Oak Defender cocktail - opinions/thoughts?

Franklin

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Been meaning to post pictures of this cocktail for a while. Came out of a Chicago area home many years ago. It's not the typical laminated Williams cocktail, instead it appears to be made from Oak. I don't know much more than that.

There is no cabinet serial number that I can identify, it's missing the CPU, ROM and Power boards (I've posted separately in the WTB section so if you have any please PM me!)

Other than the cabinet wood, it has a gold/brass type metal vent cover material rather than the typical black plastic. It appears to have copper ground cable instead of the silver braided ground, and the large pcb mounting plate is black instead of silver.

It's entirely possible a skilled cabinet maker made this at home, but if you see it up close it really appears to be factory. Just way to much detail for me to believe some guy made this at home and swapped parts into it.

I do have the top, but I dropped it off at the glass shop to get a new top glass made today (this one has finally made it to the top of the project list). Didn't think to snap pics

Anyway, I finally took some pictures to put out for public opinion. Anyone else ever see an Oak Williams cocktail like this?
 

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Additional Pics.
 

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Defender Cocktail
 

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Just a few more
 

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The "TESTED MAY 21, 1981" makes me think it has to be original, because if someone just built it, why would they go through the trouble of putting that on it?
 
I love it and bet it was a prototype. I would think that this was presented to Williams as a viable cabinet design, but thought by management to be nice looking but way too expensive to mass produce in solid oak, so they decided to use the cabinet design but change the material to MDF with woodgrain laminate to simulate the look while cutting down on the cost. Just a theory, but it makes sense to me.
 
I don't think the 'tested' really means anything because I think that's just on the control panel.... I think one of three things happened

1. Somebody built a really nice cabinet and swapped everything over out of a damaged original. 30% chance this happened

2. It's a prototype.... 60% chance this happened

3. it's a 1 off built by a Williams employee, using parts from the factory a-la Johnny Cash 10% chance this happened

 
I agree with the point about the Tested mark.

Wish there was a way to contact someone who worked at Williams around 1981!
 
That's pretty fascinating! I'd say it's a prototype; if they moved all the parts over to a new cabinet, they did a really detailed job of it.
 
My opinion is that is was custom made by Williams as something special to celebrate the success of the game. Maybe it was a special award Defender. All the metal looks golden in color.

Something like Atari did with the one gold Asteroids.

????
 
The old wms engineering team is mostly on the wdpu fb page. That is where you will get proper history feedback
 
Williams defender players unite. In the past 5 years it is ground zero for williams fans.
 
thats alot of flathead screws for someone to make this at home unless they did so right away in very early 80s.
lost of saw blade burn on the edges tho aswell.

awesome cab either way
 
From head of engineering thru all the video game eras at WMS even prior to Defender- Sorry but I do not remember us ever making an "oak" cocktail cabinet for any reason for any of our games. From the pictures, it appears to be pretty much the same as the cocktail cabinet we did produce but the production units were not "oak". It would have been too expensive to build with oak wood. My guess is someone "hand built this unit" .
 
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