The NEW Build Your Own Arcade Controls
Main => Main Forum => Topic started by: P-chan on December 23, 2021, 06:15:56 pm
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I have a friend who has a sizable pinball collection and also does repair/maintenance on them himself. He has a decent amount of roughly 21"x43" tempered glass panels from pinball machines and is willing to give me a couple.
My plan is to get the glass first and build the cocktail table around it. I will likely use a 32" TV LCD panel. Attached is my very rough first sketch of what it might end up looking like. The boxes that contain the buttons and joystick will be shaped nicely, not just a box, but the dimensions and proportions are pretty close to correct at a 29" table height.
FWIW, I've built pedestals and cabinets before but this is my first attempt at a cocktail table and my first use of real glass rather than plexi. The wood will likely be black melamine 3/4" with red T-molding.
Any thoughts/suggestions?
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Also for what it's worth, I realize this screen size is huge when you're sitting this close. Most of the games will be head-to-head type games where each player gets half the screen. For the single player 4:3 and vertical games, I'm comfortable with creating different MAME layouts to shrink the game display/add digital bezels as needed.
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Looks like a fun project as long as you don't do THIS (https://www.buildxyz.xyz/pinball-coffee-table/).
Make sure you test the viewing angles before you get too far - maybe make a mock-up out of cardboard? It's a big monitor so you want to be able to see everything comfortably and even if you shrink down the images with bezels or whatever you want it to not be too far away.
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That's a great idea! So long as the glass is tempered why not?
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Looks like a fun project as long as you don't do THIS (https://www.buildxyz.xyz/pinball-coffee-table/).
Seriously. he's going to regret all that great work he did when his lower back gives out within a couple of weeks...
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Looks like a fun project as long as you don't do THIS (https://www.buildxyz.xyz/pinball-coffee-table/).
Seriously. he's going to regret all that great work he did when his lower back gives out within a couple of weeks...
If you scroll down in the link, you can see that he butchered a neat-mint Centaur to make this thing. Unreal.
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I couldn't watch it. :'(
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Looks like a fun project as long as you don't do THIS (https://www.buildxyz.xyz/pinball-coffee-table/).
Seriously. he's going to regret all that great work he did when his lower back gives out within a couple of weeks...
If you scroll down in the link, you can see that he butchered a neat-mint Centaur to make this thing. Unreal.
I used to scream the house down coming home late and standing barefoot on a lego brick.
Brushing past that thing in the dark looks fatal. ;D Its like a ---smurfing--- cheese grater.
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Looks like a fun project as long as you don't do THIS (https://www.buildxyz.xyz/pinball-coffee-table/).
Seriously. he's going to regret all that great work he did when his lower back gives out within a couple of weeks...
If you scroll down in the link, you can see that he butchered a neat-mint Centaur to make this thing. Unreal.
I used to scream the house down coming home late and standing barefoot on a lego brick.
Brushing past that thing in the dark looks fatal. ;D Its like a ---smurfing--- cheese grater.
Couldn't have put it better!
I don't want to be the voice of doom and gloom, but building a cocktail table to match a piece of glass seems like the wrong way to go about doing a build. Even if the glass is tempered, glass doesn't cost that much.
My thoughts are that it would be better to do a build design that works for you and your people, family etc. Then it can be whatever size and shape you want. Then, when you're ready, just get glass cut to order. It really isn't that expensive compared to the other costs involved.
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The size is almost what I would build anyway (to fit a 32" LCD TV), and a piece of custom cut tempered glass this size would definitely be the single biggest expense of the project. I definitely looked into custom cut glass already. The only thing I would change if I was getting custom glass is rounded corners, no big deal.
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The size is almost what I would build anyway (to fit a 32" LCD TV), and a piece of custom cut tempered glass this size would definitely be the single biggest expense of the project. I definitely looked into custom cut glass already. The only thing I would change if I was getting custom glass is rounded corners, no big deal.
Fair call.
Out of interest, how much were the quotes for the glass, and how much did getting tempered glass add to the costs?
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For a similar size, just rectangular glass without even rounded corners it was about $150. They said rounded corners would be extra. Tempered glass rather than annealed only added about 10 bucks, which I thought was interesting.
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That's for 3/16" thick glass, fwiw. Going up to 1/4" added another $100 or so.
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For a similar size, just rectangular glass without even rounded corners it was about $150. They said rounded corners would be extra. Tempered glass rather than annealed only added about 10 bucks, which I thought was interesting.
More than I thought but not unreasonable. Tempered glass being not much more is interesting, I noticed that last time I asked at my local glass place too.
That's for 3/16" thick glass, fwiw. Going up to 1/4" added another $100 or so.
Wow, that is a steep rise :o
Looks like 3/4" plywood will cost you ~$66-$100 for a 4x8' sheet these days. You may as well source some clips for the glass while you are shopping for stuff. If you make the top piece with 3/4" and have 1/4" glass then it will be easier to find the right 1" clips as they mostly come in 25mm/1" size.
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Centaur? ---smurfing--- Centaur?
:banghead: :banghead: :cry: :cry: :cry:
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Centaur? ---smurfing--- Centaur?
:banghead: :banghead: :cry: :cry: :cry:
Neigh!
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If you scroll down in the link, you can see that he butchered a neat-mint Centaur to make this thing. Unreal.
Why would anybody destroy a working cabinet for THAT??
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Like my grandaddy used to say...
"There's an ass for every seat."
What a ---smurfing--- travesty to shred that cabinet when you could've just scratch built the same damnable thing.