Galaxian T-Molding - Blue, Green, Black, ??

[eXidy]

...

Its been too long for me to remember #s. The warehouse I pulled them from was around 1999/2000.
I just picked up a Galaxian yesterday with a 25" monitor in it. I want to restore it and install the 8 pack or larger. But im not even sure if this board upgrade is still available.

Jon

 

[mattosborn]

Galaxian is like this:

The 25" monitor (early) galaxian - Green T-molding.
The 19" monitor galaxian without the blue box on the front bottom - Blue T-Molding.
The 19" monitor galaxian with the blue box on the front bottom - Green T-molding.

Jon

I'm not convinced that the 25" version was necessarily "early" (as in preceding all 19")... but it is safe to say that they continued to make plenty more 19" after they stopped making the 25".
As for the early 19" (without all the blue in the front), I have seen one with original black-leather T-molding.

 

[eXidy]

...

Im actually not convinced on the black t-molding myself.
Were these games pulled from warehouses or ? Times have really changed, when I was pulling games from warehouses in the 90s and early 2000's - the games were untouched for years and years. Games that pop up on ebay and craigslist are in a much different state.
Jon

 

[mattosborn]

Im actually not convinced on the black t-molding myself.

Yeah, I was skeptical too... but this was a warehouse find, and it really did look original. Sometimes it is tough to tell though....
If it needed to be replaced, I'd still go with green. That's what I remember seeing, and I like that look best.

 

[eXidy]

...

I cant remember, but I think Galaxian t-molding is either glued or stapled into the machine. Or was that just mspacman?

Jon

 

[Jr. Pac]

I like black leather the best, followed by blue, followed by white, followed by green, followed by chrome, followed by HOT pink.

 

[mattosborn]

I like black leather the best, followed by blue, followed by white, followed by green, followed by chrome, followed by HOT pink.

We're talking about t-molding here... not your gimp suit.

 

[Level42]

I didn't believe it first either. When I went to pick up my Galaxian I actually told the seller that that T-molding was not original (and the monitor wasn't syncing, hey I was trying to talk of 25.......succesfully )

This guy was collection jukeboxes and he was interested in a certain juke but he had to buy "the lot" which was 2 fruit machines, the juke, and my Galaxian....

When I returned home I had a close look at the T-molding and it didn't look like it was retro fitted at all. Then I checked the flyers.

US flyer:

The German flyer has a very nice close up of the same picture:

Pretty clear huh....

Here's a pic when I just had my machine home. It was set-up for Dutch guilders, so it has never left the country after it was imported here.

(The marquee was there, I had removed it here already. The machine was 100% complete and in original condition, monitor, PCB, PSU everything...

Here's a pic when i was removing the original T-molding:

You can see that the black-leathered was stapled factory style. I had a very hard time removing the staples. There were no marks or anything from previous T-molding...

Can't find pics of Robin's but he had black-leathered too (ser.nr. 176) but he preferred green and replaced it. I like to keep things original where possible and installed new black-leather.

Here's my full resto thread from a LONG time ago:
http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=62784.0

Further, in this thread a guy from France (now friend "Hi") reported this:
http://www.dragonslairfans.com/smfor/index.php?topic=2059.msg23786#msg23786

He has serial nr. 361 AND he confirms his has black-leathered too.

Sooooo, maybe the very first serial nrs. by Midway were shipped to Europe, maybe to try to nag Namco (because Namco had licensed Bertollino to make Galaxian cabs....) I don't know, and maybe that's why you never (?) see the black-leathered in the US ?

 

[Level42]

There were more differences between serial nrs. The first 3000 (actually 2900) had fluorescent marquee lighting (like mine). After that they switched (who knows why) to those ugly power waisting incandescent bulbs like Pac Man has.

I did a lot of reading of service bulletins that came with a manual I had won on e-bay and there are a lot of (more or less) interesting facts in them:

http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=62784.msg631706#msg631706

Note they state ser.nr. 101 as the first everywhere, so production machines started at 101, which makes Robin's machine freaking early....

 

[mattosborn]

There were more differences between serial nrs. The first 3000 (actually 2900) had fluorescent marquee lighting (like mine). After that they switched (who knows why) to those ugly power waisting incandescent bulbs like Pac Man has.

Really? That's weird.... Good to know!
When I had my Galaxian (it's gone now ... headed to Funspot though!) I replaced the incandescents with some screw-in fluorescent replacements (to prevent any further heat-related damage to the marquee).