Turbo cabaret project

Tornadoboy

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Hi everybody,

Got some new toys! :D
A Turbo cabaret/mini which I got in trade along with a couple of Monaco GP cabarets, and here's the story thus far:

It all seems complete except for the 13" monitor (which I'm looking for, hint hint) and the shifter (ditto), word has it that its main problem was in the power supply, and after looking at its condition I didn't even dare plug it in. All the electrolytic caps on the power regulator and stereo amp PCBs were so corroded they looked like they washed up on the shore of the Atlantic, and the resistors were literally rotting off the board. FORTUNATELY everything is standard, off-the-shelf parts so I figured I might as well replace everything regardless. Despite the damage to the components the PCBs themselves seem to be in almost perfect shape and the game boards appear to have escaped harm entirely, but it remains to be seen whether they actually work or not.

While most of the side art is gone and the sides look like hell overall, physically the cabinet isn't in too bad a shape. At some point it needs to be cleaned, Bondo'd in a couple of minor places, sanded, repainted and if possible get new side art (from WHERE? HELP!), but I'm going to have to wait for warmer weather before doing all that. Most of the plastic parts seem to have survived remarkably well, the marquee is more or less perfect and the bezel is good minus a couple of minor scratches and a ding. The original foot pedal is long-gone leaving nothing but a rotting stump behind, fortunately the previous owner gave me a loose replacement which is ready to be used but getting the bolts out holding the old one promises to be an adventure. The steering wheel needs a good polishing but otherwise is in excellent shape, and the column could use a bit of cleaning and some new lubrication.
 

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The entire power supply comes out on a nice convenient piece of plywood so I removed that and tried to clean off all the crud with canned air, Q-tips and Fantastic, it worked pretty good except as the rather blurry picture shows it did nothing about what was underneath the components themselves (in the pic 1/2 the PCB I've already rebuilt). This proved yet another reason to just strip the boards of everything and start over, so that's what I've started doing. There is a stand alone regulated 5v 15a power supply which internally looks good although I have not tested it yet, but I figure in a pinch it can be replaced with a standard switching supply.

Soooooo, where things stand now:

The stereo amp board is about 90% done now except for a few things I'm waiting for, the only parts I'm leaving original are the ceramic capacitors since they're almost indestructable and the monster STK-439 IC, which at least in appearance doesn't seem too bad off.

On the power regulator board I've already replaced both 7812's since they're all of $1.50 at Radio Shack, the 78M12 I'm taking the chance of leaving since it's going to cost about $10 to chase down on its own and I don't want to spend too much initially. Everything I need to (in theory) finish up with the power supply is on its way so hopefully I will be able to give it a try in a week.

Oh the lower coin box door was locked and the key was nowhere to be found, so I tried the trick of freezing it with canned air and hammering it out from the middle with a screwdriver, which works under the theory that hardened steel becomes brittle when extremely cold. It worked like a charm and after a few bruises I managed to split the lock cyclinder in half without damaging the door.

And after all that trouble what did I find in the box? A dime, and the keys to the lock. :(
 

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Good luck on your project. I have a full size machine. It has pcb problems and is missing trees and cars. I have bought several "working" boards off Ebay, but none of them have worked.
 
Good luck on your project. I have a full size machine. It has pcb problems and is missing trees and cars. I have bought several "working" boards off Ebay, but none of them have worked.

Thanks!

I was once offered a working upright for $50 a long time ago and have been kicking myself since for not taking it, as I didn't think I had the room for it at the time. It's cool to finally have one and when I'm done restoring it it's going in my living room.

At this point you may want to consider just paying someone to fix the original, in the long run it may be cheaper than taking anymore chances on used PCBs. Also if you haven't already tried it post your problem under the general repairs and help thread, there's some pretty smart guys around here and it could turn out to be a common problem with an easy fix.
 
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Good luck on your project. I have a full size machine. It has pcb problems and is missing trees and cars. I have bought several "working" boards off Ebay, but none of them have worked.

Missing trees and cars are caused by either very low voltage comming out of the power supply (mine was down to 4.2V on the far side of the board!), or by defective analog chips.

