Inferno #2 - To Hell and Back

64B1T

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And here I thought I Robot was going to be a difficult and long-term restore.
And then an Inferno shows up.

[Longer/Full Story Here]

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So it's missing basically everything. Only the power supply and monitor are present and unhacked.

I think where I need to start is the cabinet. I've got a limited time before winter closes in, and I have no climate controlled spaces to do painting.
I want to do as much as I can to stabilize it before I have to halt it for the winter. I learned my lesson two years ago doing Joust that winter + paint = bad.
 
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So. As for what needs to be done wood-wise.

As far as I can tell, the cabinet is entirely plywood. Unlike my other Williams cabs, that includes the front panel. It has pretty severe planking, and the sideart appears to have been removed, rather than painted over.

The bottom left side is significantly worse than the bottom right side. My preliminary questions are these:

  • Will bondo be sufficient for the missing wood on the left side? It appears to be only the top layer of the plywood that is missing. Is there something else I need to do to secure it long term?
  • Can I sand down the planked paint and repaint the whole cabinet?
  • Should I just sand the cabinet directly, or should I try to remove the black paint first by other means?
  • When repainting it, should I primer it and then paint? Or just use something like Satin black by rust-o-leum which I've used with success on my other Williams front panels before.
  • Speaking of the above, does anyone know what kind of paint was applied to Inferno to begin with by Williams? I know the stenciled cabs were oil based paints that were spray stenciled, but what about Inferno, given that it was just flat black and used a sticker?

My basic plan was to:
  1. Use a belt sander to remove most of the black paint
  2. Bondo bad areas and all pits and nail holes
  3. Use a rotary sander with finer grit to smooth it out
  4. Primer it
  5. Sand again with fine grit on rotary
  6. Paint (???) Not sure on paint technique to use
Hoping I can go out to the hardware store tomorrow and get whatever I need to get started.
 
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So. As for what needs to be done wood-wise.

As far as I can tell, the cabinet is entirely plywood. Unlike my other Williams cabs, that includes the front panel. It has pretty severe planking, and the sideart appears to have been removed, rather than painted over.

The bottom left side is significantly worse than the bottom right side. My preliminary questions are these:

  • Will bondo be sufficient for the missing wood on the left side? It appears to be only the top layer of the plywood that is missing. Is there something else I need to do to secure it long term?
  • Can I sand down the planked paint and repaint the whole cabinet?
  • Should I just sand the cabinet directly, or should I try to remove the black paint first by other means?
  • When repainting it, should I primer it and then paint? Or just use something like Satin black by rust-o-leum which I've used with success on my other Williams front panels before.
  • Speaking of the above, does anyone know what kind of paint was applied to Inferno to begin with by Williams? I know the stenciled cabs were oil based paints that were spray stenciled, but what about Inferno, given that it was just flat black and used a sticker?

  • Yes. It's best however to glue down the frayed areas. For this i use superglue from the dollar store. I use the cheap thin stuff to get underneath the fraying and then i hold the area down. Then for good measure i glue around the area to make sure it stays down. You want to be sure all of the area is glued down well. If you don't you will be going back and re-gluing areas when you begin sanding and feathering your bondo.
  • You can sand the cab as is without stripping it
  • Williams almost never used primer for this generation cabinet as far as i can tell.
My basic plan was to:
  1. Use a belt sander to remove most of the black paint
  2. Bondo bad areas and all pits and nail holes
  3. Use a rotary sander with finer grit to smooth it out
  4. Primer it
  5. Sand again with fine grit on rotary
  6. Paint (???) Not sure on paint technique to use
Hoping I can go out to the hardware store tomorrow and get whatever I need to get started.

  1. secure the fraying first
  2. sand the paint off the fraying area
  3. bondo and feather
  4. bondo and feather again
  5. paint
 
  • Yes. It's best however to glue down the frayed areas. For this i use superglue from the dollar store. I use the cheap thin stuff to get underneath the fraying and then i hold the area down. Then for good measure i glue around the area to make sure it stays down. You want to be sure all of the area is glued down well. If you don't you will be going back and re-gluing areas when you begin sanding and feathering your bondo.
  • You can sand the cab as is without stripping it
  • Williams almost never used primer for this generation cabinet as far as i can tell.


  1. secure the fraying first
  2. sand the paint off the fraying area
  3. bondo and feather
  4. bondo and feather again
  5. paint
Thanks!

And step 0... Strip absolutely everything out of the cabinet.

What kind of paint should I use on this thing?
 
Holy crap, I can't believe you found an Inferno, a converted one no less!
Yeah I'm not sure if I've come down from the ceiling yet either! Never thought I'd even see a real one. It's definitely in better shape than I thought it was - it could be worse, but there's a lot to go to make it where it needs to be. This thing deserves the best care that I can give to it.
 
