Flame Mame - a MVS Conversion project

[Bobbler]

Hi guys,
well I have been lurking here for around 9 months or more soaking up the excellent information, ideas and drooling over  some of the awesome cabinets being built. At last I think I am ready to start my own build.
Basically what it will be is a control panel, but with the entire PC inside it. The original plan was to build a full cabinet but just dont have the space to put it anywhere...maybe when we get round to buying a new house

The plan is to be able to lug it around to my mates house for some beer and gaming action nowandthen, as well as being able to stick it in the cupboard when not in use at home. Future plan is build a flat cabinet in my office using an LCD which you can dock the control panel on for standup action.

Its going to be a standard 2 player 6 button each affair running Mame, Daphne and SNES games. All the software is setup ready to go after completing the PC bit last night just need to do some work on getting Daphne sorted out.
Joysticks (some cheap Baolin? models for the time being) and buttons connected up to a Minipac unit.
Trackball from a PC job which I am hacking up as a donor.
The PC is a modified Nforce2 Shuttle. I have stripped it out of the case and put some quieter cooling gear on it. Should fit nicely in the control panel sized box.

I am not very good at woodwork so it should be a challenge for me. PCs I can handle...router on the other hand I managed to demolish the Lexan sheeting I originally was going to use in about 30 seconds (well I didnt know you could only cut in one direction with them ). Have simplified the construction and will be making do without lexan top and control panel artwork on this first build....it gives me something to aspire to at a later date

Will post up some pics/links as soon as my Dremel arrives.

[mccoy178]

Welcome to the forums.   I would highly recommend taking your time with this one and not expecting it to be your final, end all project.  If you are anything like most of the guys here, once you're finished, you will want to continue improving upon what you've made based on the lessons learned.  Good luck to you and please don't forget the most important thing:  pictures are your best friend.  We likey the pickey.

[IG-88]

Welcome! Good luck on your project. Realize that if you hook this thing in your office your work productivity will drop significantly     You will probably even like going in there again!

How are you planning on controlling the SNES games? With the joys & buttons or are you going to hook up a controller somehow?

[Bobbler]

Welcome! Good luck on your project. Realize that if you hook this thing in your office your work productivity will drop significantly     You will probably even like going in there again!

How are you planning on controlling the SNES games? With the joys & buttons or are you going to hook up a controller somehow?

Will be using a USB adaptor and a couple of SNES pads.

I realise what you are saying about locating it in my office, though its not all bad. When I work from home in my office I am usually just waiting for a phone call to fix someones systems, so having something you can pick up and play in between calls is all good

[theCoder]

I second what mccoy178 said.  If you agonize over each and every decision, cut, purchase, etc., you will take forever and cause a lot of heartache.  No matter how careful you are, you will mess-up somewhere.  Learn from it and move on to the next one.

Good luck with the build.

[Bobbler]

Hmmm, well it appears my woodworking skills are somewhat lacking.
I spent best part of yesterday very patiently making my cuts, sanding, smoothing, drilling and it looks like an accident

Maybe its just something I am not up to doing as I lack the practical but have plenty of technical skills.

I may go for a pre-fab cabinet instead and convert it which I think I should be able to manage. Maybe a cocktail cabinet to replace my desk

[leapinlew]

I want to say - "Keep Trying!" or something else inspirational, but I think you might be on to something. Spend a little money and buy an old junker cabinet. An old Nintendo cabinet, Pac-man, or Ms. Pacman cabinet thats been converted a few times. Clean it up and make it yours.

My first cabinet was a Nintendo cabinet. I converted it to play 4 way classics on a vertical screen. All I had to do was cut a new CP and do some repair on the cabinet.

[Bobbler]

LOL. Thanks for the sentiment though

Thinking about the amount of money I have spent on tools etc I could have bought a cabinet by now. But tools are an investment, just need to learn how to use them properly. £15 of MDF is not a big loss.

I have a total of about three options I am looking at presently:

1. Do like you said, old cabinet and convert it. Problem is finding one for reasonable money here in the UK. I want a two player side by side style one for fighters.

2. Buy a pre-fab unit from Gremlin Solutions, but they are charging a pretty penny for them. Nearly twice the price of the same cabinet in USA - http://www.gremlinsolutions.co.uk/cabkits.htm

3. Find a chippie to build it for me. I know one guy but he's a pain in the rear to pin down, it took me weeks to get him to actually turn up at our house to fit out counter tops in the kitchen.

