Hawaii drama continues.... 2 Ms. Pac cocktails RIP

armi0024

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So previous threads I've commented about Karma, maybe it bit me....
Quick catch up, doofus traded two "non-working" "bootleg" Ms Pac cocktails that turned out to be originals and working withing 20 minutes of me working on them, for a 100 dollar board. But....he took 4 weeks to get back to me after I installed the board and backed out of part of the deal. So flash forward

Doofus has two very nice space invader cocktails that...surprise, don't work becaue of power supplies and monitor issues. So I make a deal. I will retore, by rebuilding the power supplies and the monitors both back to original shape, and build custom adapters to allow the 60 in 1 horizontal shooters to be played on the cabinet without hacking the original wiring. In exchange, I get the last two Ms Pac cocktails from his dad's vending company. So drop a bunch of money into caps, transistors etc and completely rebuild the power supply boards, monitors etc (I still need to get one monitor and one board in the three stack going 100%)

Doofus texts me today...Um bad news, my dad cleaned out his company and the two ms pacs and then centipede cocktail are in the dump, how about I trade you a showcase cabinet? Now I have 20-30 hours at least, and a few hundred dollars of parts into the si cocktails. I did this because I wanted to make them shine since he was giving me such an amazing trade, now he wants to trade a f'ing Show Case cabinet, aaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhh. To boot, I had someone willing to pay me 1000 for one of the Ms Pac's restored and have a few hundred in parts to make that shine so I can make all my money back.

So one might say I jumped the gun in moving forward, but A) Shipping to Hawaii isn't cheap so I try to do it in lump orders and B) I wrote him two weeks ago and asked him if he was sure he could do this because I was going to invest money, to which he said yes yes yes, all taken care of. I'm pissed at this guy and even more crushed that two above average condition Ms Pac cocktails got run over by a bull dozer in a land fill yesterday. It is amazing to me how environmentally negligent people here are. Too boot, the company offered to sell me the cabs a month ago, but I had already made a deal with this guy so I said "No, I already made a deal with your owners son for those cabinets." aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
 
You sure that the bulldozer got to them yesterday? Thats pretty shitty of the guy.

Matt
 
Well this was supposed to be payment for the si tables. He offerred to let me keep one and return one as payment but I put in 2 ms pac cocktails, a centipede and an upright ms pac(in very rough shape) worth of work...

I drove to the dump as soon as I found out, A) private people are not allowed B) Dozered daily...
 
It's kind of like throwing insult onto injury, I could have saved dozens of monitors from the dump, but I decided to keep my life simple, only get a few of these Ms. Pac's and not get caught up with 20-30 cabinets and assorted parts. After all I'm supposed to be doing residency :) It is very tempting to keep these SI's, except that I don't like SI at all, and I may be able to get him to do two Neo Geo's plus a Ms Pac upright(which I think is junk aside from the monitor) Then sell off what I can get out of him to import some cabs from the mainland.... Damn it, this is a pain the butt!

I could also get cabinets built here, but there are no monitors here, outside of the 100-200 no sitting in a landfill, and they are not cheap to ship!
 
Its my understanding that when anyone works on something to repair it, ie a mechanic or tv repair guy. They have whats known as a workman's lean against the repaired item. Usually, an estimate is given on the cost of the repairs before the repairs are performed and once authorized by the owner, repairs are done. Price is paid at pickup. That being said, the fact that your payment was 2 vintage game cabs should not change the fact that the workman's lean exist. In my neck of the woods, showcase cabs usually fetch 50 to 250 at auction since they are so damn large and no one wants them. This is paramount to the guy offering you 1000 bucks to fix his car, and then saying, hey I'm a little short, can you take a hundred instead.
If I were you, I would take a long hard look at what the games were worth vrs. what the repairs were really worth. I would then tell the guy that he owes you X amount of dollars or I am keeping both cabs for my trouble. I recall this discussion on the two SI machines. In essence, you did the collecting world, and this guy, a favor by fixing these two machines that aren't particularly valuable but still nice collector pieces. You shouldn't be out money or stuck with a monster sized albatross of a game for your trouble. But hey, thats just my two bits. And if you have already found an affable solution, my apologies for the semi-rant. Best of luck .
 
