Alternate marquee and bezel lighting? To prevent artwork flaking and peeling?

fizgig

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Alternate marquee and bezel lighting? To prevent artwork flaking and peeling?

I'm restoring some taito games and as you know, the artwork on these things is usually flaking pretty bad from the heat of the lights. Can anyone suggest or recommend other ways to light these?
 
I'm restoring some taito games and as you know, the artwork on these things is usually flaking pretty bad from the heat of the lights. Can anyone suggest or recommend other ways to light these?

LED's. No heat. I think you can use LED's for pretty much every Taito light fixture. Bezel, marquee, coin door. The pinball style (bayonet) will plug right in.
 
Won't that just light the ends of the marquee instead of all the way accross?
 
Won't that just light the ends of the marquee instead of all the way accross?

Have you actually checked behind your Taito marquee? The fixture should look like this:


marqueelightbig.jpg
 
Never tried led's but I'd imagine they'd work fine. Other ideas I've thought of but never tried would be to move the light fixture back further if possible to reduce heat. Another Idea is to place a piece of clear plexi right in front of the lights. Hopefully the plexi would absorb the direct heat and not cause any issues lighting the marquee.
 
I'm gonna convert my Pump over to 100% LEDs (even the marquee box!) some distant day in the future, I'll take pictures and show off when that distant day comes. I have a similar, more pressing project for my Neo Geo. LEDs are the way to go, every time.

LED's. No heat. I think you can use LED's for pretty much every Taito light fixture. Bezel, marquee, coin door. The pinball style (bayonet) will plug right in.

FYI, LEDs aren't 100% heat-free. They produce a hundredth (or less) the heat of an equivalent incandescant bulb, but they still produce some heat. In fact, LEDs powerful enough to be used alone for general illumination usually require or incorporate a heatsink of some kind.
 
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FYI, LEDs aren't 100% heat-free. They produce a hundredth the heat of an equivalent incandescant bulb, but they still produce some heat, and LEDs powerful enough to be used alone for general illumination usually require or incorporate a heatsink of some kind.

I'm gonna convert my Pump over to 100% LEDs (even the marquee box!) some distant day in the future, I'll take pictures and show you when that distant day comes.


Imagine the difference in temp between LED's and standard 6V 44 lamps. Standard 44's will melt plastic, LED's will not. No heat or 10% as hot, they will still be cooler and work better in this application.
 
Imagine the difference in temp between LED's and standard 6V 44 lamps. Standard 44's will melt plastic, LED's will not. No heat or 10% as hot, they will still be cooler and work better in this application.

Yeah, they're so cool the heat they produce can generally be safely ignored, and they can always be substituted in an enclosure intended for the much-hotter incandescants, but if they're in a totally enclosed compartment (i.e. wasn't made for any lights, ever) it can build up. Just something to be aware of.
 
Imagine the difference in temp between LED's and standard 6V 44 lamps. Standard 44's will melt plastic, LED's will not. No heat or 10% as hot, they will still be cooler and work better in this application.

thats why those instructions cards on the bezels are so warped
somebody should repro those...oh wait I did :D
AbQCkhaCAAECJB_.jpg:large
 
Keep in mind that while heat will damage marquees, so will certain wavelengths.

There are two different kinds of "white LEDs" out there, one that is actually a red, green, and blue LED in one, which combines to produce white light. You can easily see this but looking at the LED up close.

The other kind is a ultraviolet emitting one with a coating to convert the UV light to white light. I don't know how much UV leaves the LED unconverted, but any amount would contribute to damage, just like a black light would (but more intense).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Light-emitting_diode#Phosphor-based_LEDs
White LEDs can also be made by coating near-ultraviolet (NUV) LEDs with a mixture of high-efficiency europium-based phosphors that emit red and blue, plus copper and aluminium-doped zinc sulfide (ZnS:Cu, Al) that emits green. This is a method analogous to the way fluorescent lamps work. This method is less efficient than blue LEDs with YAG:Ce phosphor, as the Stokes shift is larger, so more energy is converted to heat, but yields light with better spectral characteristics, which render color better. Due to the higher radiative output of the ultraviolet LEDs than of the blue ones, both methods offer comparable brightness. A concern is that UV light may leak from a malfunctioning light source and cause harm to human eyes or skin.

Also some LED lights have voltage regulators with heat sinks that generate quite a bit more heat.

Personally, I will stick with a nice low wattage florescent tube, they are plenty cool to the touch.
 
Also some LED lights have voltage regulators with heat sinks that generate quite a bit more heat.

True. While not usually a problem with the kind of lamps we're talking about, I once bought some wedge-style LED bulb replacements and the current-limiting resistors burned up and melted the damn things. Some of the crap that comes out of China amazes me sometimes....
 
True. While not usually a problem with the kind of lamps we're talking about, I once bought some wedge-style LED bulb replacements and the current-limiting resistors burned up and melted the damn things. Some of the crap that comes out of China amazes me sometimes....

You really have to be careful with the Chinese electronics.

"No wonder this circuit failed, it says made in Japan."

"What do you mean, Doc, all the best stuff is made in Japan."

"Unbelievable."
 
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