Its a shame Ikea dont make them for like £25 or similar

[Bobbler]

Sorry to bump my own thread again but just managed to snag this from ebay:

Despite its untidy appearance the structure is sound, not a cocktail but I just had to snag it as it was local to me and ended up at £145 which I thought was pretty good.
Got several Neo Geo carts with it too which are pretty distracting LOL.
Just think some tidying and a bit of TLC here and there and it should be good to go.

So happy that I have a cab, my youth can begin again now

[leapinlew]

Awesome....

Way to go - this is a great 1st step. I converted 2 cabs before I built my own from scratch.

[FunWithFire]

Just whatever you do, you have to promise to keep that control panel overlay. It's beautiful.

[Bobbler]

Just whatever you do, you have to promise to keep that control panel overlay. It's beautiful.

You have to be kidding, right ??!?
Its like a jesters trousers!

[danny_galaga]

Just whatever you do, you have to promise to keep that control panel overlay. It's beautiful.

You have to be kidding, right ??!?
Its like a jesters trousers!

so you are saying its pants? 

[Bobbler]

Update for today:

Cabinet has been completely cleaned inside and out. I dont know how people can let things get so disgusting 
As a bonus for my trouble I found some nice new t-molding stashed in the back of the cabinet. Just enough for both front sides of the cab. BONUS!

Stripped out all of the MVS wiring that was in there, not very tidy job but the loom was expertly wound. I know some people like to leave them intact but there was so much botched together wiring I thought it would be safer to remove it. Besides, its not likely to get another owner

Removed the clowns trousers control panel sticker. Removed the side arts.
Learnt that Sticky Stuff remover takes about 5 to 6 hours to remove the glue from one side. 2nd side took 20 minutes with a couple of applications of t-cut. Cleaned up the metal panel and removed some of the surface rust. Will strip it with Nitromors at some point I think before I apply a new overlay.

Mounted in the PC hardware which went straight in where the old MVS system was. It has a nice little slideout tray to screw it to.

Attempted build of cardboard bezel. Found my talent in doing so was lacking so ended up ordering one along with an ArcadeVGA card. Originally planned to replace the monitor with a PC job but I love the old school look of a proper monitor in there.

Took off the coin mech. Found that mounting a microswitch behind the coin return button should make for a nice admin button with just a little bit of glue

Ordered a copy of Project Arcade from Amazon too.

To do still:
Fill control panel buttons and redrill to 6 button layout.
Speaker system installation.
Fit T-moulding
Clean up and respray the metal kick plate and the plates around the coin door area.
Fit new camlocks to front and rear doors.
Put a new powerfeed in for the monitor PSU, PC and speakers as old one was "untrustworthy" IMO.
Fit the monitor bezel.
Decide on artwork for control panel and sidearts

Some other bits and bobs:
Get the old MVS carts and the Neo Geo up on ebay, which should hopefully pay for just about what the cabinet cost me and maybe a bit over towards the artwork etc.

[Bobbler]

Update for today:

Control panel has been filled. Plated the back of the existing button holes with some metal (took the case off an old IDE CD Rom drive I had up in the loft...perfect donor!) and stuck it in place with some araldite epoxy. Filled up the holes with Plastic Padding body filler. Sanded flush once dried and hardened. The Dremel has proved its worth already during this project, sanding down the filler was taking an age until I broke out the Dremel and flap wheel attachment. Also made short work of the rust and loose paintwork.

The T-molding I found inside the cab has been installed today too. I may change it for a different shade as I am not sure if its going to be the right blue for the sideart/overlay that I am working on at the mo.

I have been taking pictures of the progress, just havent got them uploaded from my camera as of yet. I will update the thread with them at a later date.

Thoughts for the day:

I think I may just go for some sort of sticky sheeting instead of spray paints to tidy the metal kickplate, glass retainer and metal edgings of the coinbox area. Its gonna be best I think as some of the bits I can't remove without taking apart a huge amount of the cabinet and I cant get it outside at this time of the year in the UK

[Bobbler]

Update for today:

Have got some sideart and a control panel overlay ordered from Mamemarquees. Just waiting on the design being done (I cant use Photoshop at all LOL) so for a few quid extra requested the guys to do it after supplying them some ideas from stuff I have been gathering together.

