My Story...My Defender Restoration

[Tighe]

Here are some pics of the gutted cab I got from drj90 - Dan is the Man! This cabinet is much more structurally solid than my original, paint was in much better shape, so much so that I went back to my local paint department(s) Lowes & Home Depot and re-checked my paint matches (see previous post). I didn't take my cabinet to the store this time- I knew they couldn't get a read with their spectrophotometer from the side of my cab, so I just took some paint chips off the cab- I'm gonna bondo and primer and black anyway, just wanted to get a good paint match before I sanded over it. The red I found seemed pretty much dead on, the yellow is about 90 percent there, whats funny is, depending on where you pull color from the shades change - significantly. I'm assuming that from many factors, how good original paint job was, amount of sunlight the paint has been exposed to etc. etc. The Red and Yellow on this cab is much fresher than my first one so I'm glad I got to see the better paint and match it.

RED: Valspar 1010-3 Heirloom Red (Lowe's)
YELLOW: Valspar 3007-1A Yellow Mustard (Lowe's)

Looks good! For the most part, a little cabinet wear doesn't bother me, but when you can see the grain of the plywood, it drives me bonkers. Cabinets like Defender and Berzerk (pretty much any Stern cabinet for that matter) can be improved with a paint job. They had a lot of over spray and always reminded me of local political campaign signs from back in the 80's. If I had a Defender I would totally repaint it but first I would make sure the grain doesn't show, and I would probably apply a few coats of satin clear-coat.

 

[mcgolfpro]

Cutting Holes in my Defender Cab for Paint Samples

So tonight I got the hole saw out and cut "circles" out of the richest red and yellow sections of my defender cab...I figured I'm going to be doing plenty of sanding, bondo, and priming so when complete nobody should be the wiser... Took the circles to Lowe's and let them run it through their spectrophotometer. It came up with the best match yet for the Red and Yellow. Red is pretty much dead on to my eye and the yellow is 95-98% good. The only sample Jars they had were in satin. I will probably go with a higher gloss for the real deal. The approximately 1 inch squares are the paint samples they came up with, and now I have permanent sections for future paint matching if needed! They will be "hermetically sealed inside a mayonnaise jar underneath Funk & Wagnalls' porch" forever!

Here are the numbers from Lowe's:

RED: Valspar Red-95060 (Base?) 101-0.5, 109-2.75, 113-0.5

YELLOW: Valspar B 4-94101 (Base?) 105-0.5, 107-1.75, 113-3, 114-30.5

 

[Tighe]

You are nuts!

No one would have known the colors were slightly off, and I bet in the factory their colors varied over time, you never get the same exact mix. That is why you can't take a quarter panel off car in the junk yard with the same color and put it on your car without it being noticeable. I am not all riled up because you drilled holes in your cabinet, I just think it was not necessary as I bet no 2 Defenders were the same out of the factory.

So tonight I got the hole saw out and cut "circles" out of the richest red and yellow sections of my defender cab...I figured I'm going to be doing plenty of sanding, bondo, and priming so when complete nobody should be the wiser... Took the circles to Lowe's and let them run it through their spectrophotometer. It came up with the best match yet for the Red and Yellow. Red is pretty much dead on to my eye and the yellow is 95-98% good. The only sample Jars they had were in satin. I will probably go with a higher gloss for the real deal. The approximately 1 inch squares are the paint samples they came up with, and now I have permanent sections for future paint matching if needed! They will be "hermetically sealed inside a mayonnaise jar underneath Funk & Wagnalls' porch" forever!

Here are the numbers from Lowe's:

RED: Valspar Red-95060 (Base?) 101-0.5, 109-2.75, 113-0.5

YELLOW: Valspar B 4-94101 (Base?) 105-0.5, 107-1.75, 113-3, 114-30.5

 

[mcgolfpro]

You are nuts!

No one would have known the colors were slightly off, and I bet in the factory their colors varied over time, you never get the same exact mix. That is why you can't take a quarter panel off car in the junk yard with the same color and put it on your car without it being noticeable. I am not all riled up because you drilled holes in your cabinet, I just think it was not necessary as I bet no 2 Defenders were the same out of the factory.

I WOULD HAVE KNOWN. I'm sure the factory colors did vary over time, as far as being "necessary"...is any of this? I think that game cabinet paint probably went in batches. I doubt or maybe I "bet" that in some crazy scheme to turn a profit they might have mixed enough paint to do more than one cabinet at a time. I "bet" many defenders were the same out of the factory... I have seen threads where people are looking/compiling paint codes for various games:

http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=84492.0

I'm not really doing this restore with the "that's good enough" mentality.

