Museum of the Game® & International Arcade Museum® Forums
Ok so as some of you know I've been working on restoring a pretty beaten up Tempest Cocktail and one of the major cosmetic issues it has are some pretty gnarly gouges and scratches on the woodgrain laminated top under the glass.
As far as I can tell at one point in its life this cab had its original glass artwork broken. Some time between now and then it seems that some heartless individual decided to use the cab as a table and it looks like they dragged something heavy and sharp across the surface. I'm guessing a monitor maybe? And the really shitty thing is the damage is right in the middle of the glass where it won't be covered by the art. You can't really tell in the photos but the marks are fairly deep and quite the eyesore.
The top can't stay like that if I'm cleaning this cab up, so today I was on a mission to repair them the best I could.
I took a quick trip to home depot and snagged both a Roberts "universal" floor repair kit, and a pack of Rejuvenate ExactMatch markers.
Using a combination of those, some 99% Isopropyl, some shop towel, and a small spray bottle with water I was able to channel my inner Bob Ross and mask off quite a bit of the damage. It took the better part of an hour and quite a bit of blending but I'm quite happy with the end result.
It's Definitely not perfect, if you look at it in the right light with glare you can still see the damage, and if you know its there and go looking for it you'll see the spots. But its a far cry from the eye catching marks that it once had. Plus once its under the glass and the arcade black lights are turned on you'd never notice. Not bad for my first try at this.
Anyways, not as riveting as replacing the "vibration dampener" foam inside the cab, but it was a big win for me today, so I thought I'd share.
As far as I can tell at one point in its life this cab had its original glass artwork broken. Some time between now and then it seems that some heartless individual decided to use the cab as a table and it looks like they dragged something heavy and sharp across the surface. I'm guessing a monitor maybe? And the really shitty thing is the damage is right in the middle of the glass where it won't be covered by the art. You can't really tell in the photos but the marks are fairly deep and quite the eyesore.
The top can't stay like that if I'm cleaning this cab up, so today I was on a mission to repair them the best I could.
I took a quick trip to home depot and snagged both a Roberts "universal" floor repair kit, and a pack of Rejuvenate ExactMatch markers.
Using a combination of those, some 99% Isopropyl, some shop towel, and a small spray bottle with water I was able to channel my inner Bob Ross and mask off quite a bit of the damage. It took the better part of an hour and quite a bit of blending but I'm quite happy with the end result.
It's Definitely not perfect, if you look at it in the right light with glare you can still see the damage, and if you know its there and go looking for it you'll see the spots. But its a far cry from the eye catching marks that it once had. Plus once its under the glass and the arcade black lights are turned on you'd never notice. Not bad for my first try at this.
Anyways, not as riveting as replacing the "vibration dampener" foam inside the cab, but it was a big win for me today, so I thought I'd share.