Have managed to stick my ball top joysticks in thanks in part to the Dremel again! The original mountings are welded in place and didnt want to remove them if possible. I used a cutoff wheel and cut some notches into the ball tops mounting plates which have worked out quite nice as they now fit in the existing mounting points.

Missed the delivery driver for my ArcadeVGA card and monitor bezel

Have ordered up some sticky vinyl to cover the metal work and had the cunning plan of using some skateboard grip tape to cover the metal at the base. Should wear well and saves me some spray painting.

Copy of Project Arcade turned up though which made my day. Superbly written book from what I have gone through so far.

Ordered some cam locks to replace the ones on the cabinet which have been drilled out as the previous owner lost the keys

Got my GameEx key through too.

An eventful day really considering I didnt get home from work until 6:30.

[leapinlew]

Anyone can say all these things. It truly takes a man to post pictures.

 

[Bobbler]

LOL sorry mate, I just keep forgetting to upload them from my camera. I promise I will when I have a bit of time.

Lo and behold there are now some images up

[Bobbler]

Well some good, some bad.

The good -
Order is in for the sideart and CPO at Mamemarquees. Just had the first draft from Scott there. Man they work fast!
Got the bezel all fitted along with the sticky vinyl which has covered up the rough metal parts nicely.
Speakers installed in the cab this afternoon.

And now for the bad
Marked up the holes for the 6 buttons this afternoon and started with the drill (got a metal die cutter thing on order but need to drill out the holes for the threaded bolt to pass through), problem is as the drill hit the metal mounted to cover the old button holes it just pushed them off the panel      . Seems epoxy is not the best thing in the world for keeping them secure.
Gonna have another go at the process during the week with some better metal bits I have floating around. If that fails I discovered my mate has a arc welder up in his attic that I can borrow.

[Bobbler]

Small update:

Turbo Twist 2 Spinner arrived this morning from http://www.groovygamegear.com . Quickly discovered that this is going to be fantastic in GameEx for selecting games! GameEx already recognises mouse Z axis (wheel) and allows you to whizz through the list quickly with just a button required for select and back functions. TT2 has Z axis right on the optiwiz!


ArcadeVGA is all in place now and working. Shame my monitor appears to have some jailbar effect bands running up it, but can be combatted by turning the brightness down a bit. New monitor is on the shopping list now, just need to track one down which isnt that easy.

All power is in place in the cabinet. Standard kettle style PC socket mounted in the back which goes to a 4-way socket. Makes it all nice and easy with just one plug to connect to the outside.

Speakers and sub are all inside along with the PC. Took a bit of juggling around to get it all to fit but its done!


Re-done the control panel metal back plating. The epoxy is just curing downstairs clamped up at the moment. Hopefully I have learnt from my mistakes which became evident when I stripped the old plates off. All the epoxy was bonded to the control panel fine but had barely stuck to the plating over than in a few places. This time I have "roughed up" the plates and clamped it all together on my workmate while it sets.
We will see in the morning if its gonna hold better. Pending the outcome and the arrival of my metal hole punch we could have a functional cab by the weekend

Draught of sideart has come through from Scot at Mamemarquees too:

Gonna look good!

[Kaytrim]

And now for the bad
Marked up the holes for the 6 buttons this afternoon and started with the drill (got a metal die cutter thing on order but need to drill out the holes for the threaded bolt to pass through), problem is as the drill hit the metal mounted to cover the old button holes it just pushed them off the panel      . Seems epoxy is not the best thing in the world for keeping them secure.
Gonna have another go at the process during the week with some better metal bits I have floating around.

I have seen others use bondo to fill in the holes on a metal CP.  If your epoxy fails again you could give that a go.  I like the artwork that you posted.  Would like to see more of this.

I use GameEx as well.  You have come up with a better solution for navigation that I did.  I just used two buttons wired into the joystick up and down.   I might have to look into your solution when I build the final version of my cab.  I do have a spare spinner laying around that could be used for this.

