Mario Bros inspired custom Mame cabinet

[Erik]

Alternate title: Area Man Builds Arcade Cabinet in 15 Years

Not going to give the life story, but the short of it is that I have been wanting to make a cabinet since Mame 0.33.  So my first game is 15 years in the making!  I actually bought the Ipac on here in 2003 and it sat unused for 10 years until now.     I built it over the span of a few weeks this Winter.

There are a half dozen or so things I would do differently if I were to do it again, however they don't bother me enough to do it again    There are a ton of builds that inspired this and to try to name them would be to leave out others, so I will just say it would not have happened without the many projects BYOAC members have shared. 

This thread will be mostly pics so it will seem to go very fast although it did take a few weeks.  I just wanted to be sure I completed the project before starting a thread.

[Erik]

I printed a shape roughly based on the Ultimate Arcade and cut it out.  The dimensions are fairly shallow since it will have a 1920x1200 lcd.  My eyes are sensitive to refresh rates so arcade monitors were out of the question.

It's hard to tell from the perspective of this first shot but both sides were cut from a single 4x8 sheet.

[Erik]

The cabinet is basically held together by wood glue and brads.  This worked out great and was very easy to do.

[Erik]

Coin door was an ebay pickup a few years ago.  It came with the counter and the buckets and everything, although I yanked those.  Not shown but the coin slots are lit by LEDs powered by USB. 

[Erik]

Here's where it starts to look like a real game 

[Erik]

Started applying a black speaker cabinet vinyl.  It looks ok, however I don't think I would use it again.  It is not extremely durable.  I basically chose it because I was concerned if I got into a hot mess of painting the project might lose momentum forever 

[Erik]

Installed the speakers.  These are from parts express and I love them.  ND4 or something like that.  4" full range.  The grill is perforated aluminum I cut and painted it black.

[Erik]

A couple misc pics.  The first one shows the issue I ran into with the coin door.  Everything but the sides of the cab is 1/2" birch ply.  It was too thin for the coin door and it wouldn't tighten down properly.  I had to add a 1/4" strip around it to get it snug.

The second pic shows my hinge situation which was a complete failure.  This was my biggest disappointment of the project.  After many attempts I could never get them to swing over the pointy tips of the sides correctly, so I bailed on them and screwed the panel down with L-brackets on the interior

[Erik]

I installed a 250mm fan and a 10" sub.  The fan pulls in a lot of air and there are exhaust vents at the top.  There is no need for fans at the top as it moves plenty of air and maintains positive pressure.  The sub is an open air one, so the leaky nature of the cabinet isn't really an issue.  I'm pretty happy with how it sounds. 

[Erik]

Began building a control panel.  This took as much time as everything else had probably.  I ran into some problems with how the joysticks would line up but after a few drinks I worked it out. 

The joysticks are copies of Seimitsu sticks and they're pretty nice.  The white buttons are Sanwa and the clear buttons are Seimitsu.  I found (after completing, of course) I prefer the Seimitsu feel over the Sanwa. 

The joysticks are made for a metal control panel so I needed to modify the wooden panels quite a bit to accommodate them.   Lots of routing, bondo, and sanding





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[Erik]

Panel construction continued...

[Erik]

Painted top of panel black and applied a 3M adhesive textured carbon fiber look panel.   The black looks nice to me but sometimes I wonder if I should have went with the blue carbon fiber 

Full disclosure, I wanted to do something custom and interesting here but every time I would make something it turned out gaudy.  I am not a graphic artist and I knew when to throw in the towel. 

[Erik]

I made up some side art and marquee art from vector images of the original art.  I sent it to Soul Draw and they printed it for me.  The sides are black adhesive backed, as I wasn't sure if white would cause any issues.  The marquee is reverse printed and looks fine sandwiched between plexi.  One issue I had with Soul Draw was they rolled the side art way too tightly.  It had all kinds of creases that were extremely hard to get out. 

Was sort of terrifying to apply the side art but it worked out in the end.  DIdn't get pics of that, just a few mid points.

[Erik]

Computer pics.  It is an i5-650 with 8GB ram and SSD.  It has an old sound blaster which at one time was desirable and the video card is a GTX 650.  It runs XP x64. 

The speakers and sub are powered by a cheap, really old car amp that was collecting dust in the garage.  I read a lot of speculation on how much power these would require.  So I did my own test and at excruciating volumes it was barely topping 2 amps.  At normal listening levels it is below 1 amp.

You can also see how the monitor mounts.  The width of the monitor determined the width of the cabinet.

