Demolition Derby a good place to start for a noob?

jcar302

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Hey guys, new here.
Moving to a new house in a couple of weeks with a finished basement.
Always wanted a small arcade, just never had the room until now.

I'm not very savvy with the terminology and arcade repair, so please be patient as for half the abbreviations i see here i have no clue what they mean.
I own an electrical contracting business in NJ and my current main hobby is cars.
So i'm very mechanically inclined, but i don't have much electronics experience.

I guess my questions are:

Is the midway demolition derby a good place to start?
If it breaks what skill level is needed to repair it?
Parts availability?
Expert help to troubleshoot?
If i find one within a decent distance, what is the best way to transport it?
Fair market value?

I'm open to an upright or cocktail table.
But searches on this forum lead me to believe that for a beginner the upright may be a better start due to rarity of parts for the table.

Any reason i should steer clear of one of this machines?

I appreciate any advice.
Thanks,
Joe
 
As a newcomer to this hobby, I'd say your best bet is an upright cabinet with a JAMMA game. JAMMA means the main PCB inside uses the same pinout standard which can be plugged in and taken off with ease and swapped out with other JAMMA games. Its no different than SNES cartridges and Genesis cartridges. You can't plug a non jamma game onto the wiring harness unless you have a special adapter.
They are the most basic of games to repair and troubleshoot. Lots of great games from about 1987 to 1996 all use this same pinout standard.

Demolition Derby is a badass game by the way. A good one should yeild a fair price of $500. It's bulky, heavy, and chock full of steering mechanics that might take more time to troublehsoot when something goes wrong.

Welcome.
 
Welcome!!!!!

DD seems like a cool game to me and one I'd want myself.

Loads of info here and people to help. The site is pretty friendly and I find myself helping others, paying it forward for all the people that have helped me learn along the way.

And that's the way it should be really.
 
Welcome!

I say get a Sundance, in fact I hear there's free one in an abandoned CA restaurant....

Ok ok just kidding, KLOV veterans will get the joke of that.

DD is an awesome game but they're expensive and parts can be tough to find, that said if you come across one cheap I say grab it, but otherwise I second everyone whom says to start with a JAMMA cab, or at least a game which JAMMA adaptors are readily available.
 
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Demolition Derby is a great game....lots of fun especially with other people. With that said...I don't know if I would say it's the best game to enter this hobby with. I'd like to think that I know a bit about Demoltion Derby, and it's a odd machine indeed. Here is a bit of info for you to consider.
The machine came in two style cabinets Upright(2 players) and the cocktail/island (4 players) The upright is unique in the fact that they shipped these machines with 2 style boardsets in them. One style is called the MCR series, the other is called the monoboard series. MCR style boards are the same that are found in Tapper, Timber and Discs of Tron. The monoboard is the same style that is used in Rampage and Max RPM. So keep in mind that if you get a upright, you will be dealing with one of two different types of hardware.

The 4 player island machine uses the MCR type boards. The deal with this machine is the one of the boards on the stack (SSIO) is modified from the factory to accept the additional inputs from the other 2 players. So this modifed PCB is unique to Demolition Derby and tough to find. Not likely to go bad, but it can happen. (I've experienced a failure) The 4 player machine has very bad documentation and a wiring diagram has yet to be found. (at least by me)

So Demoltion Derby is kinda a oddity in my opinion....and parts can be tough to find. The machine can pop up from time to time, and the 2 player upright seems to be more common, than the 4 player version.
I currently own the 4 player, and have a 2 player that has a deposit to be sold.
-Mark
 
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Thanks for the input guys.

Tec9, i saw your ad in my searches and was probably get to send you a pm to see if you still had it. If it falls through, please pm me, i'm only in NJ by Great Adventure and would love to have it.

Let me clarify a bit with the games.
While i'm not in complete understanding of the "jamma" setup, not sure it's for me, even if it's easier.

I have certain games I desire. If the machine isn't one of them, not sure i would feel like i spent it well.

DD is by far the top of my list. It's the game i remember playing on the boardwalk, i'd glady blow every quarter i had on it.

Others i like would be 720, mortal combat 3, super sprint, offroad and spy hunter.
I'm sure i could come up with a few more, but these are typically the type i like.

I guess my problem is that most games i like require a steering wheel.

I don't want any of you guys to think i'm taking your advice and throwing it out the window, it's just that if a generic type setup can't give me the old school experience i long for, i don't think i want to spend the money.

The reason i wanted Demolition Derby first is that if i don't get another for a while, at least i would have my favorite.
Parts were a big part of my fear, and now i see that it may be a justified fear.

Just for the record, i can read diagrams and have no problem putting in the time to repair a game, just wanted to make sure there was some type of guidance available.
And this forum seems to have plenty of good people on it as i read through post after post.
 
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I'm guessing the other games on your list may be easier to collect and repair. You may want to consider one of the other ones first.

also it helps if you get to know some of the people local to you, since when you get stuck on something you will want a friend to swing by and take a look!
 