 

[Bobbler]

How come you have gone for seperate buttons for GameEx control? I was just using the joystick before the arrival of the spinner, didnt seem to need to have special controls for it.
It was more luck than planning that it worked out though. I just happened to have a mouse with wheel plugged in my cabinet while setting it up and spinned the wheel on it, the list scrolled nicely Further luck was had when the TT2 turned up and noticed that it just uses a mouse Z axis for functionality.
Bondo would be good, but the problem is that I need to put new holes which are partially gonna be on the filled ones, I dont think that filler alone will stop the buttons being bashed through the control panel in a frantic session

[Kaytrim]

How come you have gone for seperate buttons for GameEx control?

My guests didn't know how to use the controls to maneuver the menu system that GameEx has.  So I added the 4 buttons to the admin panel layout just for that purpose.  I also have a three button section for MAME admin controls (pause, config & quit).  Follow the link in my sig below to see more.  I was stuck on the guest board until SirWoogie got the forum fixed so my name there was AKA Kaytrim.

[leapinlew]

One thing is driving me crazy about your side art. The ship from Galaga needs to point up and down. Don't know why thats bothering me as much as it is.

Also, the sideart is missing something.... consistency I think. The flames are high quality shiny graphics while the old school video games are all pixelated. Does that strike anyone else as off? It looks good and would look great on your machine - but I wonder if you could tweak a few things and make it look even better.

[Bobbler]

One thing is driving me crazy about your side art. The ship from Galaga needs to point up and down. Don't know why thats bothering me as much as it is.

Also, the sideart is missing something.... consistency I think. The flames are high quality shiny graphics while the old school video games are all pixelated. Does that strike anyone else as off? It looks good and would look great on your machine - but I wonder if you could tweak a few things and make it look even better.

I appreciate the critism Leapinlew. I know what you mean about the ship but I wanted some stuff flying about up there, maybe Skykid would have been a better choice or Gradius ship or something I dunno, but I like it there and its recognisable.
Seriously though I like the work, I wanted pixel characters over the top of the flames. The flames themselves will be on the control panel (without the characters) so it should look good as "the big picture" if you will.
Scott has come up with a design for me from a few very basic elements that I gave him and its exactly what I wanted. First draft that came through looked a little "busy" I guess as it just had random pixel characters over the top of the flames so didnt look like they "belonged". We had a quick chat and lost some of the other guys from the sideart and made those left fit better.
Thats the thing with art I suppose, one mans Mona Lisa is another mans sheep in famaldehide LOL

[deadkenndys1105]

So im not the only bother but the galaga ship being sideways.  Well this is going to be a nice project.  I dont like conversions though.

[Bobbler]

Well, today was the day I decide to give up on attempting to rework a metal control panel
New drill bits - Check!
Metal cutting hole punch - Check!

Got the drills holes done by stepping up the range of drill bits till I got to 10mm (for the hole punch screw to pass through). 12 holes done but half of my bits completely blunt.
Stuck the hole punch thread through, began to turn and found that its not cutting anything really, it too was blunted by just a couple of turns of the thread. What a waste of time, I get the feeling that the steel of the control panel top is just too tough for anything but industrial level tools. After taking a look at other metal control panels around on the net its in a completely different league by the looks of it. A couple of similar conversion projects show people either just filling up extra holes and cutting out new ones or getting plasma cutting done or doing what I am about to do...
So its looking like the end of the project for the time being, I have one option left to me which is remake the control panel out of wood but I already know I cant even cut a straight line!
Its so frustrating. I just want to play some games!!!

[Bobbler]

Its been a while since I did much work on the cab, but this week I have been working from home so there was some time to get stuck in.

I have managed to take my time over cutting and stuff and come up with a replacement for the metal control panel from the original.

Lo and behold, a playable Mame cab:



Just need to do one more hole for my spinner, once I have worked out the placement, and we are about there

If only I could stop playing games it would have been done by now LOL.

Another bonus is that its fully undoable by just undoing the screws (that are filled) and you can just clip the original metal panel back in place

Also going to stick a usb port on the underside of the CP for plugging in SNES or Playstation controllers etc and a couple of headphone jacks for late night gaming.

Managed to keep the button for admin stuff down to a minimum too. The central black button is the shift key and then you can escape from a  game or gameex via pressing it at the same time as the coin (yellow central button), shift + 2UP for pause, shift + 1UP for mame TAB menu. Excellent!
Going to make up a mini instruction card to put under the monitor glass to clarify it for guests.

