Stern Scramble converted into Pac-Man

icecoldtexan

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Hi all,
I bought a Pac-Man cocktail arcade in good working operation for $480. I did some investigating and came to the conclusion that it is a stern scramble cabinet with a Pac-Man glass and board.
I have a couple questions for you experts.
Did I overpay for this game ?
What components will I need if I want to convert it into a 60-in-one
multicade? I am compentant with mechanical and electrical issues so that wont be a problem. I just need part numbers and online places to buy them.
I think I'll need a 60-in-one board, a adaptor so i don't have to cut into my
original wiring, and I think I may need new control panels that incorporate a
trackball and fire buttons. My control panels are 11 inch. Also would like to replace tube with lcd monitor.
Thanks in advance
 
If you are going to convert a cab to a 1 n 60.
Sell the power supply, monitor, the cabling and the board.
If the control panels are Original sell them too.

Buy blank control panels. Now you can drill holes anywhere you like and you don't have to strip off anything. You can add joysticks and track balls.

Buy a switching power supply This will give your 1 n 60 Nice clean power instead of trying to modify a ms pacman power supply. Cheap and faster more reliable.

Buy a Jamma Harness this will make sure you don't have loose connector issues.

Buy an LCD.

Have you destroyed the value of the machine? To an original collector like me yes.
You might want to consider selling the machine as a whole and start building a cab from the ground up.

Just a thought..
 
to the point of overpaying:
it's a nice cab (style) it is a cocktail, it's a pac man.

The price may have been a touch high, but not really. especially if it's pretty nice.

We would need to see some pictures of the wiring, and internals to tell if an adapter would work for a 60 in1 or if you need to rewire.

www.arcadeshop.com sells control panels for the multicade. That way you can keep the original parts original.

it would be nice to see a number of pictures. inside and out
 
I did not find cp's from the usual sources for Stern cocktails, so I had some fabricated. They are made out of .100" aluminum so it's easy to cut holes in yet strong enough for yanking on. Blank panels ready for your design, cut out and paint. I have one set left.

$60 plus shipping. If you are interested I can send you pics.

Dave in Mukilteo
 
It wouldn't surprise me if it wasn't even a real Pac-Man board. I don't think you could buy a Pac-Man board BITD and convert your existing machine, you had to buy a full machine from Midway. Same for Ms Pac.
 
It wouldn't surprise me if it wasn't even a real Pac-Man board. I don't think you could buy a Pac-Man board BITD and convert your existing machine, you had to buy a full machine from Midway. Same for Ms Pac.

there were plenty of Pacmans that were already being stripped in 1981/82 to be converted to newer games so extra boards were floating around pretty quickly. one of the few games i've seen in a thirft store was a Scramble upright converted to Pacman at a Value Village about 20 years ago so it's not all that unusual.
 
I ordered the 60-in-1 board, the adaptor to fit the original wiring harness, and a power supply. I want to see how that works before i buy a monitor and the control panels.
I will take some pictures inside and out and post them in a few hours.
The coin door has a stern sticker on it and a label on the inside that reads scramble.
Some of the steel on the side of the monitor was cut away to allow the monitor swind door to close and not hit the pcb.
Who would buy the internals ? The game does work very well.
 
I ordered the 60-in-1 board, the adaptor to fit the original wiring harness, and a power supply. I want to see how that works before i buy a monitor and the control panels.
I will take some pictures inside and out and post them in a few hours.
The coin door has a stern sticker on it and a label on the inside that reads scramble.
Some of the steel on the side of the monitor was cut away to allow the monitor swind door to close and not hit the pcb.
Who would buy the internals ? The game does work very well.


so you bought a pac man to jamma adapter, (assuming it's original pac man wiring?)
unless you've done some research, you ought to get the pictures up sooner than later. It's likely a bootleg board with a different pinout. hard to say without seeing it though.
 
Why not save the work and turn it into a multi Pac? JAMMA cabinets are dirt cheap and much easier to convert, and the multi Pacs have a similar market value.
 
so you bought a pac man to jamma adapter, (assuming it's original pac man wiring?)
unless you've done some research, you ought to get the pictures up sooner than later. It's likely a bootleg board with a different pinout. hard to say without seeing it though.

