I debated about starting a thread until I was at the painting stage, but after finding so few showcase styled cab projects I figured I'd start a little early. More build pictures are on my website:
http://home.comcast.net/~dark.paladin/gauntletBackground:I was the first caller on a Gauntlet Legends game in the huge showcase type cabinet for $250 on craigslist. I called the guy back and told him I would have to pass as I didn't have anyplace to put it, and would have to rent a truck to pick it up due to its size. The next day I woke up and realized that I should have just taken it completely apart if need be to fit it in our truck, even if it took several trips.
About a week later I saw all the guts of a Gauntlet Legends cab on craigslist. I called the seller, and it was the guy who ended up with the cabinet I passed on. Turns out he only wanted the cabinet, as he purchased a huge control panel from mameroom and an LCD monitor. He's turning the cabinet into a MAME cab. I picked up all the guts of the cabinet - 38" medium res monitor, complete control panel, game boards, power supply, fans, wiring harness and 2 backup hard drives. I paid him $225 so he still ended up with the better deal, but I think I did OK for what I got.
Scratch build begins:It took a while to decide what kind of cabinet to build. If you've seen the Atari/Midway cabinets you'll know that they're essentially a huge rectangular box with a control panel extension. The speakers are actually mounted inside the plastic control panel. The other type of showcase cab is more of a T shape with the speakers mounted to the sides of the monitor. I ended up going with a mixture of the two types, it's the T shape, but without speakers next to the monitor.
I got the dynamo showcase plans from jakobud's web site, but some of the measurements didn't quite add up right. The height of the monitor stand seemed to be 3 different sizes, depending on which diagram I looked at. It may be partly my fault, as I'm no expert on reading plans. I decided to use the plans as a guidline, but just wing it when it came down to the final measurements.
So far I've built the monitor stand and control panel stand, but neither has t molding or paint yet. The design I came up with will have the advantage of breaking down into 4 pieces - the monitor surround, the monitor stand, the control panel stand and the control panel.
I haven't decided what to do with the bottom of the cabinet. I should have used plywood for the base, but I used the same 3/4 inch particle board as the rest of the cab. I'm a little worried that leg levelers won't hold the weight without ripping out of the bottom. I'm thinking of either using 2 inch casters or nylon furniture sliders. I'll have to make sure the 2 inch casters don't raise the cabinet up too high, making the control panel uncomfortable.
Any comments are welcome! Pictures of the backside of any showcase monitor section would also be appreciated. I've got lots of pictures of the fronts of these styled cabs from ebay, but no shots of the back. The monitor surround will be the most difficult part to build due to the need for plexi and a way to hold it in place. My monitor chassis is just about level with the bottom of the monitor, so the dynamo plans for the back won't work.
Monitor stand: The stand has a removable shelf just below the level of the door. I notched the door and surrounding panels so the door will sit flush with the rest of the front when it's closed. You can also see the holes in the top panel, shelf and bottom extension that will allow wires to pass through.
Control panel stand: The stand has a cutout for a coin door, and a hole in the bottom extension (not shown) that matches up with the monitor stand to allow wires to pass through. I should have made a top for it like the monitor stand, for the control panel to bolt to. I'll probably have to do that.
Stands together: I haven't figured out how to bolt the two sections together. I should have hammered some t nuts into the backside of the monitor stand extension when I built it.