Chronicles of BRILLIANCE!

FrizzleFried

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This thread is dedicated to those absolutely BRILLIANT!! modifications that you find done to cabinets, etc. when you get home and first open them up.

You know... the "nail in the fuse holder" type mods that we all know and love so much >bleeding sarcasm for those who can't quite catch it<...


I will start:

This BRILLIANT!! modification that I found on the Black Widow I picked up a couple days ago speaks for itself... but for the deaf... what you have is an obvious situation where someone wanted a switch up front so they didn't have to switch the machine on and off at the back or plug and unplug it.

Their solution:

attachment.php


What you're looking at there is a toggle switch they installed on the control panel. How they achieved this BRILLIANT!! piece of modification genius?

attachment.php


They pulled the plug off the power cord, wired it to a toggle switch then wired an extension cord to the other side and ran the extension cord out the back. At least the guy didn't cut the power cord super short to the switch... he'd rather use zip-ties to attach it and the extension cord together back to the back of the machine where it separated and the extension cord went out the back while the power cord was just sitting inside. Nice.

OBVIOUSLY the guy absolutely needed a switch up front... but all this work begs the question... HAS THE DOUCHEBAG NEVER HEARD OF A FREAKIN' POWER STRIP???

Anyway... the mod's been fixed...

attachment.php


...except for the hole in the control panel... :004_smad:
 
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No pictures because it was close to 20 years ago, but shortly after I got in to this hobby I got a Jamma cab with Black Tiger in it which worked minus the sound. Not knowing any better, I took off the marquee, snipped the wires right before the speaker and installed a (volume) pot. Problem solved! :D
 
I got a kick out of this one that I found in a old converted Stargate cab that I picked up.

"Well damn, that there light bulb thingy ain't workin no more. I got a fix for that...."

6082606763_34b218ba5d_b.jpg
 
I got a kick out of this one that I found in a old converted Stargate cab that I picked up.

"Well damn, that there light bulb thingy ain't workin no more. I got a fix for that...."

6082606763_34b218ba5d_b.jpg

How did it look lit up with the marquee on?
 
Good god.....tell me that's photoshopped!

Edward

By the looks of it that place has been abandoned and it might have been done on purpose so that no one would turn it. The tubing going through the wheel is different color than everything else so thats what makes me think it was done on purpose.
 
I picked up a non-working stargate. When I opened it up, the alligator clips shorting across one of the fuses had fallen off...
 
My Robotron was full of 'em. It was originally a Joust (the proper Robotron cabinet shape - factory Joust conversion) that someone converted back to Robotron. Here was the control panel wiring harness:

cp_connector.jpg


Yes, that's Cat-5 and duct tape.

Or, how about the power supply:

ps_horrors.jpg


Here we have three horrors. The bridge rectifier floating above the board on scraps of wire (one broken off, I might add), because the original had wire leads and this one has spade lugs. When will people learn, you're supposed to use paper clips when you do this...

Also note the ever popular burned-connector-so-I'll-just-solder-the-wire-to-the-pin, and the blown fuse jumpered out with a piece of wire.

And, I still laugh when I think of this:

metal_clip.jpg


Yes, that metal clip is touching the power wire, and it is electrically hot. It's also very close to that metal ground braid. Apparently, whoever converted this game had never heard of pulling the switch out...

I should have probably should have taken pictures of the underside of the control panel too. It was converted from Joust to Robotron, and they mounted the start buttons using Snapple caps as washers (holes drilled a little too big), and the leaf switches are propped up to the right height by using the snapped off handles of plastic cutlery as spacers.

-Ian
 
So the previous owner was MacGyver? :confused:

My Robotron was full of 'em. It was originally a Joust (the proper Robotron cabinet shape - factory Joust conversion) that someone converted back to Robotron. Here was the control panel wiring harness:

cp_connector.jpg


Yes, that's Cat-5 and duct tape.

Or, how about the power supply:

ps_horrors.jpg


Here we have three horrors. The bridge rectifier floating above the board on scraps of wire (one broken off, I might add), because the original had wire leads and this one has spade lugs. When will people learn, you're supposed to use paper clips when you do this...

Also note the ever popular burned-connector-so-I'll-just-solder-the-wire-to-the-pin, and the blown fuse jumpered out with a piece of wire.

And, I still laugh when I think of this:

metal_clip.jpg


Yes, that metal clip is touching the power wire, and it is electrically hot. It's also very close to that metal ground braid. Apparently, whoever converted this game had never heard of pulling the switch out...

I should have probably should have taken pictures of the underside of the control panel too. It was converted from Joust to Robotron, and they mounted the start buttons using Snapple caps as washers (holes drilled a little too big), and the leaf switches are propped up to the right height by using the snapped off handles of plastic cutlery as spacers.

-Ian
 
LOL!!!! I just left Karma for RH saying exactly the same thing!!

Only my comment referenced McGruber :D


Hehehe. Yeah - I've done my fair share of hacks to make things work. The difference is, when I modify things, they actually work... For example, you can replace a wire leaded rectifier block with a spade lug leaded one, but little pieces of insulated wire aren't the best way to do it. If you tightly crimp paper clips to the spades, and solder them, then solder the paper clips into the board, you can make a good, solid, reliable repair. Whoever did this didn't even get the solder hot enough to stick properly.

-Ian
 
The Big Blue I just bought had tape over the speakers and vents because it was to loud. There was also a coin switch added to the coin door. So I set the game to freeplay turned the volume down and removed the tape and switch ;-)
 
The Big Blue I just bought had tape over the speakers and vents because it was to loud. There was also a coin switch added to the coin door. So I set the game to freeplay turned the volume down and removed the tape and switch ;-)

This reminds me of a friend who back in 80 or so had a Galaxian in his bedroom and he had a piece of cardboard taped over his speaker because he didn't know where the volume control was.
 
a lot of the arcade machines at Dave and Busters have the service switches in the front. I wonder if anyone got courageous enough to flip one of the switches.
 
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