Help identifying this Gremlin cabinet

Lumo

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Donor 2025
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Long story short, I had a free Saturday a couple weeks ago and late Friday night an ad pops up for an Arkanoid 5 hours away. I'm sure no sane person has ever driven that far for an Arkanoid but:

1) It has a really nice spinner with an almost perfect purple top which has been hard to source, whereas my current Arkanoid (yes I already have one) has a plastic knob that looks like a thousand cigarettes were extinguished on it.
2) It's in a decent Gremlin cab, my daughter has been asking for a Frogger and I had intended to accomplish that through a bitkit anyway.
3) It's only $200 (Canadian pesos).
4) Most importantly, I got sucked into wanting to know what game had originally been in there. Older style coin mech and not a woody. I couldn't say for sure what it was, the owner couldn't find any useful info and I wanted to find out.

So I made the trip. Sadly, the answer to my curiosity wasn't obvious. There was no label indicating the original game, but a few clues:

-Cab is 1/2 plywood (not mdf), original off white laminate that is pretty glossy (like the inside of a freezer)
-Inspection date on the coin door is Oct 29, 1980
-Monitor (appears to be original with zero burn-in!) is a Sega Nanao plugged into AC 100v

Sadly the control panel is not original, so no help there.

Based on date, it's too early to be a white Frogger (assuming these do exist) or a Zaxxon. Which leaves a bunch of stuff I'm not very familiar with:
-Carnival
-Head On
-Deep Scan
-Invico
Or maybe an early
-Moon Cresta
-Space Firebird
-Astro Blaster

The only pic I can find with my coin door is Astro Blaster, and to me it looks well laid out for a G80 cage. So I'm guessing that's it. But I've seen videos of later woody astro blasters that have a WG4600 monitor (and different coin mech).

Any educated guesses from the Gremlin experts?

Is the coin door actually a clue, or were those regularly swapped during production?

Is there info anywhere on Gremlin serial numbers?

Really appreciate any thoughts. But if it's an Astro Blaster this could start an unnecessary project because "Fighter pilots needed in sector wars"!
 

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My Sega Space Trek is a serial 83K cab, so I don't believe it was that. Space Trek was a little later into 1980.
If I had to guess, it's likely a Moon Cresta cab. The fact the original power brick lacked any DC components supports that theory.
 
Ironically I just brought home a suspected factory white Frogger this afternoon and am waiting for help to unload it and bring it upstairs. I'll make a separate post when it gets settled. 🐸🕹️

But congrats on the pickup!!! 🎉
Those plywood long coin door cabinets are extremely well made and so much nicer than the shredded wheat MDF ones. Hope you're thrilled with your purchase!

I had a similar one 8-9 yrs ago. The control panel suggests it was a Moon Cresta that had been converted to Mr. Do. I did exactly what you're thinking and converted it to a Frogger. It came out really, really nice and I loved that game, but stupidly sold it when I got out of the hobby.

Here's a couple pics for inspiration, and congrats on the find!! They're great cabinets.
 

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My Sega Space Trek is a serial 83K cab, so I don't believe it was that. Space Trek was a little later into 1980.
If I had to guess, it's likely a Moon Cresta cab. The fact the original power brick lacked any DC components supports that theory.
Wow I hadn't even come up with Space Trek as a possibility. I'm pretty sure I've never seen one in the flesh.

Thanks for the Serial number.

Moon Cresta makes a lot of sense.
 
Thanks for the inspiration @ZaxxonBoner . That's a very nice Frogger you put together.

If mine turns out anywhere near that I'll be thrilled.

I'll be watching to see whether you found your white Frogger, so do post it. The thrill of the hunt!
If you go the Frogger route, Sega released a modified Moon Cresta board that works with your transformer setup. My Frogger runs that style of board.
 
I recently found a complete astro blaster harness boxed up in my pile if you want to go that route. Lmk and ill hunt it down and confirm
 
If you go the Frogger route, Sega released a modified Moon Cresta board that works with your transformer setup. My Frogger runs that style of board.
Not sure I'm following @Dillweed . Please let me know if I'm understanding correctly.

The Moon Cresta board took ac power directly? And then presumably converted to dc right on the board?

And you're saying they made a version of the Frogger PCB which did the same - which you found and are using? Or is this a separate Moon Crest board that takes ac and converts it before powering the main board which can also be added to the Frogger setup?

Thanks!
 
I recently found a complete astro blaster harness boxed up in my pile if you want to go that route. Lmk and ill hunt it down and confirm
Thanks @Cegron . How did you end up with that?

It's tempting. A Frogger would probably get a lot more plays, but that attract voice adds amazing atmosphere.

I'll do a bit of looking to see if getting a PCB is even feasible and let you know.
 
Not sure I'm following @Dillweed . Please let me know if I'm understanding correctly.

The Moon Cresta board took ac power directly? And then presumably converted to dc right on the board?

And you're saying they made a version of the Frogger PCB which did the same - which you found and are using? Or is this a separate Moon Crest board that takes ac and converts it before powering the main board which can also be added to the Frogger setup?

Thanks!
Yup, the Moon Cresta board was Sega's redesign of Galaxian, but they kept the AC power circuitry on the board. The converted Moon Cresta boards that run Frogger are exclusively Sega's work, and I believe they did it to use up the remaining stock of Moon Cresta boards. They aren't common, but they show up periodically. Mine has one and runs that same transformer.

1760841984788.png
 
Thanks @Cegron . How did you end up with that?

It's tempting. A Frogger would probably get a lot more plays, but that attract voice adds amazing atmosphere.

I'll do a bit of looking to see if getting a PCB is even feasible and let you know.
Back in the day, it wasn't too hard to find an operator with a warehouse full of goodies.
They always had a mix of stuff in various states. I parted out alot of cabs and saved everything i could.
 
Thanks @Cegron . How did you end up with that?

It's tempting. A Frogger would probably get a lot more plays, but that attract voice adds amazing atmosphere.

I'll do a bit of looking to see if getting a PCB is even feasible and let you know.
I have a cardboard bezel for it too….
 
Yup, the Moon Cresta board was Sega's redesign of Galaxian, but they kept the AC power circuitry on the board. The converted Moon Cresta boards that run Frogger are exclusively Sega's work, and I believe they did it to use up the remaining stock of Moon Cresta boards. They aren't common, but they show up periodically. Mine has one and runs that same transformer.

View attachment 855515
Thanks for the clarification. I like your theory on the remaining stock. If I can add reckless speculation, do you think they were trying to use up the Moon Cresta cabinets too? I'm wondering if that could be how we ended up with a few white Froggers.

Would be interesting to know if those white Frogger cabs are the ones running the alternate boards.
 
It's dusty but you can see it's pretty good shape.
 

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If you're interested, i can hunt down the harness. I do not have marquee or control panel.
 
Thanks for the clarification. I like your theory on the remaining stock. If I can add reckless speculation, do you think they were trying to use up the Moon Cresta cabinets too? I'm wondering if that could be how we ended up with a few white Froggers.

Would be interesting to know if those white Frogger cabs are the ones running the alternate boards.
Those white cabs are interesting, they were the base for a lot of games.

Plywood white cabs;
Star Raker
Frogger
Astro Fighter
Astro Blaster
Pulsar
Space Trek
Moon Cresta
Crazy Climber (no joke)
Jump Bug

And most certainly more I am forgetting. I assume Turpin was another one in the white cab, but I've never seen that one.
 
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