APB Restoration - Done!

[RetroACTIVE]

I was a bit bummed by the APB stuff that was not as nice as it should be... because I'm ready to put this thing to bed... but it will just have to wait.

The color I had picked originally for the space invaders door was not what you see... it was a bit darker and had a slight texture to it, closer to the original finish... but unfortunately that powder was no longer available and I left it up to them to pick a substitute.  Its a gray with a little brownish tint... it looks nice, better than what I could do with a spray can so I'm pretty happy with it. 

[HaRuMaN]

Why is the left coin return crooked?

[RetroACTIVE]

Why is the left coin return crooked?

Oh, I've not mounted it back to the door... i just plopped it on there for a photo.

[Malenko]

still looks fantastic James!

[RetroACTIVE]

still looks fantastic James!

Thanks!  Hopefully I'll be done soon... I'm looking for suitable seat covering at the moment.

[RetroACTIVE]

This seat is a result of a bunch of different folks... plans were drawn up from my original seat, DPTWiz (klov) had reproduced the wooden seat pedestal as a kit for me so it came ready for assembly!  Rich at ThisOldGame faithfully reproduced the seat side art in both factory white and APB flyer red!! I chose red.  The pain for me was finding a suitable replacement for the seat material... I was lucky enough to find one and its pretty much dead nuts the same as the original...

Building the base of the seat first...


Then came the front and rear faces...


That's it! Nothing to it... I did sand the corners to round them off as per the original.  I hit it with 80 grit on the random orbital...


Can you guess which one is new


Sides attached...


I painted the sides two colors... Black for the inside face and Red for the outside... in case there is any exposed wood when the decal is attached.


Here is the new seat rubber... whadddya think?


Cut to fit (about right)... we will trim it later...


I attached the bolts and tnuts (not shown) then sprayed the thing with contact cement...


Also coated the rubber matting..


Simply roll it on keeping constant even pressure against the material...


Continue until its wrapped tight and then staple...


Trim off excess... and we're done!!!



Re-attach the sides... sorry folks no pics of attaching the side art... truth be told it was pretty easy... no special skills needed... if you can put on a postage stamp... you can do this one


Do the t-molding...

...looks so darn good when that protective layer is peeled away...


Here it is... (red got washed out in the pic)

[Spyridon]

Nice work.  That seat turned out great.

[jennifer]

         Oh yes, that did work out nice..... I gotta ask however, that seat rubber, can I get some too or was it just a lucky find??

[RetroACTIVE]

         Oh yes, that did work out nice..... I gotta ask however, that seat rubber, can I get some too or was it just a lucky find??

Found it on amazon...
http://www.amazon.com/Rubber-Cal-Ribbed-Corrugated-Rubber-Floor/dp/B001ASCTEQ/ref=cm_sw_em_r_o_dp_-m7-mb0VD185G_tf

[RetroACTIVE]

I've been waiting for this for a bit... I received my artwork the other day and had a heck of a time getting it to fit... bottom line... its a tight fit and it is challenging.  For one, its irregular and secondly it has very little room for error as it follows the cab profile fairly close... 

But I'm giddy... this looks so damned good!!!

...pinball machines make great tables ...except stuff slides off them


... its necessary to trim the excess ... and trim it close as I mentioned, its a tight fit.


... align it, you will need to put the cop light right up against the edge of the cab to get the back side to fit without hanging over... there is little margin


...shyaaaah


...calling officer Bob!!!!


... aaaaaand there it is!


...tutha' side




just to show how tight it is ... along the cop lamps...




... along the back side...


Here is a nice shot of both the side art and seat art from ThisOldGame.com

[Spyridon]

Nice job installing that, but I have to say that is some pretty ugly side art.  That guy gives me the creeps!

[brock.sampson]

What?  That guy is awesome especially love the 70s porn moustache.

[HaRuMaN]

         Oh yes, that did work out nice..... I gotta ask however, that seat rubber, can I get some too or was it just a lucky find??

Found it on amazon...
http://www.amazon.com/Rubber-Cal-Ribbed-Corrugated-Rubber-Floor/dp/B001ASCTEQ/ref=cm_sw_em_r_o_dp_-m7-mb0VD185G_tf

Nice.  That looks like the same material on my Battlezone.  I'll have to keep that in mind...

[JustMichael]

What?  That guy is awesome especially love the 70s porn moustache.

