Trackball cutout repair?

[obitus1990]

I'm converting a Golden Tee back to its original form, Mortal Kombat. The wood and metal parts of the control panel have been ruined by the trackball cutout. On the wood, the trackball cutout falls in the area of one of the joysticks, eliminating two of the joystick's screw holes, half of a button hole, and the hole the stick arises from. Since the area to be repaired would fall in a high stress (from joystick movement) area, is there a way to repair this reliably, or should I just cut a new panel, using the existing as a template as much as I can? The metal I am not so worried about because the new CPO will cover that, followed by plexi, and it's only a large round hole, versus a trapezoidal cutout like what was done to the wood for the base of the trackball to fit in there.

 

[CharlieG]

Can you reinforce the repaired wood with some metal braces on the underside? Ugly on the inside but passable on the outside?

 

[obitus1990]

I suppose. It would probably involve having to cut a few slots with router so that a metal brace can be countersunk, allowing the joystick will sit flush with the wooden panel.

 

[lilypad19]

On ruined wooden areas - I create a new 'plug' for lack of a better term and cut out all of the bad areas and replace it with new. Epoxy the new part in, sand it all smooth and redrill as needed. I did this sort of thing on my Joust CP - but the process is similar with larger areas. Don't try to reinforce crappy wood if you can avoid it. Hope this helps.