Things left to do:

Wait for the cp overlay/side art.
Fit the TT2 spinner.
Fit USB and Headphone ports
Instruction card
I have a Matrix Oribital 4x20 LCD that I may put in there to show controls etc.
Mount power switch on top of cabinet.

Then...remodel my office from scratch so that there is more room to play on the cab!

[steveh]

I hate to say it but they way your controls are setup you are going to be hard pressed to find a convenient place for the spinner.  I would say move both sets of controls more to the side and drop the spinner in.  but thats going to mean a new cp.

[Bobbler]

Heh heh,
it actually slots in just nicely by the player 1 buttons (circled in picture below) thanks in part to the small footprint of the TT2 spinner I got.
I always knew it was going to be hard pushed to fit it all in, but the placement feels ideal  to me. I can get my hand to it from left or right and have access to buttons from either side.
Its main use is going to be for the navigation through GameEx frontend (setup of mouse Z axis it just lets you scroll through the game list no bother at all) with some occassional Arknoid action



Here you see the insides with the TT2 in place. Its a squeeze but its all just about there.

[Bobbler]

The spinner is in place now (as per inside cp shot in post above). Arkanoid just became so much more fun compared to playing with the joystick 

Power switch mounted on top of the cabinet - just used a spare button and extended the wire from the motherboard up to the top of the cab. Should stop any accidental pressing during gameplay.

Tweaked the IPAC settings a little, I found that when using it there where some occassions where you could end up bringing up the tab menu accidentally by pressing certain buttons at once.

Tweaked the monitor calibration and played with some resolutions - No more rolling screen in vertical games, MK series and in the frontend when the resolution switched  Still rolls around when the windows logo is on during bootup but I can live with that its only there a couple of seconds. Just need to get it recapped to get rid of the jailbars which show up on the darker screens mainly as the new or used monitor is either too pricey or not the right size...

Ordered up some more memory as 256 meg isnt enough for Killer Instinct as its paging out to hard disk and causing framerate drops. Another gig should stop this I think and make it boot and exit a bit better.

Snagged a second hand AMD 2800 XP to replace the 1800, again just for a bit of extra oomph for not much money.

Couple of sets of headphones (Skullcandy GIs) and the leads to split out the connection from the speakers so I can play later and get the sockets mounted underneath the control panel.

The Matrix Orbital LCD seems a bit pointless really, it doesnt add anything to the cab really other than a bit of bling factor as controls are easy enough to figure out IMO. May mount it if I can think of any real reason to use it, possibly as the instruction card substitute for the GameEx controls...

Done some more tweaks to my XP install to reduce it further. Bootup is now pretty quick even with the 256MB of RAM in there. Highly recommend TuneXP for doing some stuff that you normally wouldnt think of doing (move bootfiles location, turn off some unecessary NTFS file settings, tweaks the paging file etc)

Still waiting on the artwork from Scott though which is a bit of a downer as I cant finish up the wiring, all the buttons will have to be removed when I fit it so they are not solidly in place, the leads to some connectors coming off during play now and then so will be soldering them in place.

May go for a change of buttons and t-molding, we'll see how it all looks when the artwork is in place. Quite fancy making the coin button out of a translucent with the disk for 25c...

[steveh]

it looks to me that the spinner is too close to every thing to be functional.  But if you like it run with it.

[javeryh]

I'd also be worried about pressing the player 1 buttons when using the spinner... unless you use your right hand or something...

[Bobbler]

Thanks for the concerns guys, the spinner feels fine to me as I just naturally started using it with my right hand. I suppose it depends on what you are used to really or how bit your mitts are LOL.
I tested it out before fitting by taping a couple of button nuts together (which is the rough size of the spinner profile) and a sticky backed pad on the bottom.
Just stuck it in place at various locations on the control panel and played some games to see if it got in the way with two players on there.
Its a small width 20" cab at the end of the day, I dont want a franken-panel or some huge surfboard affair like a lot have on their machines. The idea of sticking every concievable control on for every combination of game just looks a mess in my opinion.
This is a first arcade project (and first bit of woodworking I have undertaken in nearly two decades - last time I was about 12 years old), I will learn a lot from doing it the way I am and hopefully learn by those mistakes....indeed I already have thoughts for when I build a cab from scratch which I am sticking down on paper as I go along with a shopping list of parts and tools I would like to use.