Idealistic Inconceivable Inferno Inspiration -> that's one crazy control panel. :)

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Thanks!

And step 0... Strip absolutely everything out of the cabinet.

What kind of paint should I use on this thing?

An oil-based satin if you could find it.

I want to stress the whole situation about gluing down the frayed veneer/outer layer. I did a defender restoration some years back and didn't spend enough time gluing down those areas. I spent about 2 days gouging out Bondo and parts of the veneer that 'bubbled up'.

If you feel this may be difficult for you then you can use a circular saw at a very shallow depth and a straight piece of wood as a fence to cut the bag veneer off. The problem with that is you're going to end up with about five or six inches in height where you will question how thick your Bondo needs to be. Gauging that depth can be tricky.

You can also buy thin sheets of real wood veneer but the 'veneer' on most of these Williams cabinets are somewhere between sheathing and sanded plywood so getting a good match is practically impossible.
 
In advance of attempting to repair the exterior of the cabinet, I stripped the thing down as much as I felt necessary to clean and refurb. Makes moving it around much easier.

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In doing so, I learned some additional stuff.
  • The original marquee light fixture is gone. There was just a under-counter florescent floating around in there. It's a miracle that it didn't break the speaker. Thankfully the speaker and grille seem to be in good shape.
  • The AC harness actually seems to be pretty much unhacked. The only modification was that the op inexplicably tapped off the MONITOR feed to power the game PCB. Wild. The rest seems factory. The main harness was hacked up to create the Jamma harness and is beyond repair.
  • The damage to the coin box wood section is because someone pried off the back at some point. I re-secured it with a couple nails.
  • Unfortunately, no artwork under the TMNT CPO. Only the remains of a Double Dragon CPO.
  • While the Control panel *is* swiss cheese, none of the embedded threads for the original joystick mounts are gone. I think it can be probably bondoed and saved. Needs a new plate for sure though.
  • There are small remnants of silkscreened artwork on the glass. I suspect it may be the original bezel. Sadness.
  • Someone attempted to hot glue the coin vault door back on its hinge. They failed.
  • I found a bunch of quarters in the machine :)
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Overall, after emptying it out and giving it a quick clean, it seems much more solid than I had previously thought. It's cleaning up nicely.

One other thing- I have NO IDEA how to remove the plastic monitor bezel. It seems like it's permanently blocked in on every side. Any ideas?
 

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An oil-based satin if you could find it.
I wonder where I can find that in Maryland. Sherwin Williams didn't have it.

I want to stress the whole situation about gluing down the frayed veneer/outer layer. I did a defender restoration some years back and didn't spend enough time gluing down those areas. I spent about 2 days gouging out Bondo and parts of the veneer that 'bubbled up'.
I will definitely be pursuing this option. If I can avoid doing any cutting on the cabinet, I will. I'll start gluing as soon as I can lay the cabinet down.
 
I wonder where I can find that in Maryland. Sherwin Williams didn't have it.


I will definitely be pursuing this option. If I can avoid doing any cutting on the cabinet, I will. I'll start gluing as soon as I can lay the cabinet down.

It's tricky for me to find it locally as well. The last time I purchased any satin black oil-based paint was through Amazon.
 
Not sure. last time i bought some i simply rolled it on. I didn't spray it on.
From my experience, oil based Rustoleum Satin Black paint behaves differently from say, latex based paint. It gets less "orange peel" when cured. Use a foam roller to apply it (that's the secret). Let it cure for 24 hours. Then lightly sand with 200 Grit sandpaper by hand. Then rinse and repeat one or two times. The finish will be super smooth. Also, artwork sticks better to oil based paint.

That said, any consideration to vertical grade laminate?

Del
 
From my experience, oil based Rustoleum Satin Black paint behaves differently from say, latex based paint. It gets less "orange peel" when cured. Use a foam roller to apply it (that's the secret). Let it cure for 24 hours. Then lightly sand with 200 Grit sandpaper by hand. Then rinse and repeat one or two times. The finish will be super smooth. Also, artwork sticks better to oil based paint.
I think I may be more comfortable with the air gun, but I'll take that under advisement and maybe do a practice piece on a different piece of wood and see if I can get it right... I'm hoping there's enough warmth left in the year to do it. It was pretty chilly this morning so looking a little grim.

That said, any consideration to vertical grade laminate?
None. I've never done laminate before and I don't want my first attempt to be done on Inferno. Additionally, if Williams didn't do it that way from the factory, I don't want the machine to be done that way if I can help it. :p
 
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