If it's one of the PAC-1/PAC-2 bootlegs, a Pac-Man JAMMA adapter should work, if it's one of the regular ones requiring a standard switching supply (those boards don't use the AC input like a real Pac-Man board). They have 2 edge connectors, one is the Pac-Man pinout, the other is very close to Falcon (but the directions are a little different than on Crazy Kong, so a Falcon adapter won't work). Definitely would like to see pics of what you got, then it'd be easier to help you :) As to converting it, it's not like he's destroying an original machine...it's already a conversion...
 
Thanks for the input, here are some pictures. The coin door is rusted up like it's been outside but the wood is not warped, wonder if someone replaced the coin door ? There are two switches on the coin door, one will turn off the display when the coin dooe is open and will pull out to play when the door is open, the other seems to initiate a test pattern on the screen. Can ya'll determine what i have here with these pictures ? I can take more if needed. Thanks.
try this link for more pictures: www.photobucket.com/icecoldtexanarcade
 

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OK, guess I was wrong, that does look like a real Pac-Man board :) The power switch you mention is the interlock switch. The other is for test mode, it tests the ROM's, then lets you test all the controls (you should hear different sounds when you press each button, coin switch or joystick direction). Looks like a G07 monitor too, so that's good (they're very common and easy to fix)
 
OK, guess I was wrong, that does look like a real Pac-Man board :) The power switch you mention is the interlock switch. The other is for test mode, it tests the ROM's, then lets you test all the controls (you should hear different sounds when you press each button, coin switch or joystick direction). Looks like a G07 monitor too, so that's good (they're very common and easy to fix)

can you tell if it's a stern cabinet or a midway. You can see on picture # 6 where they had to cut and bend some metal so the monitor would clear the pcb
 
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If I decide to install a monitor should it be a LED or LCD and 720 or 1080. also what size will fit, I'm thinking 19".
Thanks
 
It's a Stern cocktail for sure, exactly like mine with the oddball size control panels. I used the original monitor metal and swapped in a nice 4900.
 
I did a scramble cocktail to 60n1 conversion not too long ago for guy. The control panels are odd sized and not easy to find. The CP really don't have room for a TB. Remove everything from the cabinet, rewire JAMMA with a switching power supply. My cab had a GO7 (recapped & new flyback) monitor that worked out very well and gave the 60n1 a better arcade feel than a lcd. Cab worked out great made a nice multicade cocktail.
 
I did a scramble cocktail to 60n1 conversion not too long ago for guy. The control panels are odd sized and not easy to find. The CP really don't have room for a TB. Remove everything from the cabinet, rewire JAMMA with a switching power supply. My cab had a GO7 (recapped & new flyback) monitor that worked out very well and gave the 60n1 a better arcade feel than a lcd. Cab worked out great made a nice multicade cocktail.

I think this is the route I'll take. I found a multicade underlay and CP overlays. I did also find some blank 11" control panels.
Which controls are required for the 60-in-1 ? I know it will need the joystick, one and two player start, then do each CP need one or two fire buttons ? Is a trackball necessary ?
 
On the multi i just did, the owner wanted it a ms pac underlay on top (easy for me). I used a new joystick and two buttons. Scramble CPs have two button already so I added the start buttons to player one CP. The board makes use of three buttons for a couple of games but for the most part two will play most of the games. I used two small buttons (like the midway originals for a cocktails) for the player one and player two start buttons. I have built a few multicades and personally like a trackball, but not on a cocktail. The guy who bought this machine was very specific in what he wanted. He was only interested in about ten of the "classic" games, so the two button CPs worked great.
 
I'm curious, where did you find Stern cocktail blank control panels? You may know this, but 11" Pacman cocktail cp's will not fit the Stern machine. You must have panels specific to the Stern.

A trackball for the 60-in-1 is a must for Centiepe and Millipede and is OK for Arkaniod. Fitting a joystick, a couple of buttons and a trackball will be a tight fit on a cocktail panel. If you use one of the expensive mini trackballs it will be easier to fit but I don't know how it will play.
 
I'm curious, where did you find Stern cocktail blank control panels? You may know this, but 11" Pacman cocktail cp's will not fit the Stern machine. You must have panels specific to the Stern.

I did not know they were different. What is the difference? I purchased 11"x5" overlays, they will fit on my control panels if I can't find some new ones. My panels look like they have a piece of thin wood on top of them, is this factory ?
I also purchased a new joystick and noticed the mounting holes are wider than what i have on there now. I saw a bracket that looks like it's for that, is that correct that I'll need that bracket or can I just drill new holes on my panel befor i put on the overlay. does anyone have a picture of the back of a midway control panel?
 

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