Be careful when moving your arcade machine. TRUST ME ON THIS!

[boogieman]

Oh what fun things I get myself into!  I had a soul edge cabinet, a really big one with a 27" monitor.  Anyways, I decided it was too big for my living room, so decided I would like to swap out the internals into a gutted (not by me) virtual fighter cabinet.  So, I decided to take it to the garage.  Now my house has a wheelchair ramp (for the previous occupants) instead of stairs, so I figured this would be an easy job.  Problem is at the bottom of the ramp is just grass, no sidewalk.  So i decided to put some 2x4 lumber there to push the 2 wheel dolly on.  It's a bit hard to describe, but basically, there is a little ditch there with about a 18" rise to the road.  I was going to push the arcade machine on the road around to my garage.  Anyway this is where the fun starts!

I get down the ramp and onto the wood.  My wife was moving the lumber in front of me so I wouldn't sink into the ground (it's rained recently and is soft).  I get the machine to the top of the ditch just ready to get on the road.  One wheel of the dolly dropped of first and all hell broke loose.  The game starts tipping.  I try to save it and have enough time to think OH S##T THIS IS GONNA HURT, I WONDER HOW HEAVY IT IS?  Then  WHAM!!! the machine spins/tips down the 18" rise and slams into my left shoulder/arm/neck/ area.  It also hits my left shin in a place I had previously hurt it. 

Well, the cabinet EXPLODED into about 5 million pieces, the monitor was slammed into me and I have no idea if it still works.  It hurt like hell and really felt like someone body slammed the whole arcade machine onto me.  I couldn't move for a while and of course my wife sees the whole thing (why is that always the case?  Wives always see the dumb stuff lol).  She was really freaked out.  Anyways, I am OK but my shoulder is really sore/swollen. 

YOU SHOULD HAVE SEEN THE CABINET!  It looked like a semi ran into it.    The cabinet I had a real neat shape, the monitor was in a little "box" part on front of the cabinet, that box part ended up on top of me lol.

Then while still hurting very bad, I had to unwire a bunch of stuff so I could separate the components.  Luckily my wife was there to help carry misc parts to the garage. 

Anyway, be careful with those dang cabinets, I think they are out to kill me lol 

[ChadTower]

Ow.

Gotta strap it to the dolly, man.  Strap it down.  And use plywood for temp flooring!

Glad to see you're not injured.

[Ginsu Victim]

You can't make a thread like this without pics.

[ratzz]

NIGHTMARE!

What hurts more now, your shoulder or your broken heart ... 

[CrazyKongFan]

YOU SHOULD HAVE SEEN THE CABINET!  It looked like a semi ran into it.    The cabinet I had a real neat shape, the monitor was in a little "box" part on front of the cabinet, that box part ended up on top of me lol.

Did it look anything like George's Frogger cabinet after the truck smashed it on Seinfeld?

Anyway, sorry to hear your loss...hopefully at least the monitor survived. It's amazing how heavy that stuff is. When I got my gutted former Robotron cab, it had nothing of any weight in it except the power supply, and it still weighed a ton. I couldn't imagine lifting that thing up into and down out of a pickup truck if it'd been a complete game.

[Darth Nuno]

This is what I call 'ArcadeLifeStyle' 

Glad to see you're not injured, but please... for the love of God ... put some pictures 

[SirPeale]

Ow.

Gotta strap it to the dolly, man.  Strap it down.  And use plywood for temp flooring!

Glad to see you're not injured.

I was going to say this exactly.  You should have used plywood at the very least instead of a very narrow 2x4, and you should have strapped it down.

[TOK]

Thank you. I think the value of my Soul Edge has just increased by 10 cents.

[boogieman]

LOL Pics?   

I already cleaned up the mess.  Now it just looks like components sitting in my garage. 

I will be sure to use straps and plywood from now on.  I wish I would have got some pics of the aftermath, but I am afraid my wife would have shot me or at least had me committed!   

Well, at least it will be easier to put the stuff in the new cabinet now lol.

[extendedplayarcade]

Good thing to hear no one got seriously injured. 

They have those heavy duty hand carts at lowes or home depot with those tracks on them for stairs.   They also have adjustable straps.   They are great to have if in case you decide to move some more machines.

Brent
www.extendedplayarcade.com

[rlehm]

You can't make a thread like this without pics.

[Hemi]

What I think they mean when they say "add pictures" is to get the cab in position to where it ALMOST fell on you and have the wife take some pics AS it starts to fall on you.   

[Jimbo]

What I think they mean when they say "add pictures" is to get the cab in position to where it ALMOST fell on you and have the wife take some pics AS it starts to fall on you.   

Even better, video it! 

