nintendo cabs

coleco1981

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Just curious - does anyone know the story behind the different types of nintendo cabs? I have a plywood popeye cabinet but I understand there is a particle board cabinet. Which ones are older and aside from the molding offsets, what other differences are there? Do the serial numbers on the cabs give an indication as to when it was made?
 
I believe the particle board cabs were the ones made in the US and the plywood were the Japanese. I may have that backwards though.
 
Plywood was the first, particle board was second.

Most Popeye machines, I have seen have been particle board.

So, if you have a plywood version- I would assume, it was early in the run of Popeye.

I moved my Popeye from a particle board cabient to plywood. So, I guess that could have happened to your game also.
 
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I believe coin-op manufacturers switched from plywood to particle board because, as sales of new games skyrocketed in 1980-81, plywood prices shot upward. Particle board was cheaper and easier to work with, so they switched and never looked back.
 
so not to slightly derail this thread, but what was first, the 4 board DK, or the 2 board? the reason i ask is cause i have a mario bros in a converted 4 board dk that is a plywood cab. just wondering how many variations there are.
 
so not to slightly derail this thread, but what was first, the 4 board DK, or the 2 board? the reason i ask is cause i have a mario bros in a converted 4 board dk that is a plywood cab. just wondering how many variations there are.

4 Board set was first. If you look at the serial tag TKG-2 & TKG-3 were 4 board sets and TKG-4 was a 2 board set.


I believe the particle board cabs were the ones made in the US and the plywood were the Japanese. I may have that backwards though.
This is correct. US built cabinets were particle board and the Japan built were Plywood.
 
There's also a chance your cabinet was originally a Donkey Kong and someone converted it to a Popeye.
 
The classic Nintendo Cabinets, like donkey kong, dk jr., popeye, etc. were made in Japan and the U.S. simultaniously. The only exception that I know of is that, iintially DK was Japan only, but they eventually started making Donkey Kong cabinets in the U.S. too.

The Japanese-made cabinets are plywood and have that hard enamel like coating on them.

The U.S.-made cabinets are particle board and don't have the coating, they're just painted.

With a game like Popeye, the fact that it's ply just means that it was made in Japan, it doesn't tell you much about the time it was made (early vs. late). This is because, by the time Popeye came out they were making Nintendo cabinets in both Japan and the U.S.

As for the DK boardsets. Nintendo used 4-board stacks in the early japanese Donkey Kong uprights, they also used them in all of the cocktail cabinets. When the TKG-4 (2-board) boardsets came out they used the 2-board stacks in the uprights but continued to use the 4-board stacks in the cocktail machines.

In most cases you can tell the time period from the label on the boardset, the Radar Scope to DK conversions had TKG2 4-board stacks, the early red and blue Donkey Kongs (and probably early cocktails and caberets) had TKG3 4-board stacks. I believe the highest you'll see in the early Japanese Donkey Kongs is TKG3-06. If you have a 4-board stack that says TKG3-07 that usually means its a later cocktail boardset.
 
Wow thanks for the info - that makes sense.

So next question on nintendo cab trivia, I know that Radar scope, DK, DK2, DK3, VS and Popeye cabs are pretty much the same - right? What other games did nintendo use the same cabs for?
 
Wow thanks for the info - that makes sense.

So next question on nintendo cab trivia, I know that Radar scope, DK, DK2, DK3, VS and Popeye cabs are pretty much the same - right? What other games did nintendo use the same cabs for?

I think that's about it. DK3 was a kit only (you could convert your (Radar Scope) DK, DK Jr., or Popeye into a DK 3. Vs. did have a dedicated U.S. cabinet (particle board) that was a little different style, but there were also many many kits for people to convert their DK style cabinets to a Vs. system. Mario Bros. had a dedicated widebody cabinet and came as a conversion kit as well.

Rember that when DK hit, Nintendo was still a small company based out of Japan, and as DK got popular they expanded to keep up with demand and started making cabinets in the U.S. Popeye was scheduled to come out around the same time as DK but got caught up with legal (intellectual property) hurdles. I strongly suspect (based on the timelines) that the reason we started seeing blue DKs was becasue Nintendo Japan could'nt keep up with demand for DKs (which were in red cabs) so they started using blue cabs originally designated for Popeye to keep up with demand. They may have made the switch permanent so that they could be more versitile in filling demand for DK and Popeye.
 
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