I think he wears too much rouge...

[opt2not]

RetroACTIVE, your gameroom looks awesome. Got more pictures of what's in there?

APB is turning out great too, glad you saved this one! 

[RayB]

Beautiful work.
 

[RetroACTIVE]

RetroACTIVE, your gameroom looks awesome. Got more pictures of what's in there?

APB is turning out great too, glad you saved this one! 

Thanks... Yeah, at some point I'll take a couple of shots of the game room... I 'aint there yet... I need to get all of these machines finished up then it will look nice

Beautiful work.
 

Thanks!

[adidas1984x]

got to do video as well!!!

[RetroACTIVE]

Pedal work... I took some shots of the application of the anti-skid tape but cant find them... anyway... cut it stuck it... nothing to it.  You can get it at Home Depot or Lowes.

Old grubby potentiometer and a new one ready to go...


Pedal parts ready to be assembled, I already put the axle in and the C clips on the ends.  All we need now is the new pot, rocker arm and spring...


Rocker Arm... installation


Soldered the cabinet pigtail on to the potentiometer and used a bit of heat shrink tubing to make it nice.




Mounting the pedal...


Seat Mount on the inside with bolts...


Exterior Coin Door...


Interior Coin Door...


As you recall... in a previous post I had a difficult time dealing with the filthy inner shelf... welp... decided to give it a coat of paint...

Masking...


Painted... nice and clean now!!!


Now that looks much better ....


Now the control panel.  To be honest, I really would like to strip this down, powder coat it and put a nice silk screened reproduction overlay on it... but since that doesn't exist ...yet... ahem... I am just going to clean this, change the wheel out and the buttons out to pep it up a bit.

Old rusty wheel...


Bad buttons...


Gummed up bearings...


Filthy wheel hub...


Dismantling "The 500" wheel



See the diff between the old and new bearings....


Bobs APB buttons


Stripped and cleaned


Installing the hub...


...the large wheel bearing


...the wheel


...and the encoder pcb.


The last of the wheel...


Installation of the EMI shield. Of course this piece was missing from my APB... found one and then found the knurled nuts used to anchor it...




The APB System 2 Boards, properly mounted in the APB cabinet:


A view from above...


Control Panel...


Atari's APB








Thats all folks!!! I hope that there is some information in this thread to help other APB lovers out there!!!  This was very fun... now back to Space Invaders

[opt2not]

 
Excellent job Retro! That APB looks amazing! So clean and minty...
Seeing what you started, this cabinet has come a long way. Thanks for documenting and sharing the process. 

Heh, you do love the sandblastin' don't cha?

[RayB]

Looks like it has the world's longest circuit board!

great job!

[yotsuya]

I played this game enough as a kid to tell you that I really enjoyed reading this thread and seeing your progress! 

[Vigo]

 

I love APB, it had so much personality. Very cool restoration, you do grade A work! 

[RetroACTIVE]

Thanks folks... yeah I've been enjoying playing this.  I'm digging the confess-o-meter stages after you capture the perp!

I may do a couple small finishing touches....

1.  There is/should be a paper cardboard shroud that is stapled to the shelf and curves up and over to the left sidewall to keep grime from falling on the sound board and coin counter area.
2.  I may finish painting the insides... i really like the way that shelf came out and it makes the rest of it look dirty.

3.  There is a small PCB issue on the main power connector.  The original design has a small rf filter board that sits between the harness and the pcb.  On mine, it is bypassed because the header on that small filter board is burned up... I will definitely rebuild this and re-pin the main harness with trifurcon connectors for long term reliability.

[jennifer]

        Two thumbs up...... The dude on the sideart, still a little creepy!        Kinda hopin" to see the space invaders too, is that a upright?

[RetroACTIVE]

        Two thumbs up...... The dude on the sideart, still a little creepy!        Kinda hopin" to see the space invaders too, is that a upright?

Yup it's an upright... http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=108461.0

[RayB]

I'm pretty sure the filter board was just to meet FCC radio interference rules for commercial devices. You don't need it.

[Malenko]

baller status.

Whats up next?

[RetroACTIVE]

I'm pretty sure the filter board was just to meet FCC radio interference rules for commercial devices. You don't need it.

Yeah... your absolutely right...  its not needed... but I was thinking on repairing it just for sake of making the the game 100% done.

baller status.