The chips are kinda rare...74LS626, which are a VCO (voltage controlled oscillator). Therefore if your voltage is too low, it doesn't oscillate at the right frequency to generate the graphics lines for the trees and cars.

Now if you bought 'working' boards, it probably is then just your power supply. However it could also be the chips.

I picked up a few extra when I repaired my board. They're socketed which is nice. I spose I could sell a few if anyone needs some.
 
Somebody is selling 10 of those chips at $11 each on Ebay, not cheap but if you want to go that route:

http://cgi.ebay.com/74LS626-Integra...emQQptZLH_DefaultDomain_0?hash=item588431fd68

If you're talking about the 5-volt self contained power supply mounted on the plywood board, couldn't you just replace that with a standard 5/12 volt switching supply? Most take 110vac input like the original and are capable of putting out the same 5vdc at 15 amps.

Update:
The fuse sockets had some acid-like green corrosion (it was not from acid however) so I took them out and tried soaking them in white vinegar and salt, worked quite nicely and they're now in good shape.

I've now installed all the parts which I intended to replace in the power supply except for the 3300uf caps which I'm still waiting for, so hopefully I'll be able to fire it up soon.
 
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Somebody is selling 10 of those chips at $11 each on Ebay, not cheap but if you want to go that route:

http://cgi.ebay.com/74LS626-Integra...emQQptZLH_DefaultDomain_0?hash=item588431fd68

If you're talking about the 5-volt self contained power supply mounted on the plywood board, couldn't you just replace that with a standard 5/12 volt switching supply? Most take 110vac input like the original and are capable of putting out the same 5vdc at 15 amps.

Yeah, they're pricey chips. I didn't pay that much but definitely more than any 74LS of any other type I've bought before. I'd love to sell my extras at $11 (and $7 shipping) each :) No, seriously, I'd be willing to sell them for $5 plus actual shipping in padded envelope if anyone needs some.

But before anyone blames these pricey chips, test the +5V across the board (adjust it up with the knob on the supply if necessary) -- I found mine to be close to 5 at the supply but dropped by the time it got to the far parts of the board. Then adjust / test the voltage pots on the side of the board that control the tree/building height, check the sockets that the 626's are in. If all that tests fine, pull out and swap the 626 chips around and see if you get different results. If you think it's the chips then that would be the next step to replace.
 
Got my 3300uf caps finally, hopefully I'll have something to show soon! :D

I've also got coming what hopefully is the last of the parts I'm going to need to get one of my Monaco GP cabarets workings, so I'm chomping at the bit to finish up with Turbo so I can take a crack at that!
 
This looks like my old turbo, did you get this from Bstnguy? those cabarets were also probably mine at one point..

if that was mine, it was just a PS issue. the game worked then went into storage. i might know someone with a monitor for ya..
 
This looks like my old turbo, did you get this from Bstnguy? those cabarets were also probably mine at one point..

if that was mine, it was just a PS issue. the game worked then went into storage. i might know someone with a monitor for ya..

Wow, no kidding? It's a small world! Yep they're from Bstnguy, I traded him a flyback tester for it and the two Monaco GPs. What info could you give me about it? Also who has that monitor you mentioned and how much do they want?
 
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Well... if I were to go off looks alone, I'd say the power supply is cured! Not too shabby if I do say so myself, especially for something that started off looking like the gods of dust, corrosion and filth had wiped their asses with. I picked up some black paint so before I re-install this puppy (assuming it tests ok) I'm going to clean and paint the interior so I don't have to pull things apart again later.

Hopefully I'm going to test it for signs of life this weekend, let's hope I get off this easy! :D
 

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Just finished up repainting the interior and making the last of the Daddy Long-leg spiders very unhappy, it looks like night and day now in comparison.

I started by cleaning out as much of the crud as I could using a vacuum and clean paint brush, then before painting I used what is shown in the 3rd picture. It's not cheap as it costs somewhere between 8 and $12 a bottle at Home Depot, but it claims to not only kill the mold but leave a residue to keep it from coming back, so I figured it was worth it and afterwards I was still left with plenty left for my other projects. I sprayed enough of it initially to leave the interior wet, then tamped it down with a dry paper towel to leave it merely damp so as to hopefully minimize whatever moisture damage it could cause.

