Author Topic: Tank II (Read 59823 times)

ChadTower · « **on:** January 09, 2008, 09:29:55 pm »

Peale helped me get this a couple of years ago... back when I was still in the "cabs are so hard to find" phase of the hobby. He pointed it out to me and I drove all the way from Southern MA to near the QC border in VT to get it. Him and I have poked at it a bit once or twice but basically it has been sitting in my basement for 2-3 years. Time to get this sucker working again.

DreamCast Kid · « **Reply #1 on:** January 09, 2008, 10:12:55 pm »

Nice looking project there! I remember seeing that game in a bowling alley many years ago. The monitor was so far gone you could barely see the game

How big is that cabinet? Looks like it be fairly easy to cut out and put together, do you have any measurements?

ChadTower · « **Reply #2 on:** January 10, 2008, 12:51:47 am »

I could get measurements, not sure how to diagram up angles and the like, though. Never done that before. It is about 54" tall at the very top.

IG-88 · « **Reply #3 on:** January 10, 2008, 07:01:34 am »

Look at those boards! Thats awesome!

Level42 · « **Reply #4 on:** January 10, 2008, 09:51:16 am »

Quote from: ChadTower on January 09, 2008, 09:29:55 pm

Peale helped me get this a couple of years ago... back when I was still in the "cabs are so hard to find" phase of the hobby. He pointed it out to me and I drove all the way from Southern MA to near the QC border in VT to get it. Him and I have poked at it a bit once or twice but basically it has been sitting in my basement for 2-3 years. Time to get this sucker working again.

Yeah, tell me about it:
http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=41578.0

Looks like the same monitor

I was scared to death to power that monitor up.
At least, you still have the PCB(s).........

ChadTower · « **Reply #5 on:** January 10, 2008, 10:53:08 am »

I honestly don't think this one is that far from working unless some NLA part is gone. Almost all of those chips are the same one - I'm guessing an early TIP but I haven't looked it up yet. I get neck glow in the monitor and the screen does light up but I don't hear any chatter at all. It has so much screen burn you can see the whole tank playfield without anything being drawn.

I think I'm going to start by repinning all of the connectors, capping the monitor, and maybe capping the game boards. Those ribbon connectors scare me, though - they're soldered to the boards in what appears to be a fragile manner.

EDIT:

Thanks for posting that link to your old thread... gave me a good direction to go on the monitor. I'm going to look into Paige's reference that you can take the RCA output from a VCR in order to get this monitor working again. That would be the yellow cable, obviously... I never knew there were two wires in that thin yellow cable.

Level42 · « **Reply #6 on:** January 10, 2008, 12:48:19 pm »

Haha

You're welcome. Yeah B/W raster should be about the easiest thing to connect up.....if what you say is correct, the sync is also in that signal.

Looking back at those pics I must say the cab looks nice. It's worse in reality though....
Poor thing is still waiting it's turn....could be a while.....

ChadTower · « **Reply #7 on:** January 10, 2008, 12:57:10 pm »

Heh... found the thread this cab came from... man some of us were newbs to the hobby back then, myself most of all. That was like a month after I registered and I knew practically zip about electronics theory and less about arcade games.

divemaster127 · « **Reply #8 on:** January 10, 2008, 01:39:50 pm »

That is a awesome cab, I remember playing the game, thats been a few moons ago
dm

ChadTower · « **Reply #9 on:** January 11, 2008, 08:59:36 am »

Pulled the "chassis" last night and have a cap kit in hand. This game appears to have never been worked on at all. I can't find any signs of someone having been on the boards, in the wires, anywhere. I'd like to clean everything off but I'm not sure how safe it would be to wet down a circuit board from the mid 70s.

LeedsFan · « **Reply #10 on:** January 11, 2008, 09:39:57 am »

What's your intention? Just to get it up and running or a full restoration? That monitor looks to have quite bad burn in it in the first pic.

ChadTower · « **Reply #11 on:** January 11, 2008, 09:45:11 am »

Quote from: LeedsFan on January 11, 2008, 09:39:57 am

What's your intention? Just to get it up and running or a full restoration? That monitor looks to have quite bad burn in it in the first pic.

I'll get it working well, clean it up as well as it will go, and then from there see how much needs to be done for a full restoration. Honestly, the only two obvious things I see that it needs are T molding and a repaint on the coin door. The rest are just dirty. Maybe fill-smooth/repaint the back.

The bigger question is what I'll do with it once I'm done. I don't really have plans to keep it and it won't have much monetary value.

