cutting it out of).  I have been using 1/4" birch, but I have thought about switching to 1/4" MDF as it would be easier to assemble (there is always a slight warp to the birch which make it a little hard to put together as you have to clamp it in place while it dries).

[somunny]

Thanks for pointing that out.  I found more info here!  Scroll down:

http://retroblast.com/index.php?scid=1349

Wow!

There was someone selling miniature machines (non-working) on ebay a while ago.  They had a bunch of them.  I didn't save any pictures unfortuately.

edit - Here's the thread regarding those (again, no pics  )

http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=50990.0

Yeah, Franklin Mint style! 

[melarky]

I had my wife send me some pics of the finished mario cabinet so I could put them up, here they are:

[melarky]

Also, here are some pics of the donkey kong lamp I made (in case you're too lazy to click on the above link).  The first 2 pics are of me painting it and showing it all masked off, and then there is one of it finished, and another with the actual lamp on in the pic...

I really like how these turned out.  I also really liked how easy it was to put together (especially the second one I did with the grooves, it made it really easy).  It was a lot of fun to make these, and I've wondered if there would be an interest to buy kits...

[BobA]

We had a micro cab competition back in 2003.  Looks like many of the pictures have disappeared.   Maybe some of the participants could pop the winning pics into this thread.

http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=10462.0

[TadChower]

I put together a little model cabinet around the end of last year using the plans from Jakobud's site and a few pieces of balsa wood. I think it turned it out pretty cool, but of course I already see a few things I'd redo.

The artwork came from the art library as featured on this site , and was applied with some 3M spray adhesive. The only problem I had was the front piece was cut a little odd , so the coin door and such is a little to the left.  I can always redo it, I suppose.

I wanted to add some LEDs behind the marquee and under the game screen, but haven't done so yet. Just a fun little weekend project. 

edit : I left the Sidewinder in the picture for a little size comparison.

[Justin]

Mr Sunshine,

Very nice!  I like it!

You need to grab one of those needle pins that have colored balls on the end, and pin it in there to act as a joystick. 

I ned to build one of these, seriously.  Thing is, I am pretty sure it will bee a little rough looking, and I wont be happy with it.  I want it to be smooth and perfect, but at this scale it is very very hard.

[TadChower]

Very nice!  I like it!

You need to grab one of those needle pins that have colored balls on the end, and pin it in there to act as a joystick. 

Thank you for the kind words. 

Yeah , I was thinking about that. I picked up everything at the local hobby shop. You'd be surpised what little pieces and parts you can find there. I'm almost inspired to just make another one , and use this as an example of what NOT to do.

Like the internals , I really thought about buying one of those little tv's for dollhouses and hacking the picture inside to show a game screen or something. Then doing some monitor mounts with balsa , and painthing them silver. Even going so far as to adding a little square on the inside, and pasting a pcb picture to it.

I think I would keep everything the same scale though , as it's easiest to work with. Add a little battery pack with some lighting , and it makes for one cool little cabinet.

[melarky]

Nice Mr. Sunshine, looks great.  I'm thinking about doing the namco cab next, I think it would be cool to have a bunch of these lined up.

[Encryptor]

if youve got no money to buy one, try this.

nexus6 - Did the links on this site for the games work for you? I wanted to get some of them but nothing works.

Encryptor

[RayB]

You guys's minis put mine to shame!!   

[nexus6]

if youve got no money to buy one, try this.

nexus6 - Did the links on this site for the games work for you? I wanted to get some of them but nothing works.

Encryptor

strange, i've got no problems to follow a link.

[Encryptor]

if youve got no money to buy one, try this.

nexus6 - Did the links on this site for the games work for you? I wanted to get some of them but nothing works.

Encryptor

strange, i've got no problems to follow a link.

I follow that link just fine and the page comes up. On that page it says this:

Paper Arcade.

Go to the following links (click on the picture of the cab you want to make) using the internet and print out the – if you will – paper-engineered blueprints (should scale to fit any paper size* see bottom of this page for more help on printing). Cut, fold, make, be proud of. That is all.

It lists a bunch of games underneath the above paragraph. These are the links that don't seem to be there or work for me. The list of games is there but I can't click on any of them to download any of the pics.

Encryptor