Note the before and after pics, it really made a big difference and I highly recommend doing this if you truly want to clean up a cab.
 

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Hopefully I'm going to test it for signs of life this weekend, let's hope I get off this easy! :D

Famous last words...

I put it all together yesterday and plugged it in for the very first time to give it a blind test, and nope I'm not getting off that easy. :( It comes up with the ambulance noise for a moment (at least the sound amp works!), all the LED score displays read nothing but flickering zeros, it doesn't respond to coins and none of the marquee bulbs light up. In other words, and in my unqualified opinion, likely power supply issue.

Oh well, nobody ever said life was easy.

Ok I certainly knew this was a possibility but I was hoping that all the corroded components I replaced on the power supply would cover whatever issue it had originally, in fact there's very little I didn't actually replace on the regulator and amplifier boards. I did finally check the 5-volt supply and that tested at 5.2vdc, so that can be ruled out.

SOOOOOO... my immediate plan is:

1 - Pull the power supply and check it volt by volt, which is what I should have done in the first place before putting it back in. Everything left should be easy to replace if need be except the main transformer, god help me if I've got to chase down one of those. I'm hoping it's something dumb like a blown bridge rectifier or that 78M12 that I didn't want to have to chase down, it's not all that complicated a circuit so I should be able to isolate the problem.

2 - Test the two 13" monitors that came with the Monaco GPs I got and see what kind of shape they're in, and if one works adapt it to go in the Turbo, so at least I won't be testing blind. And if neither tests good then I'll make an extension harness for one of my 19" monitors and temporarily use that while I figure out the rest.

On a more positive note I just got done cleaning up a scanned image of the instruction sheet that is stapled to the inside of the door and it came out great, so if anybody needs a copy let me know, it's too big a file to attach to this message. Also I stumbled upon a NOS control panel cover on Ebay for $26 total and now have that on order, so at least it'll look nice.
 
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Thought I'd perform some CPR on this thread:

I've put aside working on the electronics for the time being to concentrate on restoring the cab itself, that way I won't have to take it apart again later for painting and risk disturbing any repairs I may have made, and so far so good. As I've posted earlier I've completely cleaned and repainted the interior which looks 1000 times better now, and I've replaced the plastic CP shroud and cleaned/lubed the steering wheel, which now spins freely without sounding like a hand cranked coffee mill full of rust. I found that the cab's original primer wasn't doing a very good job, which explains why when somebody tried to peel off the side art they took a lot of paint with it, so I was able to easily scrap it off of both sides without much effort and minimal damage.

So now it's pretty much ready for Bondo and a new paint job, more pics to come!
 
Ok I've got some picks to show, the first 4 are of the sides, one stripped of paint and the other still intact. Note the remaining black patch is where someone pulled the paint off accidentally with the side art, then spray painted it to try to hide the damage:
 

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And some of the bondo work I have been doing over the past week:
 

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here is the best pic i could find of the day i picked it up. figured you might want it since your doing such a great job restoring it. Came from an arcade in Littleton NH.
good luck.

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here is the best pic i could find of the day i picked it up. figured you might want it since your doing such a great job restoring it. Came from an arcade in Littleton NH.
good luck.

Thanks! It's getting there and hopefully I'll be able to start painting this weekend, like I've said earlier I want to wrap up all the major cosmetic work now so I can fix the electronics and not have to take them out again later.

Any idea what issues it had? I've been told it was in the power supply, which I've now mostly rebuilt and the voltages seem good. When I plug it in I get an ambulance sound for a moment and flickering 0's on all the LEDs, I haven't hooked a monitor up yet to see what that shows. One way or another this SOB is going to work! :D

BTW awesome Haunted House! One of these days I'm going to chase down some sort of electro-mechanical game too.
 
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More pics of the now sanded Bondo. A couple more hours of good weather should be enough for me to deal with
any remaining gashes and to finally be able to begin painting. It looks like WWIII, but what you see for the most part is as smooth as a baby's butt!

Remember people, Bondo if your FRIEND!
 

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