The NEW Build Your Own Arcade Controls
Main => Project Announcements => Topic started by: Edgedamage on August 27, 2003, 03:25:56 pm
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Here we go on the long road to restoration.
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joust
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robotron insert
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joust insert
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I'm going to ask a stupide question.
I've never seen a cocktail Robotron before. How do you play Robotron without a second joystick? How do you control the direction of the firing?
-Jeff "etumor" Allen
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No question is stupid. The evil conversion elfs got to the cabinet before me and removed the second joystick and drilled a extra hole and put a button where the second joy should be.
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Anyway you can measure the dimention on that Joust cocktail cabinet? That thing is SWEET ;D.
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I will do my best to get them but right now I am really busy at work in fact I am at work right now :-[
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cool, especially the joust!
keep us up to date on your progress. :)
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Nice score on the Robotron cocktail. Those are very hard to find. I hope you restore it.
People like to say the Joust cocktails are rare, but they aren't. I have seen tons of them, and they are probably the fourth most common cocktail out there (after the standard Midway one, the Atari cocktail, and the 13" "School desk" cocktails that tons of game makers used).
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Man tell me about it I have been in the arcade restoration hobby since 1990 and seen operators machine rooms full of joust cocktails that have been converted to double dragon or bubble bobble. As for the robotron I have been playing arcade games since 78 and I have only seen one other robotron cocktail and that was in the late 80's. My plans are to fully restore the both of them. Phoenix arcade will be getting orders from me in the near future. I will start on the joust first the cabinet is rock solid as for the robotron the cab needs work I really hope that home depot has that same funky wood grain laminate because the robotron is missing some on one lower coroner.
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I think Mike Apollo has a Robotron cocktail.
Edit: Yep!
http://www.appolo.com/projects/robotronct/robotron_cocktail_table.htm (http://www.appolo.com/projects/robotronct/robotron_cocktail_table.htm)
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Had a bit of time last night so I started working on the joust. Here's how the cab looks opened up. And yes the last owner remounted the monitor for it's last conversion.
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Hre's a first look at the underside of one of the panels. Looks like someone got creative with body filler.
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After stripping the parasitic parts off the host panel. What I saw next broke my heart looking at the panel and the two inner holes of the four are the original factory holes The one with the four recess for t-nuts is a mount for the really rare optical joystick. Dammm I watched a pair get sold on e-bay last summer.
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After removing the monitor here's a glamour shot of the lovely insides.
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And finally here's a shot of the front of the machine stripped so parts can be cleaned / stripped. As soon as everything is removed from the machine and cleaned out
I will take measurements as promised. One other thing as much as I hate to get a classic machine that has been converted we all must understand something from a operators point of view "when a machine stops making me money I will convert it to a more profitable machine" I know this sucks for people like us but it is the nature of the beast.
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and here's the joust cab stripped and ready for rebuild.
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You deserve a cookie for this good deed! Keep us updated!
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Man the thing was dirty. Good luck with your restoration.
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Ha joust was the cleaner of the two robotron has so much leaves and grass inside I swear every time I open the top I can hear something growl at me.
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I also am waiting patiently (almost) for dimensions of the Joust cabinet. If I drew out the different panels to make it easy to take the measurements and label them would that help? I would have to guess at the shapes and you really only have to do one side for the sides and front.
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It looks like my Robotron table had the same butchery done to it as yours, luckly it is now fully restored and looks the part. The only thing left to do is fit new instruction cards under the glass.
http://www.robotron-2084.co.uk/robotroncocktail.html (http://www.robotron-2084.co.uk/robotroncocktail.html)
I'm also trying to get together an owners list with game serial numbers, if anyone reading this owns a Roby cocktail Email me or visit:
http://www.robotron-2084.co.uk/robotroncocktailownerslist.html (http://www.robotron-2084.co.uk/robotroncocktailownerslist.html)
I'm lookig for the following parts to complete mine to showroom condition:
1. Cash box lid
2. T-molding (it's aweird size!)
Can anyone help me?
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Yeah, email Mike Appolo at appolo.com. He's got a 2084, IIRC. Check his website.
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Ok got a little time last night worked on the coin door.
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Joust coin door sanded.
