Centipede Restoration... no turning back now...

[ArtMAME]

I got a nice Centipede cabinet at SuperAuctions in Atlanta last week.   

Cabinet is nice and solid, monitor and bezel glass are in awesome shape. 
Side art has a few deep gouges but is intact.
No boards or PSU, just a monitor with really bad mushroom burn-in and badly cracked chassis board. 
CP is a bit bent on the left and overlay is torn up badly.
Trackball needs good cleaning or rebuild kit. 
Fire and cone buttons need replacin'

At first I was gonna go cheap and just MAME it into a Centiped/Millipede combo using a spare PC and PC monitor... with the intent of fully restoring it in the very distant future...

A few bids later............Looks like I am restoring a Centipede now... ...Won a parts lot on Ebay for working harness, PSU, A/RII board, and untested motherboard...

...no turning back now...  restoring a classic like Centipede...might as well do it right...

I may grab a cheap Electrohome chassis off Ebay to see if the monitor tube still works.  Then later get a Happs Vision Pro to put in the Centipede, and use the old mushroom monitor to play around with.

For now, all my change is gone  , thanks to that parts lot, and another recent purchase...

I really need to stay off Ebay for at least a year...darned this Ebay  , darned this hobby  ...  darned this BYOAC forum...

Did I mention darned this Ebay??? 

Here is a pic of the Centipede cabinet.  What you see on the right is the side of a scratch-built cabinet that I am making for a friend...there just aren't enough hours in the day...can anyone relate???

[CheffoJeffo]

ArtMAME you know that you need a bigger challenge than the "easy-way-out" of a dedicated MAMEing -- you deserve more !

And now you have more.

Nicely done, BTW!

Cheers.

[97thruhiker]

Good luck with the Centipede, I had a blast with the Nintendo cabinet I picked up back at the Orlando auction.  I'm glad you found a cabinet to restore at the auction as I remember you were wanting to get down to the Orlando auction.

[Gambit]

Looks like a half finishes lucid cabinet in the picture also.  So you'll have a mame and a centipede eventually.

[korendog]

Very nice acquisition ArtMAME.  Enjoy the restoration process....that is a sweet cab.

[ArtMAME]

Looks like a half finishes lucid cabinet in the picture also.  So you'll have a mame and a centipede eventually.

Does look like a Lusid's cab doesn't it...It is actually a Midway-style cab like the MKs or the Blitz cabs.  I modeled it after my Williams High Impact Football cabinet.  I did use Saint's book as a construction guide, which illustrates a Lisud's cabinet.     I made the cab 4-1/2" deeper to acomodate a 29" NEC presentation monitor (big and bulky just the way I like it)  .  I already have a completed personal MAME cab, and I am working on this for a friend, and I am working on another MAME conversion using a generic Konami cab.

Yeah, yeah, I know, I got too many projects... well, got no kids right now...so I have plenty of time to dedicate to this stuff, sort of...

Oh, I forgot about the Centiped restoration... I better get back to work

Here is a shot of my WIPs 

[CheffoJeffo]

Yeah, yeah, I know, I got too many projects...

I only see three projects ... freaking novice ... you need at least 5 projects before you come close to "too many" 

* CheffoJeffo  rubs his hands in glee at the thought of going to auction this weekend to pickup up another project for the pile

Cheers.

[Havok]

Yeah, yeah, I know, I got too many projects...

I only see three projects ... freaking novice ... you need at least 5 projects before you come close to "too many" 

Seriously - I see enough room for at least one more upright and cocktail...

 

[ArtMAME]

Yeah, yeah, I know, I got too many projects...

I only see three projects ... freaking novice ... you need at least 5 projects before you come close to "too many" 

Seriously - I see enough room for at least one more upright and cocktail...

 

Guess I am going to have to crash the next auction and pick up some more projects...

[patm95]

Congrats on the cabinet.  It is going to be awesome when you get it done.

[cw]

Yeah, yeah, I know, I got too many projects...

I only see three projects ... freaking novice ... you need at least 5 projects before you come close to "too many" 

* CheffoJeffo  rubs his hands in glee at the thought of going to auction this weekend to pickup up another project for the pile

Cheers.

5 is close to ...too many... im in deep trouble.... but it does get better with each weekend... and load of  parts for ebay and good old bob r... this hobby will eat every spare inch of house and garage you have....  darn you saint you did this to us...

[theCoder]

You definitely picked a tougher challenge.  It is much easier to roll-your-own because you can make it up as you go along.  Your friends don't necessarily know what you had in mind originally vs. what you ended up with.  They do (as least some) know what the original is supposed to look like. 

I agree with your eBay comments.  It is too easy to pick up something, thinking, yea, I can use that in my next cab.

Good luck on the project

[ArtMAME]

It is much easier to roll-your-own because you can make it up as you go along.  Your friends don't necessarily know what you had in mind originally vs. what you ended up with. 

Yes, I have definitely had to make adjustments and improvisations as I have progressed with it.  The scratch-built cab was originally supposed to be a prototype so I could work out all the bugs, but it is turning out so well that my freind wants that instead of the one I was going to build next.  It has been a challenge, but I have enjoyed it the heck out of it.