JamBurglar
Well-known member
This is pretty boring compared to a lot of the stuff you see on this site but I didn't see anything on this specific topic after a search so I thought I'd add this to the site in case somebody else was interested.
Original Nintendo buttons are really hard to come by, especially the dark blue ones used in Donkey Kong, Donkey Kong Jr. and Popeye. The shortage of buttons stems from abuse in arcades and the brittle plastic Nintendo used. Smokers used the blue buttons as cigarette rests, which utterly destroys them. I've also heard stories of buttons shattering, although this is probably a bigger problem with the orange jump button. I'm sure a lot of people share my experience of looking for months or years and finding nothing. Some people buy fully populated control panels just for the buttons. Moreover, there are no accurate reproductions on the market. Apparently its difficult to get the color right. Nintendo buttons are also smaller than the standard size so the repros sometimes get modified so they'll fit on a Nintendo control panel.
Anyway, after months of looking, a fellow KLOVER (Bungy) helped me out and traded me some original blue buttons for a restrictor plate. Thanks Bungy! Anyway, the buttons were not burnt. They did have some pretty good scratches and one had a gouge. They had some slight, but even, discoloration. I wanted to see how far Novus plastic polish would go in fixing them up.
This first pic is a comparrison. The left button is unpolished. I had already polished the right button the night before. You can still see the scratch in the right button's outer ring that Novus did not fully remove. If you look close you can also see a little chip in the center part of the button. Keep in mind though, I took these pictures in bright light and positioned the right button to emphasise the damage. If I would have turned the right button 180 degrees it would look nearly flawless.
I dissassembled the buttons to polish them. Here's the left button unrestored and dissassembled. You can see the gouge pretty good in this photo.
I probably spent a good 1.5 to 2 hours polishing each button. I cleaned the buttons using Novus #1 (the cleaner). Because of some of the deep/sharp scratches I used Novus #3 (most abbraisive) to start. Most of my time was spent with Novus #3. I then moved on to Novus #2 (less abbrasive) for a while, and then recleaned with Novus #1. I only polished the parts that would sit above the control panel. I didn't see the use in polishing the threads. It takes a ton of elbow grease to do this sort of thing and I didn't want to spend another couple hours trying to polish the threads. Anyway, here's the left button after I polished it. As you can see, the gouge is still visable under bright light but not nearly as visible as before. Polishing helped the discoloration some but did not remove it. In most cases, however, discoloration is not going to be very noticable when you reassemble the button because all of the exposed parts tend to discolor evenly.
Here's the comparrison with both buttons restored. As you can see, the Novus will polish the buttons pretty good, but it won't entirely remove deep scratches or gouges and will only lessen the effect of discoloration. That gouge on the left button is at about 5 o'clock so the play in light hides it pretty well in this picture. The point being, unless you put direct light on the flaw, you won't even see it.
Here's the buttons installed. I put the scratches facing the back, so they don't really pick up in the flash. This picture is in very bright light and in normal light the buttons look new and shiney. Overall, I'm pretty satisfied with the results.
To sum up, the Novus smooths out the scratches and makes everything shiney, and therefore does a great job at hiding even decent sized gouges and chips. Its the rough edges on the scratches and gouges that catch the light and make them visable so when you polish them, the defects get hidden. As long as the buttons aren't burnt, or seriously gouged up, I think they can be restored with nice results. Frankly, I don't think anyone would notice any of the imperfections on the ones I did without a flashlight and close inspection.
So that's my pathetic review for the week. Join me next week when I delve into the interesting topic of attempting to hide the scratches on the back of a marquee (and failing misserably.)
Original Nintendo buttons are really hard to come by, especially the dark blue ones used in Donkey Kong, Donkey Kong Jr. and Popeye. The shortage of buttons stems from abuse in arcades and the brittle plastic Nintendo used. Smokers used the blue buttons as cigarette rests, which utterly destroys them. I've also heard stories of buttons shattering, although this is probably a bigger problem with the orange jump button. I'm sure a lot of people share my experience of looking for months or years and finding nothing. Some people buy fully populated control panels just for the buttons. Moreover, there are no accurate reproductions on the market. Apparently its difficult to get the color right. Nintendo buttons are also smaller than the standard size so the repros sometimes get modified so they'll fit on a Nintendo control panel.
Anyway, after months of looking, a fellow KLOVER (Bungy) helped me out and traded me some original blue buttons for a restrictor plate. Thanks Bungy! Anyway, the buttons were not burnt. They did have some pretty good scratches and one had a gouge. They had some slight, but even, discoloration. I wanted to see how far Novus plastic polish would go in fixing them up.
This first pic is a comparrison. The left button is unpolished. I had already polished the right button the night before. You can still see the scratch in the right button's outer ring that Novus did not fully remove. If you look close you can also see a little chip in the center part of the button. Keep in mind though, I took these pictures in bright light and positioned the right button to emphasise the damage. If I would have turned the right button 180 degrees it would look nearly flawless.
I dissassembled the buttons to polish them. Here's the left button unrestored and dissassembled. You can see the gouge pretty good in this photo.
I probably spent a good 1.5 to 2 hours polishing each button. I cleaned the buttons using Novus #1 (the cleaner). Because of some of the deep/sharp scratches I used Novus #3 (most abbraisive) to start. Most of my time was spent with Novus #3. I then moved on to Novus #2 (less abbrasive) for a while, and then recleaned with Novus #1. I only polished the parts that would sit above the control panel. I didn't see the use in polishing the threads. It takes a ton of elbow grease to do this sort of thing and I didn't want to spend another couple hours trying to polish the threads. Anyway, here's the left button after I polished it. As you can see, the gouge is still visable under bright light but not nearly as visible as before. Polishing helped the discoloration some but did not remove it. In most cases, however, discoloration is not going to be very noticable when you reassemble the button because all of the exposed parts tend to discolor evenly.
Here's the comparrison with both buttons restored. As you can see, the Novus will polish the buttons pretty good, but it won't entirely remove deep scratches or gouges and will only lessen the effect of discoloration. That gouge on the left button is at about 5 o'clock so the play in light hides it pretty well in this picture. The point being, unless you put direct light on the flaw, you won't even see it.
Here's the buttons installed. I put the scratches facing the back, so they don't really pick up in the flash. This picture is in very bright light and in normal light the buttons look new and shiney. Overall, I'm pretty satisfied with the results.
To sum up, the Novus smooths out the scratches and makes everything shiney, and therefore does a great job at hiding even decent sized gouges and chips. Its the rough edges on the scratches and gouges that catch the light and make them visable so when you polish them, the defects get hidden. As long as the buttons aren't burnt, or seriously gouged up, I think they can be restored with nice results. Frankly, I don't think anyone would notice any of the imperfections on the ones I did without a flashlight and close inspection.
So that's my pathetic review for the week. Join me next week when I delve into the interesting topic of attempting to hide the scratches on the back of a marquee (and failing misserably.)