Here's what working on an MCR game is like, Spy Hunter specifically in this case.

Game works just before I purchase it and load it into the truck.

Unload it and plug it in at home, has some graphics issues. It's still using the original interconnect cables, so I'm not surprised about with the new problem.

Order and install new interconnect cables, re-seat the chips on all of the boards for good measure while there apart. Clean almost 30 years of dust, dirt, and cobwebs from between the boards.

Power it up, get the Peter Gun music, but nothing but white on the screen. Re-do the steps with the cables and chips.

Power it up again. This time get no sound and only white on the screen.

Too aggravated to continue, so I put it away for a while and work on other stuff.

For the record, I have repaired a dead Tron and Two-Tigers so I'll eventually have this one up and running again too. It's just hard to deal after a while when each thing you do seems to make the situation worse.

With all of that being said, I do like the MCR games and would love to have a 4 player Demolition Derby. I dropped many quarters in on at an Aladdin's Castle many years ago.

You might want to cut your teeth on something cheaper and easier to repair. If you kill a Space Invaders or Pac-Man board then you're not out a lot and you can easily find replacement parts. But if you kill a DD boardset then you're going to have a tough time finding a replacement and it will probably be expensive to get it.

-JM
 
If a driving game is at the top of your list, I'd strongly recommend a nice two-player Championship Sprint by Atari. It was one of the System II games and it was housed in the same cab as Paperboy. When racing a buddy gets a little stale, and you decide you need more intimate gameplay, purchase the Paperboy kit and add some more variety to your gaming muscles.
 
Thanks for the input guys.

Others i like would be 720, mortal combat 3, super sprint, offroad and spy hunter.

Your picking some tough games to fix :)
Any driving game has the additional headache of steering mechs, which are fairly complicated on some games.

I have an OffRoad, 720, and MK from your list.
I would recommend the MK.
The joystick on a 720 will cost you well over $100. to replace and the game itself is temperamental. (although worth the $ in my opinion)

I have MK1, MK2, MK3, MK4, and lots of other boards for my MK4 cab.
Like mentioned earlier, JAMMA means the connection type, so you can fit tons of other "JAMMA" game boards into a JAMMA cab.

You just need to unhook a cable and plug in another game, only takes a minute.
 
You guys seem to have some very good points.
So maybe i'll add some easier ones to the list and go from there.

I think i'd also be open to cocktail tables of any sort, is that a good idea? Pac man, donkey dong, etc.. While not on the top of my list, maybe the simpler more common games could get me going.

I take it driving games and noobs aren't a great combo.

As far as the jamma thing, i'm going to look into it.
I just always pictured having an original or at least original looking games.
 
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http://www.ebay.com/itm/Ms-Pacman-C...450?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item19c8284402

This is close enough to me to go look at.
Will also score some point with the mrs, because this is the only game in existance she likes to play.
What do you guys think?

Not afraid of putting a few bucks and some elbow grease into a good game.

No clue on pricing on any machine, seems retail companies sell games for triple what private.



I know it seems like i'm more confused than when i first made the post, that's because i am lol. My personal taste in games i guess is pretty complex.

Gozer, i'm going to keep my eye out for championship sprint, looks like it's just super sprint with 2 wheels, never seen it before. But a few google searches suggests that it's not that expensive.
 
Well, spending my spare time scouring ads for arcade machines and cabs.
I know my list isn't going to come easy, i'm being open minded on what i want.

Kinda funny reading some of these ads on craigs.
I'm guessing retail is about 3-4 times what private sale is.
Do people really pay $1500+ for some of the basic games?
Trade a classic car for games i never heard of?
Upgrade your hvac system for a couple of mediocre games? lol
I see games for sale that you guys wouldn't pay much more than $150 for, but for $500-$1000 (based on reading a months worth of the for sale section here)
Some people really need a reality check, i'll assume they look at arcade game sales companies and figure "that's what they are asking".

I guess at least the thrill of the hunt is fun.
 
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http://www.ebay.com/itm/Ms-Pacman-C...450?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item19c8284402

This is close enough to me to go look at.
Will also score some point with the mrs, because this is the only game in existance she likes to play.
What do you guys think?

Make an offer at $200 and escalate from there. I wouldn't pay more than $325 for that machine. It needs an underlay (no big deal) and looks like it has significant screen burn. Very good condition examples of that machine can be found for $500-$600 if you're willing to bide your time and scour Craigslist or the for sale section on this forum for a while.

Cocktail versions tend to sell for less than their upright counterparts because they often lack cabinet artwork (there are exceptions to this rule, but that's a thread in and of itself.)
 
Around here cocktails usually go for more, especially if they are 60n1s. I like the artwork on the uprights better though.
 
This arcade game shopping is tough on the eyes. Worse than playing 5 hours of Bad company 2.
Staring at the screen of the computer starting to blind me.

How much do you guys think a fair condition working pacman plus is worth?
Only issue is said to be the video is a little off center of the screen.
Could i put the multipac chip in it and get all the pac games?
 
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