Zakk · « **Reply #12 on:** January 11, 2008, 11:34:47 am »

Nice! This would be a cool one to get working and looking good. Real piece of arcade history.

divemaster127 · « **Reply #13 on:** January 11, 2008, 11:53:25 am »

I wish you were closer to where i lived I would like to buy that machine from you.
dm

divemaster127 · « **Reply #14 on:** January 11, 2008, 11:54:09 am »

Chad, I bet you have some pretty nice machines can you post some pics of all your goodies
dm

ChadTower · « **Reply #15 on:** January 11, 2008, 12:44:41 pm »

They're mostly all either folded up (pins) and stored while I work on the basement, or they're project vids that I haven't fixed yet. The only two working vids I have at the moment can be seen somewhat in the background of those pics - Tempest and Space Duel.

Level42 · « **Reply #16 on:** January 11, 2008, 07:09:39 pm »

Quote from: ChadTower on January 10, 2008, 12:57:10 pm

Heh... found the thread this cab came from... man some of us were newbs to the hobby back then, myself most of all. That was like a month after I registered and I knew practically zip about electronics theory and less about arcade games.

Yes Chad, we were young then

(I wasn't registered yet even

)

There's something about that 70's style I like. It's that period where you could see the vid games were still not "adult".

About the cleaning: Atari themselves suggested the washing of PCB's in their "The Book", and that was written late 70's I guess.....

Games001 · « **Reply #17 on:** January 11, 2008, 07:16:43 pm »

Cabs are so hard to find phase... I am STILL looking in the Florida area for a single cab that is not $800+ (empty and ruined)

ChadTower · « **Reply #18 on:** January 11, 2008, 09:19:51 pm »

Quote from: Level42 on January 11, 2008, 07:09:39 pm

About the cleaning: Atari themselves suggested the washing of PCB's in their "The Book", and that was written late 70's I guess.....

Do you have an electronic copy of that? I don't think I do.

EDIT: holy crap. I was just looking at ionpool to see if they have The Book, and look at this... I have two 'scopes sitting here waiting for me and I have no idea how to use them. Bang, bang, BANG.

geomartin · « **Reply #19 on:** January 12, 2008, 12:56:20 am »

Quote from: LeedsFan on January 11, 2008, 09:39:57 am

What's your intention? Just to get it up and running or a full restoration? That monitor looks to have quite bad burn in it in the first pic.

I don't think the screen burn is an issue on this game. If my memory is correct, the maze never changes.

IG-88 · « **Reply #20 on:** January 12, 2008, 07:24:35 am »

Chad I think I may have "The Book" in PDF but it's too large too attach. Can I email it too you?

ChadTower · « **Reply #21 on:** January 12, 2008, 12:28:12 pm »

Quote from: IG-88 on January 12, 2008, 07:24:35 am

Chad I think I may have "The Book" in PDF but it's too large too attach. Can I email it too you?

Awesome! Please do... use the email address attached to my profile. Thanks!

IG-88 · « **Reply #22 on:** January 12, 2008, 02:47:35 pm »

Um...can't seen to find any email.....

ChadTower · « **Reply #23 on:** January 12, 2008, 03:31:12 pm »

That's okay... amazingly it just popped up in Arcade Misc. Thanks for being willing to send it, though.

The Book

Here is what it says on PCB cleaning.

polaris · « **Reply #24 on:** January 12, 2008, 04:13:14 pm »

chad your email address is hidden on your profile, in case you missed what IG was saying

ChadTower · « **Reply #25 on:** January 12, 2008, 04:27:30 pm »

Didn't know that... thanks for pointing it out. I'll fix it.

Dirty chassis.

Clean chassis.

In circuit cap tester. I've never used it before and I'm still trying to figure it out. Anyone have any tips?

polaris · « **Reply #26 on:** January 12, 2008, 08:49:54 pm »

Chad , i've just been looking on klov at this. amazing, it was in its fifth generation by 1978, and the 8 player version. awesome stuff.

IG-88 · « **Reply #27 on:** January 12, 2008, 09:48:28 pm »

I'm sure you all know about this book:

http://www.amazon.com/Encyclopedia-Arcade-Video-Schiffer-Collectors/dp/0764319256/
ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1200192565&sr=8-1

It has this machine and quite a few others from that era. Quite a nice read.

Level42 · « **Reply #28 on:** January 13, 2008, 06:03:33 am »

Here I am, thinking Chad is the person to have read ALL threads on this forum, and he missed this

:

http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=68787.msg709364#msg709364

Enjoy, o and two scopes is too much, send one of them

ChadTower · « **Reply #29 on:** January 13, 2008, 10:46:38 am »

Quote from: Level42 on January 13, 2008, 06:03:33 am

Here I am, thinking Chad is the person to have read ALL threads on this forum, and he missed this :

http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=68787.msg709364#msg709364

Enjoy, o and two scopes is too much, send one of them

Level42, I'm the one who put in the multimeter tutorial at the top of that thread.

