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Carriage Bolts On your CP: Tacky, or Tasteful?

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Avrus:

--- Quote from: Sir Auros on January 27, 2008, 02:29:42 am ---I remember almost every arcade game that got a lot of playtime from me having the carriage bolts on the outside, so I feel like they should be out there. I feel the same about joystick dust washers.

--- End quote ---

That was my feeling as well.  I mean, going through the trouble of building an arcade cabinet and them removing the carriage bolts? For me that would have been like not having a coin door.

That being said, if it made my cabinet look cooler I'm sure I would have considered it.   :blah:

RandyT:

My opinion is that bolt heads were seen on panels only for purposes of cost and expedience.  There is only one circumstance in which the bolt heads serve a valuable purpose, and that is additional binding points to hold down a clear plexi or lexan overlay.  While that has mechanical benefit, it certainly doesn't do much for aesthetics.

With a few exceptions, carriage bolts were added by operators, rather than installed as original equipment by the manufacturer.  More likely than not, they were installed as a repair when the OEM mounting methods gave up the fight after a few years of abuse. 

As Fozzy stated, it's mostly about what you like, what you remember, and what you are trying to recreate.  Most manufacturers (then and now) try their best to hide hardware when possible, as the result is generally considered more pleasing to the eye unless the hardware is decorative or part of a specific theme.  But it is a matter of taste, pure and simple.

For the most part, you should never have to worry about your sticks breaking free if you use the right hardware.  You (hopefully) won't be leaving your machine in an unattended 24hr laundr-o-mat to be hammered on by drunken thugs, so the added durability of carriage bolts is probably not a concern here.

RandyT

rovingmind:

--- Quote from: MaximRecoil on January 27, 2008, 06:20:15 am ---
--- Quote from: patrickl on January 27, 2008, 05:48:10 am ---You don't understand how a t-nut works then. The bolt goes on on the OTHER side of the wood from the t-nut. The bolt pulls the t-nut into the wood.

A t-nut with bolt is basically the same as a carriage bolt with a nut. The difference is that in the case of the t-nut, the nut is actually stabilized by the nails on the nut.

--- End quote ---

That's not how T-nuts are normally used but that method would be as strong (or nearly as strong) as mounting with carriage bolts.
--- End quote ---

Actually that IS the way they are supposed to be used.  If the joysticks were undermounted the t-nut would go on top with the overlay covering them.  If the joysticks were topmounted, the tnut "should" go on the bottom with the stick and bolt heads recessed enough for the overlay to cover them. 

T-nuts were designed to work as blind nuts in wood.  After they get put in, the bolt puts pressure on it to pull it into the wood fibers.  Initially the prongs are there to take the place of having to use a wrench on the back.  They usually fail through poor initial installation or overtightening which causes the teeth to literaly cut a groove letting it spin, hence the use of glue to assist its holding power.  Once it starts spinning you cant get it to a proper torque to hold and the bolt can work loose like any other undertightened bolt.  If a joystick is top-mounted and the t-nut is on the topside of the panel also, thats just poor craftsmanship, or somebody in a hurry and didn't know any better.   If a cabinet manufacturer did this they might have been expecting the plexi to assist in holding it down. 

They do have some that CAN be used that way but they have a larger flat and nail holes to hold them to the wood.  You still have the, "screwdriver will pop them out" problem if you work at them.

edit:  i havnt dissassembled arcade cabinets, so i do not know how the manufacturers of them have used t-nuts.  I have used them in industrial uses where they have to meet their rated holding power to be ISO compliant.

javeryh:
I've got black ones on my cocktail CPs (metal) but if I had to do it over (which I may yet do) I'd get rid of them.



MaximRecoil:

--- Quote from: rovingmind on January 27, 2008, 11:19:01 am ---Actually that IS the way they are supposed to be used.  If the joysticks were undermounted the t-nut would go on top with the overlay covering them.  If the joysticks were topmounted, the tnut "should" go on the bottom with the stick and bolt heads recessed enough for the overlay to cover them. 

T-nuts were designed to work as blind nuts in wood.  After they get put in, the bolt puts pressure on it to pull it into the wood fibers.  Initially the prongs are there to take the place of having to use a wrench on the back.  They usually fail through poor initial installation or overtightening which causes the teeth to literaly cut a groove letting it spin, hence the use of glue to assist its holding power.  Once it starts spinning you cant get it to a proper torque to hold and the bolt can work loose like any other undertightened bolt.  If a joystick is top-mounted and the t-nut is on the topside of the panel also, thats just poor craftsmanship, or somebody in a hurry and didn't know any better.   If a cabinet manufacturer did this they might have been expecting the plexi to assist in holding it down. 

They do have some that CAN be used that way but they have a larger flat and nail holes to hold them to the wood.  You still have the, "screwdriver will pop them out" problem if you work at them.

edit:  i havnt dissassembled arcade cabinets, so i do not know how the manufacturers of them have used t-nuts.  I have used them in industrial uses where they have to meet their rated holding power to be ISO compliant.
--- End quote ---

Have you ever seen the T-nuts on the bottom of an arcade machine for the leg levelers? How about speaker enclosures (T-nuts are often used for mounting the speakers—you don't want to go all the way through because that compromises the seal of the basket to the baffle).

In any event, T-nuts are typically used for screws that are going to be removed or adjusted often. They provide metal threads that don't strip as easily as wood, and that is their primary purpose. If someone needs a lot of holding power/clamping force, they use hex nuts or something along those lines (note how much burlier a hex nut is than a T-nut). Also keep in mind that the back side isn't always accessible in applications that call for T-nuts—and in the cases where the back side is accessible, most people would just opt for a conventional nut and bolt arrangement, if they needed a lot of strength.

The situation with an arcade control panel is not a common one. How many other applications can you think of where you need to bolt from the back side and have nothing protruding on the front side so you can apply an overlay?

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