[Loafmeister]

boogieman:  What counts is that you're ok. You can always buy a new Soul Edge cab, just be ready to pay 10 cents more .

[boogieman]

Well, I made a lot of progress on fixing the mess.  The soul edge cab is gone, but truthfully that cab was the biggest piece of crap.  Very shoddy construction in my opinion.  Anyway, I got the monitor mounted in the virtual fighter cab yesterday, and today I got the motherboard/hd/computer stuff mounted in the cab.  It is turning out really good.

I still need to re-make the cp and such, which is 80% or so of the hard work I suppose.  I got the computer booted up, it was missing a system 32 file, so I had to reinstall xp.  It messed up all my maximus arcade settings and I had to re-install arcadevga drivers and such, but it worked.  Good news, I got the monitor working.  The neck board was a bit off, I pushed it back onto the neck and it was acting weird, fuzzy screen and such.  I pushed it a bit more and it clicked into place, worked perfectly.  That made me REALLY happy!  I figured it would have trashed the monitor.

Anyway, this seems to be coming together real fast.  The quality of the virtual fighter cab is probably 3 times as good as that soul edge.  I am going to have to get a new bezel (the soul edge one is too short) for the monitor, and new plexiglass for the monitor.  Also I will need a new marquee as the custom sized one is not sized right lol.

[Ummon]

Ow.

Gotta strap it to the dolly, man.  Strap it down.  And use plywood for temp flooring!

Glad to see you're not injured.

I was going to say this exactly.  You should have used plywood at the very least instead of a very narrow 2x4, and you should have strapped it down.

Yeah, that's like Laurel and Hardy stuff.

[CrazyKongFan]

Yeah, that's like Laurel and Hardy stuff.

Hardy: Well, here's another fine mess you've gotten me into!
Laurel (squeaky voiced and crying): Well I couldn't help it

TCM showed a 24 hour marathon of them the other day...I'd forgotten how funny they were

[M.Lanza]

I came pretty close to arcade destriction twice yesterday.

I'm moving out of state and just got the truck yesterday and started loading stuff.
The mame cab was the first to be loaded since it's the biggest and heavest thing I own.
Loading everything myself and using a very cheap handtruck do not make for a good combination.

Don't go cheap on the handtruck. It's not worth it to save 10 or 20 dollars on somthing
to move large, heavy, and expensive objects.

I may have thought I was saving money when I bought it, but a 10 minute operation with little trouble
turned into 45 minutes of fear and many close calls.


The second instance came when I had to carry the megatouch from the table it was sitting on
in the house to the truck 30 feet away. The megatouch may be small, but it's much heavier than it looks.
My strength gave out and I dropped it while I was setting it down about an inch above where I planned
on putting it. I got lucky.

I'll have help when I get to my destination, which is great because I don't think I could manage to
lift this thing by myself again without incurring a major back injury.

[nipsmg]

Another moving tip:  Make sure that if you put casters on your cabinet as an afterthought that you properly secure the bottom panel of your cabinet.

Loaded it in the moving van, went over speed bump.

after I opened the back, I found that the bottom panel of the cabinet had shot up through the rest of the cabinet, splitting the sides off, destroying the PC inside, and making the whole cabinet insalvagable....   I didn't design the base panel to hold all the weight, as it originally just sat on the floor, and shared the weight with the 2 side and front/back panels.  I never reinforced it (like an amateur/idiot).


It took another 2 years before I built another cabinet (at least I had all the parts).

RIP Arcadia (http://arcadia.gerety.net)

[ChadTower]

And make sure if you use the angle mounted rear caster method that you are strong enough to stop the cab from rolling away from you.  Twice I've seen guys lean the cab back and then watch it slam to the ground because the bottom shot forward and they couldn't stop it.

[Ummon]

And make sure if you use the angle mounted rear caster method that you are strong enough to stop the cab from rolling away from you.  Twice I've seen guys lean the cab back and then watch it slam to the ground because the bottom shot forward and they couldn't stop it.

You know I hadn't thought of that. Depends on the weight distribution - cab design and where exactly the rear casters are placed - and would suggest mounting rear handles.

[paulscade]

I can see this now...

Cabinet tumbling down the ramp... boggieman trying to stop it... it's no use... cab breaks into a million pieces with boogieman laying at the base groaning in pain... and the words barely coming out of his mouth...   

Quick sweetie, get the camera... I need to have pics of this for the guys at ArcadeControls.

[ChadTower]

What I don't get is the miracle of a shattered cab but an intact monitor.     What are the odds of that?

[TheShanMan]

What I don't get is the miracle of a shattered cab but an intact monitor.     What are the odds of that?

It's kind of like a motorcycle helmet: take the damage in order to protect what's inside.