IG-88, I haven't seen that book, but have seen a few much like it. I'll keep an eye out for a copy of that book, thanks.

I'm seriously considering taking out a 2600 for the living room again so the kids can spend some quality time with Combat before I get this working. We used to have one there, but there's really only room for three consoles in the entertainment center, and the N64/GCube/Wii combo seems to keep everyone happiest. The NES just got bumped by the Wii.

ChadTower · « **Reply #30 on:** January 13, 2008, 11:18:21 am »

Dammit. I just pulled a flat capacitor out as instructed by the cap kit sheet... but I can't tell which lead is positive and which is negative. The board isn't marked and the cap isn't marked... the only hint is that one side has two leads twisted together, the other side has one lead.

If it helps, it is an ERO 0.033uF (and the kit says to replace it with a 1uF).

ChadTower · « **Reply #31 on:** January 13, 2008, 11:38:56 am »

Another dammit. I'm pulling a couple of caps and have noticed that Bob included 25v replacements... the originals are 50v and his sheet says 50v.

ChadTower · « **Reply #32 on:** January 13, 2008, 01:24:05 pm »

Found some caps in my spares that matched the proper voltages, so I used those.

I have the whole cap kit done now except that one that I can't figure polarity on...

A couple of the caps were off in other places, one on a small power PCB I hadn't seen, and one on the underside of the metal bracket the chassis PCB connects to...

There are two huge ass caps, maybe the power supply filter caps for the whole cabinet since I don't see any others, that should be swapped. One of them has a whole bunch of ratings on it, though, so I need to figure out what to put in.

Kevin Mullins · « **Reply #33 on:** January 13, 2008, 01:52:37 pm »

Does this help?
Match the polarity to the resistors in the same circuit.

Level42 · « **Reply #34 on:** January 13, 2008, 03:27:06 pm »

I had wrong voltage values in my G07 cap-kit from Bob as well. Mail him about it (it will cost him some sleep though !)

IG-88 · « **Reply #35 on:** January 13, 2008, 05:26:28 pm »

I was wrong by the way. That encyclopedia doesn't have "Tank 2" in it. Every other Tank edition but not that one. Still a nice read tho...

ChadTower · « **Reply #36 on:** January 13, 2008, 05:31:05 pm »

Quote from: Kevin Mullins on January 13, 2008, 01:52:37 pm

Does this help?
Match the polarity to the resistors in the same circuit.

Thanks! I had to use the schematics to locate a couple of caps, hadn't gotten around to locating that one yet.

Level42, I did email Bob... he says he wouldn't have made that mistake. A little odd considering I am looking at all 4 of these caps at 25v rather than 50v. Of course, I bought the kit a couple years ago, so I'm not worried about it. I had the parts on hand from a "general monitors cap supply" I picked up a few months ago, can't remember who though. $25 worth of various caps commonly used in monitors.

ChadTower · « **Reply #37 on:** January 14, 2008, 10:52:55 am »

The one cap I'm still confused on... after a bit of advice from RGVAC, I may have pulled C17 instead of C16... but the most likely leads from C16 (as marked on the board) are for this component that looks exactly like a corn dog. I've never seen a cap like that...

Level42 · « **Reply #38 on:** January 14, 2008, 02:05:30 pm »

Quote from: ChadTower on January 13, 2008, 05:31:05 pm

Quote from: Kevin Mullins on January 13, 2008, 01:52:37 pm
Does this help?
Match the polarity to the resistors in the same circuit.

Level42, I did email Bob... he says he wouldn't have made that mistake. A little odd considering I am looking at all 4 of these caps at 25v rather than 50v.

Yeah, his response to me was the same. But still he doubted a bit and asked me to mail a picture, which I did. He then went through hours of video tape (yeah, I couldn't believe it either, but apparantly he constantly films the packaging.......

) and couldn't find the mistake. Got a LONG e-mail about how he couldn't explain this happening as he is so precise and his way of working etc.
I guess he's just very proud of his (almost) fault-less process

He sent me the correct caps right away, by the way. Bob's great, even though he doesn't accept PP/CC....

Isn't that a tantalum cap ? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tantalum_capacitor

B.t.w. what is a corn dog ?

ChadTower · « **Reply #39 on:** January 14, 2008, 02:54:31 pm »

Quote from: Level42 on January 14, 2008, 02:05:30 pm

B.t.w. what is a corn dog ?

That does appear to be it, thanks... I had that originally pegged as C16 but didn't think it was a capacitor. Now I know

That's a corn dog... a hot dog encased in corn bread.


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