Whats up next?

Welll... If I can ever get rid of this respiratory infection I have I will be continuing onto my Space Invaders project.... then believe it or not I have an Atari 4P football game to finish (there is a resto thread on it around here somewhere). That one I started well over a year ago and had to rebuild the whole cabinet as there was so much moisture and rodent damage to it.  I've one more panel to finish and then I can put it back together...

[Malenko]

how much are you going to sell me this APB for? Frederick aint that far from Delaware!

[RetroACTIVE]

how much are you going to sell me this APB for? Frederick aint that far from Delaware!

HA!!!! Not sure this one would be worth the trip... I don't think anyone would be willing to pay what I would have to ask for as the amount I've invested in this bad boy is way way way more than what this game is worth.

[TheShanMan]

As always, very nice restoration Jim!

         Oh yes, that did work out nice..... I gotta ask however, that seat rubber, can I get some too or was it just a lucky find??

Found it on amazon...
http://www.amazon.com/Rubber-Cal-Ribbed-Corrugated-Rubber-Floor/dp/B001ASCTEQ/ref=cm_sw_em_r_o_dp_-m7-mb0VD185G_tf

Nice.  That looks like the same material on my Battlezone.  I'll have to keep that in mind...

You can get this stuff at Lowes (and probably Home Depot) in the flooring dept for something like $2.50 or $3 per linear foot. I recently redid the step on my battlezone and my sea wolf with this stuff.

[RetroACTIVE]

As always, very nice restoration Jim!

         Oh yes, that did work out nice..... I gotta ask however, that seat rubber, can I get some too or was it just a lucky find??

Found it on amazon...
http://www.amazon.com/Rubber-Cal-Ribbed-Corrugated-Rubber-Floor/dp/B001ASCTEQ/ref=cm_sw_em_r_o_dp_-m7-mb0VD185G_tf

Nice.  That looks like the same material on my Battlezone.  I'll have to keep that in mind...

You can get this stuff at Lowes (and probably Home Depot) in the flooring dept for something like $2.50 or $3 per linear foot. I recently redid the step on my battlezone and my sea wolf with this stuff.

Thanks Jeff!  You know I thought the same as everyone was telling me Lowes or Home Depot... Must be my area because this stuff is no where local to me.

[jennifer]

This matting is available in different thicknesses.... mine (for the base of enduro racer) will probably be on the thin side. Guess I better get out the caliber. Thanks again.

[HaRuMaN]

This matting is available in different thicknesses.... mine (for the base of enduro racer) will probably be on the thin side. Guess I better get out the caliber. Thanks again.

Caliber?

[Malenko]

off topic: My mom builds those (she works in the stamping side of Belvedere) I used to work in Newark building Durangos

[Funnel]

  Very impressive work!! Everything is so detailed!

[jennifer]

        OMG..... I"m so shamed..... Just going to take my caliber and go!

[rotten]

Great job!  I just picked up one of these to restore to.  I really love this game.  Mine works but was having monitor problems.  Kind of a warp with tears.  So i recaped it.  That didn't work.  So i just resoldered every component on the monitor pcb.  That did the trick!  Now if i can just score the seat.  I've contacted the guy who has it, but he lives about 4 hours away.  Trying to figure out a time to meet up with him.  Worse comes to worse, i have the skills to build one.

This project is on the back burner for a bit as i am restoring an elevator action and a mystery game (other then it's a williams, my lips are sealed for odd reasons)

Hope mine will turn out like yours!

[RetroACTIVE]

Great job!  I just picked up one of these to restore to.  I really love this game.  Mine works but was having monitor problems.  Kind of a warp with tears.  So i recaped it.  That didn't work.  So i just resoldered every component on the monitor pcb.  That did the trick!  Now if i can just score the seat.  I've contacted the guy who has it, but he lives about 4 hours away.  Trying to figure out a time to meet up with him.  Worse comes to worse, i have the skills to build one.

This project is on the back burner for a bit as i am restoring an elevator action and a mystery game (other then it's a williams, my lips are sealed for odd reasons)

Hope mine will turn out like yours!

Definitely a fun game... it was fun to restore as well.  I play it regularly and its still running perfectly.  Most people who visit enjoy this one... the flashing lights really liven up the game room!

Good luck on your restore!  Don't forget to post pics!