Ok, as promised here is the write up. About three months ago a friend of mine (Mike) and I were playing some games on my pc. Well, we started talking about old times and came up with the idea that it'd be cool to have a "real" arcade machine. Of course the crappy joypads we were using helped to further this idea. So, the next day I started my search online to see what other people with this idea had done, and I wound up here. I should note here that you all have created some awesome stuff / restored some awesome stuff.
The decision was made almost instantly to build myself (and friends) an arcade cabinet. I had some rather different requirements for mine though, aside from what the average person would. Here they are in no particular order….
A. It had to fit through a 30” doorway
B. Four player control panel
C. A good sized monitor (I used a 25” tv from a pawn shop)
D. It had to endure the elements (humidity mainly, it’s on a screened in porch)
E. It couldn’t look like a drunk monkey put it together with thumb tacks and super glue……
A. Alright, let me start with A, this cab is sitting on my back porch, I have no other option. My wife, stepdaughter and I are currently living in a 1-bedroom apartment on the backside of my in-laws home. (can you say hell) I have a pretty nice porch, it’s screened in, and is on the shady side of the house. The doorways into our place range from (30”-33”) so I wanted my cab to fit through them since we’re planning on moving within the next year. The cab is 29” wide by the way, and roughly 33” deep at the bottom, which makes it very stable.
B. I wanted a four player control panel so that all my friends could play with me. I also didn’t want it to be too long or too wide, or otherwise dis-proportionate to the cab. So we decided to make it 48” wide by 16-19” deep, depending on where you measure it. As you can probably tell, I didn’t put any spinners/ trackball on there. As far as wiring goes, I used quick connects, but they have some anti-corrosion compound on them and the switch terminals. I DID NOT WEATHERPROOF THE BUTTONS….. they’re plastic, and replaceable, so I didn’t see any need to. We had an accident, I mean we did a test, by pouring beer into the panel not too long after getting it working initially. I should note here that the buttons can be washed if you disassemble them first.
C. The monitor is a 25” tv, I could not see spending more than 100 bucks for something that was going to sit outside. I lucked up and found a 25” APEX tv with a ton of inputs at a local pawn shop for about $85. I would like to also note here, that contrary to what so many people say about the arcade monitors, I have seen no considerable difference between the tv using s-video and the arcade monitors I’ve seen in action. Maybe, I just got lucky. Anyway, it was decided after placing the tv as into the cabinet, that it would look better with the tube mounted to the bezel. So I called my brother-in-law (who’s a tv repairman) to come over and make sure I didn’t blow myself up while doing this. One note here, we were going to put a nice lexan monitor bezel on the machine, however, after playing for a while, we noticed that bugs are attracted to tv’s, DUH. We left the bezel off because we didn’t want dead bugs stuck between it and the tv. I did say that this cab in on a screened in porch, but let me remind you it only keeps about 80% of the bugs out.
D. Enduring the elements, (humidity, hot and cold mainly) was the biggest pain of this project. I knew from the start that mdf was out of the question as a building material, so I wound up settling on 5/8 pine plywood and 2x4’s. I did a lot of research on weather proofing outdoor furniture and settled on using spar-urethane, which is supposed to provide a great barrier against the elements for wood. Also, the original pine color was nice, but I wanted this thing to look like a bar top, so we stained it before urethaning it, using minwax oil based stain (the color is gunstock). The whole machine has 3 coats of urethane and the top of the cp has 5, and it looks beautiful.
E. I have seen some awesome cabs on the internet, and I have also seen some nightmares. I didn’t want to build a nightmare. I started this project at the end of July / beginning of August, at the time it was 95-105 degrees Fahrenheit with 70-100 percent humidity outside. WE (Mike and I) sweated a lot, but we got the whole thing assembled in one week. Initially, the buttons on the cp were soldered and the tv sat on a shelf with a front bezel. We were so excited that it looked like an arcade cabinet we started playing it immediately. After about two –three weeks we figured out that we didn’t like the cp layout, the buttons were too close to the joysticks (players 1 &2) and the tv didn’t look so great the way it was mounted. So we disassembled the whole unit and set forth on fixing the things we didn’t like and finishing it the right way. Needless to say the high humidity messed with the staining / urethaning, so it wasn’t until last Saturday that we finished. What you see in the pictures is the finished product hope you like it…….
You may note, that we used pegboard for the back, this is for ventilation for the tv tube / pc in the bottom, I know it’s not weatherproof, but it is easily replaceable and lightweight. One other thing, I have very, very little woodworking background, especially for something this size, and none of my help did either, (except my dad). Oh yeah, on Other thing, BE CAREFUL WITH WOOD STAIN, IT WILL MESS UP YOUR CLOTHES SHOES, UNDERWEAR. ESPECIALLY IF YOU POUR THE WHOLE CAN ON YOUR FRIEND…..
I would like to thank Mike for helping pull this off, couldn’t have done this without his help (sorry about the clothes). I want to thank My wife for not killing me, or making me sleep outside with my cab. And I’d like to thank my dad and brother-in-law for the help they gave putting this thing toghether.
Next step…. Build a cocktail cab…. or maybe a racing cab…. or maybe a dual racing cab…. Oh, wait, I’m out of room now….
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