[Erik]

Almost completed pics.  At this point I did a jig  I needed to make a bezel still, which I cut out of black foam core poster board.  Afterwards I ordered some tinted and tempered glass to cover the monitor and bezel. 

[Erik]

And the final pics as it sits today!  The pins will come and go but the arcade cab will never leave 

[Typefighter01]

Me likes...me likes Hate to sound like Corybee's lady friend, but it really looks cute...good work.

[jbenesh]

Nice design and very clean work.   

[Nephasth]

Let's see the underside of that CP!

[Erik]

Me likes...me likes Hate to sound like Corybee's lady friend, but it really looks cute...good work.

haha thanks.  It is sort of cute, but it needed to stay family friendly.  At one point I tried to make something based on Ghouls n Ghosts (my favorite game) but couldn't get the artwork right.  I also love the way Dragon's Lair 2 looks but it would have been too big for my space.

Nice design and very clean work.   

Thank you!

Let's see the underside of that CP!

I just looked through the pics and I never took a picture of the underside of the CP!  I was so disappointed about the hinges I must not have bothered.  Anyways I color coded them, cut to length, and bundled them together with zip ties, but it's nothing special.

In the beginning I had the POW block (escape) button lit and was going to light the coin and start buttons.  However the light was kind of distracting so I disconnected it.  Although I liked the look when not playing. 

[retrostark]

very nice. i like all of the pictures. what drill press were you using? i am officially inspired to make a mario bros cabinet.

[Nephasth]

Let's see the underside of that CP!

I just looked through the pics and I never took a picture of the underside of the CP!  I was so disappointed about the hinges I must not have bothered.  Anyways I color coded them, cut to length, and bundled them together with zip ties, but it's nothing special.

I'm mostly interested to see your joystick mounting.

[yotsuya]

I'm mostly interested to see your joystick mounting.

Me too. That came out really nice, btw.

[retrostark]

yah i want to see the underside of the CP, just a few pictures, the control panel turned out quiet nicely and what are the specs of the computer.

don't know if you said, but what is the monitor as well?

[Erik]

very nice. i like all of the pictures. what drill press were you using? i am officially inspired to make a mario bros cabinet.

thanks and do it!  The drill press is just a cheapo Skil brand

I'm mostly interested to see your joystick mounting.

Me too. That came out really nice, btw.

I'll try to snap a couple pics from below tonight.  What the pics fail to show is that I added 4 more bolts to each of the metal CP inserts.  I stole this idea from someone else on the board.  I countersunk the screws then put thin nuts underneath.  So it goes like this:



Yes I just made that in MS Paint 

[Erik]

yah i want to see the underside of the CP, just a few pictures, the control panel turned out quiet nicely and what are the specs of the computer.

don't know if you said, but what is the monitor as well?

the specs were sort of buried above:
It is an i5-650 with 8GB ram and SSD.  It has an old sound blaster which at one time was desirable and the video card is a GTX 650.  It runs XP x64. 

I'm using HLSL and it runs smoothly.

The monitor is a 24" Dell U2414M lcd, 1920x1200.  It gives you about the same viewable area as a 20" 4:3 lcd for most games. 

[retrostark]

thanks erik for the quick reply

[adamated87]

Sorry for being a newb here, but where would one find a computer chassis like that?

That seems like a much better idea than just setting a tower in there...

[Erik]

Sorry for being a newb here, but where would one find a computer chassis like that?

That seems like a much better idea than just setting a tower in there...

 
It was this one http://www.amazon.com/MYOPENPC-BENCH-Partition-Mountable-motherboards/dp/B004U365PC/ref=sr_1_1?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1366915456&sr=1-1

Works ok but the weight of the power supply makes that area flex.  Might be better to mount the power supply to the cabinet instead.

[retrostark]

that mountable PC chasis is nice, i meant to ask about it, but forgot. thanks. kinda pricey though.

[Erik]

that mountable PC chasis is nice, i meant to ask about it, but forgot. thanks. kinda pricey though.

The price varies so you might want to check back another time.  It was 54.99 when I ordered it.

[Mr Wilson]

very nice 

[alteredgrafix]

Great job. I love your game room set up. I wish I had the space for more pins.
 

[mgb]

 

Awesome job.
That is one nice little cab you got there.
perfectly done

[sabreerbasAlpha]

There has been a few CPs around a lately that have really impressed me, And this one is right up there. In fact the whole look is bang on, But then I am just a sucker for the carbon fibre and white trim look. Very nice job mate..