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Joust coindoor painted with this cool paint I found at home depot. It's called hammered finish from rust olem. It has the same look as the paint found on most coindoors it has the textured look.
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Actually, Rust-oleum makes something called 'texture paint' which is a much better match. The hammered stuff looks nice, but isn't accurate.
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Looks GREAT. I can't wait to see the finished product. It's interesting to see more and more Mamer's going the restoration route. We love the original games so it seems a natural progression to love the original cabinets and artwork as well. The skill level is certainly there for restoration. It's nice to see, even if sometimes we don't choose to install the original PCB's. It would be an easy thing to make most of these restorations fully authentic.
Good work, it's nice to see these old gems come back to life.
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Awesome, keep us updated please! I actually like reading about restoration projects way more than I do MAME cabinets. Once I'm done w/ my MAME cab, I'm going to start going the restoration route myself (assuming I can find any old cabinets around here).
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Ok bit of an update. Nothing on the cab front but I was at my folks today and went digging. And I was surprised at all the boards I forgot I had. Well now time to test and see what works. :)
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And I found my Needham's Electronics "PB-10" Eprom reader writer. And UV eraser.
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Well no update on the cab front but I did recive my wire harness today. I will hook it up to a atx power supply and start testing board sets.
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Well got myself set up to start testing williams boards.
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I know this is a joust thread but these are the first boards I tested.
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Well started testing joust rom boards with my REV-C cpu/video board. The first one I tested passes the self test then crashes on the high score screen. I have a another rom board missing the roms but have a little plastic bin full of joust roms. I have both rom boards at work now I will first replace the 40pin connector on both of the boards. That should be the first thing you do when restoring old williams boards. Also dug up a another joust rom board with the yellow Pterodactyl bug roms but the 40pin ribbon cable is missing. Now just have to find that pile of 40pin IDE ribbon cables I have. Got a robotron rom board working but the game resets if the ribbon cable is just slightly touched. The fix for the ribbon cable I do is VERY carefully remove the end cap from the connector it is very easy to snap off the little plastic clamps if you are not careful. Then remove the ribbon cable from the main connector body take care as the metal fingers that pierce the ribbon cable are very sharp. Now with a pair of sharp wire cutters trim off the the end where you just removed the connector. Now place the connector back on the ribbon cable and using a hobby vice squeeze the connector in the vice the end cap will push the ribbon connector on to the metal pierce fingers. I did this to all complete board sets I ever had and was able with the game running tap on the ribbon cable and the game would not reset.
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Hey Edgedamage,
If you have any interest in unloading one of those Joust/Robotron rom boards let me know. I could use one for my Stargate to MultiWilliams conversion. Where did you get that wiring harness?
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Well let me see how many rom boards I can get running. So far this morning I got two running but they have
F@#@'n ribbon cable problems. I hope to have four rom boards running by this weekend. If that is the case I will let one go. Also make sure your stargate cpu/video board is REV.B or later for the multi will's kit to work. As for the wire harness I got it off evilbay and I hooked up a old computer powersupply to it.
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I hope to have four rom boards running by this weekend. If that is the case I will let one go.
Thanks! Let me know.
Also make sure your stargate cpu/video board is REV.B or later for the multi will's kit to work.
Yeah, I checked the CPU and it is indeed a Rev. B (complete with wire traces :P) but I need to do a little more looking into the sound board. Clay's manual says the sound board needs to look like the picture in the manual (which my Stargate doesn't of course) but I compared the picture to my Joust and it doesn't look like that one either. I need to figure out if I need to restrap it to look like the one in his manual or the one in my Joust.
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Hey if you want to do a swap I have no problem with that. I will trade you a joust rom board for your stargate rom board and I will trade you a newer sound board for your older one.
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Ok I got this well used but not abused cpu/video board off the bay. Spent two hours fixing bent pins on chips bent pins on the rom header and interface header replaced the missing ram chip. Powered up the board and got "Initial tests indicate you got a good deal" Now I got the board running auto cycle for the next day. Looks like I have to start saving up for that awesome joust cocktail cabinet resto kit that phoenix arcade sells.
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Got lucky today looked outside and seen a old computer in the trash. Removed the battery holder and installed it on the newly fixed cpu/video board I love free stuff.