I wasn't trying to provide a positive paint code for EVERY defender in existence...Just mine, and if someone else can use that info, maybe that will help to "preserve" future games...

 

[Tighe]

I WOULD HAVE KNOWN. I'm sure the factory colors did vary over time, as far as being "necessary"...is any of this? I think that game cabinet paint probably went in batches. I doubt or maybe I "bet" that in some crazy scheme to turn a profit they might have mixed enough paint to do more than one cabinet at a time. I "bet" many defenders were the same out of the factory... I have seen threads where people are looking/compiling paint codes for various games:

http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=84492.0

I'm not really doing this restore with the "that's good enough" mentality.

I wasn't trying to provide a positive paint code for EVERY defender in existence...Just mine, and if someone else can use that info, maybe that will help to "preserve" future games...

I wasn't trying to offend, just saying that it above and beyond. I am sure it will turn out great. Mostly I just can't stand how shoddy Williams and Stern paint jobs are. You can see the wood grain.

 

[mcgolfpro]

Understood, no offense taken, I hope none was given. Thanks for the feedback. Injected some glue into some very slight de-lamination on one corner, and cleaned up a bit on the PCB's. Not much- but I'm trying to do something everyday so I don't go months without touching it again.

 

[Tighe]

Understood, no offense taken, I hope none was given. Thanks for the feedback. Injected some glue into some very slight de-lamination on one corner, and cleaned up a bit on the PCB's. Not much- but I'm trying to do something everyday so I don't go months without touching it again.

None taken either! I look forward to watching your progress!

 

[mcgolfpro]

SS Coin Door Refurb

Pulled one of the two SS coin doors to do some clean up / refurb today. Bead blasted it and then ran a wire wheel over it. It turned out fine, just maybe not exactly like the factory finish though. More Satin look, maybe I'll try something else witht the other one...Not sure.

 

[Tighe]

Pulled one of the two SS coin doors to do some clean up / refurb today. Bead blasted it and then ran a wire wheel over it. It turned out fine, just maybe not exactly like the factory finish though. More Satin look, maybe I'll try something else witht the other one...Not sure.

You should try some rubbing compound and a cotton polishing wheel, it would give it a nice shine and should look like the original finish.

 

[mcgolfpro]

You should try some rubbing compound and a cotton polishing wheel, it would give it a nice shine and should look like the original finish.

Been there done that, I tried that first - it polished out fine, but slowly, and it didn't give the same "grained" appearance as the original. I have read about and tried scotch brite pads to get the original grained appearance as well, havent gotten it yet, I'll keep trying.

 

[Tighe]

Been there done that, I tried that first - it polished out fine, but slowly, and it didn't give the same "grained" appearance as the original. I have read about and tried scotch brite pads to get the original grained appearance as well, havent gotten it yet, I'll keep trying.

Ahh, I didn't realize it was "grained". Get the really rough ones. They make a scotch bright wheel you can put in your drill too. They sell it at Wal-mart. I will take a photo tonight.

 

[joeycuda]

bunch of tips on how to restore the grain to stainless steel - search on rec.games.pinball

http://groups.google.com/group/rec....eb?lnk=gst&q=stainless+grain#3dfd7d36762f6eeb

 

[Tighe]

Wheel

I don't know if you want to use these:

 

[mcgolfpro]

Bondo, Sand, Bondo, Sand, Infinity.........

Got going with sanding and bondo today...I can see already that this could go on forever...At some point I might have to say good enough (regardless of previous posts) and move on for the sake of progress. You can always find something.

 

[Nevus]

I love this thread. Keep up the good work.

 

[mcgolfpro]

More Bondo, Before Pics, Repairing a dogs chew toy....

More Bondo and sanding today, I started to repair the front corners where it looks like a dog chewed them up pretty good...Right height for most dogs to chew so that's my best guess, they are coming along fine but not quite finished, Here are the before pics.

 

[mcgolfpro]

After Pics of Today's Bondo work

Results from today, still a work in progress. Probably one more round of bondo and sanding will get the damaged corners done- I had to watch a little of the game today!

 

[mcgolfpro]

First Coat of Primer

First coat of primer went on today...

 

[drewpwr]

Oh WOW!!! You have just created a monster after reading this. I just picked up an Atari Race Driving full sit down and have been thinking about how much work I want to do on it. At first when I took the back panel off I thought I bit off more then I could chew but after seeing what you have done.....I'm hooked!!! Now I regret not taking pictures of the garage I picked it up in to start my photo album. LOL Keep up the good work and the funny slant to it. I could easily picture your wife's face when the second cabinet rolled up.

 

[mcgolfpro]

My Monitor

Just Ordered some parts from Bob Roberts among other things, a cap kit to make my monitor nice and bright when re-installed.