Firepro4life52

New member
Joined
Jul 21, 2012
Messages
512
Reaction score
7
Location
Virginia
Rating - 100%
17   0   0
I recently cleared out the guts of two Nintendo VS. cabinets I picked up. I don't plan on restoring them and have several parts I'd like to sell. Parts are untested as the cabinets came without monitors or boards. Everything appears to be complete, however. I have the following:

Two-player metal control panels, complete with buttons, joysticks and switches (2 available)
Control panel wiring harnesses (2 available)
PCB cages (2 available)
Speakers and wiring (2 available) **SOLD**
Service switch & coin counter w/wiring (2 available, one is still wired/soldered to coin mechs)
Power supply units, including wiring, on/off toggle and power cord (2 available)


Pick up preferred (I'm in Northern VA) but willing to ship anything but the PSU. PM me if you'd like to make an offer or have any questions. Pictures of items can be seen here:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/43376989@N03/
 
Last edited:
What's the serial number on the cab that had the black transformer? Those typically only show up in the very early DKs. You might want to hold onto that if you're restoring it.
 
Well I doubt I will restore it with all original parts, but that's interesting. I don't remember which unit came from which cabinet, but the two numbers are: 29866 PAK and 14442PAK. Is there a place to look these up and see what they started out as?
 
Well I doubt I will restore it with all original parts, but that's interesting. I don't remember which unit came from which cabinet, but the two numbers are: 29866 PAK and 14442PAK. Is there a place to look these up and see what they started out as?

Yeah, there should be serial number plates on the back, top, center. If they've been removed then you can probably tell by the components. That black transformer is very telling though. Those early blue Donkey Kongs are rare. You should restore it to a DK with real parts.
 
The numbers I listed are the ones off the Nintendo tags on the back, I assume that's what you mean. I'm not so sure about doing a full restore. I respect those of you guys that do, but I'm not entirely sold on the idea of messing around with old finnicky parts just to run a single game, unless it were an immersive sit-down racer/sim. Maybe I will hold onto that PSU in case I change my mind down the road.

In any event, these items are still available if anyone is interested.
 
The numbers I listed are the ones off the Nintendo tags on the back, I assume that's what you mean. I'm not so sure about doing a full restore. I respect those of you guys that do, but I'm not entirely sold on the idea of messing around with old finnicky parts just to run a single game, unless it were an immersive sit-down racer/sim. Maybe I will hold onto that PSU in case I change my mind down the road.

In any event, these items are still available if anyone is interested.

There my be tags underneath the PAK tags and there also may be instruction sheets on the back doors that tell you. The early blue DKs were "TKG-3" and the later ones were TKG-4. With a little TLC these old Nintnedo cabinets are very reliable and there are a lot of people in your area who would likely help you. You might consider trying to swap out the tkG-3 cab with somebody if you intend to turn it into a MAME. It's kind of sad to see these rare games get gutted like that
 
Hmm....the back doors were pulled off other cabs I didn't take from the warehouse and there are no other tags with any numbers. The cabs otherwise look identical in terms of the wood used, the blue finish, what portions of the inside are painted, the metal fittings etc. Are there any other distinguishing features that might confirm if these are early models?


As far as a restore goes, if I can't distinguish which one is an original early DK I'll consider restoring the one that is in better shape. One of the cabs has two thick pieces of wood nailed inside to hold up the bezel (even though the bezel retainer is still there...dumbasses)...so I'll probably convert that one. Fear not, I don't plan on hacking anything up....just patching up dents, painting or vinyling it in a tasteful color, cleaning the inside good, putting on new t-molding and plexiglas etc. I also held onto the coin doors and hardware and I am having them cleaned or powdercoated back to their original state. So in any event, nothing irreversible if I sell them someday to someone who wants to fully restore.

All items (minus one PSU, pcb cage which i'll hang onto) are still available.
 
Hmm....the back doors were pulled off other cabs I didn't take from the warehouse and there are no other tags with any numbers. The cabs otherwise look identical in terms of the wood used, the blue finish, what portions of the inside are painted, the metal fittings etc. Are there any other distinguishing features that might confirm if these are early models?


As far as a restore goes, if I can't distinguish which one is an original early DK I'll consider restoring the one that is in better shape. One of the cabs has two thick pieces of wood nailed inside to hold up the bezel (even though the bezel retainer is still there...dumbasses)...so I'll probably convert that one. Fear not, I don't plan on hacking anything up....just patching up dents, painting or vinyling it in a tasteful color, cleaning the inside good, putting on new t-molding and plexiglas etc. I also held onto the coin doors and hardware and I am having them cleaned or powdercoated back to their original state. So in any event, nothing irreversible if I sell them someday to someone who wants to fully restore.

All items (minus one PSU, pcb cage which i'll hang onto) are still available.

Actually yeah, there is one way to tell, even if everything else has been gutted. The early DKs used 4-board pcb stacks (as opposed to the 2-board stacks they used in later models). These didn't have cages. They mounted directly to the back left side of the cabinet with metal PCB "L" brackets. Because the 4-board stack was smaller it mounted lower in the cab.

So, look for the mounting holes from the PCB brackets on the back, left of the inside of the cabint. There should be a pair of holes about 2 inches from the back of the cab where one of the PCB brackets was. Your looking for a pair of 2, vertically oriented, screw holes about 3/4 of an inch apart from each other. The early 4-boards stacks should have the mouting holes about 18 1/2 inches up from the floor of the cab. If you find these at 18 1/2 inches up, that's the early cab. The later cab that had the 2-board pcb stack will have mounting holes about 21 1/2 inches up.

You will also probably see screw holes from the PCB cages in there if these were conversions but these mounting holes won't be in vertially oriented pairs like the DK style pcb mounts.
 
Wouldn't you know it, one of them is an early one...unfortunately it is the one that has the wood nailed in around the bezel. I'll have to see if there is a way to remove it all without causing any damage. If I do restore it, it'll be a long term side project. Any advice on how to gets all the dust, grime and dried up cola off the power supply? It's filthy.
 
The whole background on those early DKs is really cool. There were lots and lots of later blue cabs, and a handful of early red ones, but there were even fewer blue TKG-3 cabinets (like yours). Those early DKs are from when Nintendo was so small it wasn't even doing things like putting copyright info on the art to protect it's intellectual property. As DK went from a game intended to try use up unwanted (red) Radar Scope games, into a huge hit, Nintendo grew rapidly and you can physically see it in the way DK manufacturing evolved.

Check this out
http://forums.arcade-museum.com/showthread.php?t=64571

I'm sure the whole power block can be cleaned. There's a restoration section here where you can lots of help. The cool thing about DK is that you can restore the game to original and still have it play DK Jr., DK 3, and D2K all on original hardware, which uses analog sound hardware that will sound better than any emulation. I belive you can also hook up a jamma switcher to play vertically oriented jamma games.
 
Back
Top Bottom