Hey the rants are good, I had a huge one last night. I agree on the showcase, I can hardly fit two games at my house, a showcase is RIDICULOUS. I know that they took 6 roll offs from the company(his fathers) Friday, but I also just found out he was down there Friday picking stuff up. I spoke to the manager who I know separately and he wouldn't answer me directly but basically said, I don't know what he took and what we trashed. I got the sense that he was saying between the lines "I thought he took some of that stuff, but I can't really say and not have issues at work, the guy is a bit of scumbag..."

So I need an opinion, here's what I"m going to do, present three options:
1) 1500 and the falling apart Ms Pac he has for his two SI's. 1500 is parts and labor(only 25 an hour) I have into the SI's as well as the parts I bought for the two ms pac cocktails he promised me.
2) I keep the Si's and maybe give him 150-200(actually I shoudl just give him 20 a piece which is what I paid for a non-working Time pilot a few days ago)
3) They still have some games at the company, Two Neo Geo MVS systems, the Ms Pac(really only has a good monitor everything else is crap), and the Missile command/Centipede/Millipede combo he has....

ARGGGGG I really wanted to Ms Pacs to put on route and they are the perfect machines for a route here :(
 
Hey an MVS system isn't that bad if he has them at least with one of those you have lost of game options. I have one and restored and sold one the restored is fairly easy if its one of the red MVS cabinets. Might be able to get a few $$ for one if you throw a few cheap game carts in with it.
 
That being said, the fact that your payment was 2 vintage game cabs should not change the fact that the workman's lean exist. In my neck of the woods, showcase cabs usually fetch 50 to 250 at auction since they are so damn large and no one wants them. This is paramount to the guy offering you 1000 bucks to fix his car, and then saying, hey I'm a little short, can you take a hundred instead.

It gets kinda tricky in his situation since the guy thought the cabs he got rid of were just worthless bootleg cabs. The original poster kept that fact from him. So I guess technically he agreed to do repair work for bootleg prices.
 
He thought the first two were bootleg, and I didn't know until I got them home that they truly weren't. The second two, he knew were real Ms. Pac's just not working and they were in much better shape than the first two cabs he gave me. I was very very clear that I could do the rip out and replace the guts of the SI's for a relatively inexpensive price but that if he wanted me to rebuild them, it was going to be signifcantly more expensive. In fact it was him who said, "Well if I give you two real Ms. Pac cabs in excellent condition with a beat up upright and a beat up centipede would that be worth you doing a full restore on these" I was even up front about the material costs for either way, which he now is saying "Well I didn't know you were going to spend that much to get these going"

The basic problem is that this guy is a POS, and after speaking to the manager I am more and more inclined to think he sold them. I mean he has been trying to get me to come and install blue elfs in his dynamo cabs and sell them. He doesn't want to do any of the work, but wants me to give him 400 a cab on the sale, these are the same cabs he was selling on CL for 150 a piece.

A neo just sold here for 600, so if I can get those two, it's something, plus I can get cheap multi cartridges from china and probably get a bit more than 600. The Ms pac cab he has really is only worth the monitor and the game board if it works, the cab is barely holding together. I already had options to sell 2 rebuilt Ms Pac cocktail cabs at 1000 a piece and I have the parts to do it.... The market here is quite different, size really does matter, smaller is better, people are generally really tight on space. I'll let people know what happens today, I'm going up to see him....

Oh as a side note, the manager said I could come pick up a bunch of old non-jamma boards so we'll see what treasures I find. I'm done going through this guy. I should have just struck a deal with the company and bought the machines outright....
 
Once again, we are back to him not responding to me. I've been trying to meet up with him to resolve everything, but he doesn't answer. So I think my solution is to be cut him out. His only negotiating pieces aside from possibly still having the Ms. Pac's are at his Dad's company. The main manager there and I have been communicating and I may be swinging by tomorrow to pick up the Neo Geo's and a bunch of boards. I may just buy the stuff and cut this guy out, I'm tired of chasing him around for 2-3 weeks and then him backing out of deals... If I get a bunch of boards, I'll let everyone know what I find.
 
I'm with those who think these cabs never went to the dump. If you ever hear back from him, tell him you know he took the cabs and you want your original deal.
 
LOL -- I like that plan. Do you have a roommate you can blame it on? :)
 
I love it, I should just call and say, "Oh crap while I was call my wife was cleaning the kitchen out and decided the two SI cabs were in the way, she didn't know I needed them so she threw them out!!! OMG I am so sorry, tell you what, you can keep the stuff you were going to give me for them, I feel so bad, I won't make you go get those things back from the people you sold them to"

Actually I've tried calling and texting him several times and he never got back to me...maybe it's just done????
 
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