What was your scariest incident moving a game?

8BitMonk

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Recently I picked up a Dynamo HS-2 cab from Craigslist and let the person talk me into moving it with just the two of us. The cab ended up sliding on the stairs barrelling them over and they ended up getting bruised up and having to get several stitches on a finger. Pretty scary incident.

This got me thinking there must be some pretty gnarly stories of cab moves out there. These are big, bulky, awkward machines. What was your scariest incident? Machine go through a wall, fall off a truck? Let's hear it.
 
Earlier this year I was helping a buddy move an Operation Wolf into his basement. I normally prefer to be on the bottom side for moving games into basements and this was no different. We got the game maybe halfway down the strairs before my buddy yells out that he doesn't have a grip on it anymore. It happened in a blur but I got pinned against the wall at the bottom and took a nasty hit to my groin. Thankfully I wasn't seriously hurt and no hernia either....just a huge bruise!
 
Moving all my games by myself out of a basement using an automatic stair climber. Died halfway up with a Mario wide body on it screamed for my neighbor who help me to lift it off while the stair climber (around 200 pounds) slide down the steps and crashed into the basement floor. In the process I have to think quick to avoid the stair climber from hitting me on the way down and not let go of the game.
 
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I have had quite a few over the years.

The most recent one was having a game slip out of my hands and start to fall. I tried to hold it up but lost my balance and the game crashed down and I was still holding it. So I fell on top of the game.

Damage: ripped up my hands and arms and the game suffered two broken boards that I know of.
 
Recently I picked up a Dynamo HS-2 cab from Craigslist and let the person talk me into moving it with just the two of us. The cab ended up sliding on the stairs barrelling them over and they ended up getting bruised up and having to get several stitches on a finger. Pretty scary incident.

This got me thinking there must be some pretty gnarly stories of cab moves out there. These are big, bulky, awkward machines. What was your scariest incident? Machine go through a wall, fall off a truck? Let's hear it.


i think we did this already
 
Moving all my games by myself out of a basement using an automatic stair climber. Died halfway up with a Mario wide body on it screamed for my neighbor who help me to lift it off while the stair climber (around 200 pounds) slide down the steps and crashed into the basement floor. In the process I have to think quick to avoid the stair climber from hitting me on the way down and not let go of the game.


I moved all my machines by myself at 2 in the morning .
worst part was dead lifting them up onto a loading dock from the parking lot to get them
on the service elevator.. this was two months ago and i am still sore from it.
 
I was leaning a game against a DDR dance platform (Missile Command) to replace the leg levelers. I saw it start to slide, and scrambled to get out of the way. WHAM! Right on it's side.

Damn thing still worked just fine. One corner of the cab by the CP got a little damaged (bent, not broken)
 
I was ajusting the picture on a G07 and the anode cup popped of and started arcking with the frame, blue electric bolts !!! Ran and unplugged the machine from the wall. Yes it was just a fuse to repair it.
 
Many years ago, the wife and I were moving a Punch Out off of a trailer. She had the top and I was lowering the bottom of the cabinet off of the trailer. She did not anticipate the extra weight due to the second monitor. The cabinet slipped and she caught the top of it with her leg. What we did not know yet was that she was pregnant. Oops. (no problems, though)
 
I was taking an Atari Star Wars down a staircase with the seller supposedly helping me at the bottom as I went down step by step on the appliance dolly. What I didn't know was that he was just holding his hands up and not even assisting! I made it to the halfway point when suddenly I took the machine over a step too fast and it got away from me. I ended up under the machine riding it down the stairs with my ass hitting each step until it reached the first floor. I was actually fine. The seller was FREAKED OUT but he managed to avoid the machine squashing him. I loaded up and when I got it home it worked perfectly. Just had to repair a little damage on the back bottom corners with wood glue. Super scary!

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I've had minor accidents but nothing catastrophic as far as injuries to myself or machines but I feared for my safety on one run. I responded to a CL ad that was in a real bad part of Houston(there was a half way house right across the street) so I talked my buddy into going with me and we both took some protection and in fact its the only run to this day that my son didn't go on. I scored a lot of parts that I sold here on KLOV but all the machines were in horrible condition, nothing bad happened to us but it was a pretty scary situation.







 
god it looks like a freakin' meth den

i'dda def been packin'

I've had minor accidents but nothing catastrophic as far as injuries to myself or machines but I feared for my safety on one run. I responded to a CL ad that was in a real bad part of Houston(there was a half way house right across the street) so I talked my buddy into going with me and we both took some protection and in fact its the only run to this day that my son didn't go on. I scored a lot of parts that I sold here on KLOV but all the machines were in horrible condition, nothing bad happened to us but it was a pretty scary situation.
 
I was moving a game into my basement (several steps that I set boards up on).

My friend pushed a bit too hard and I lost my footing and ended up underneath the dolly and the game. Thankfully I didn't get hurt at all and was able to wiggle out and resume bringing the game in.

Only other one was recently trying to set down an Asteroids in the back bed of a pickup truck, and I couldn't maintain grip on it.... and it I grappled at it, and pushed against it to slow it's fall into it's back. Thankfully the game and I were both unharmed. Thankfully the game was unharmed, as my friend and I just drove it all the way to CT from MA to trade it for a Space Invaders upright.

I don't recall any other scary incidents. But I do wish I had an easier way of moving these that would help take the load/balancing act out of moving them. The inflatable tires on the hand truck I have are nice.... but they do tend to making moving them a tad more unstable though.
 
When I first started acquiring games, I didn't have a proper dolly or even straps yet. I would borrow a tank dolly from work when I needed to move a game. There was a Centipede that had been on craigslist for over a month that I talked the seller down to a reasonable price on. I was doing an exterior water proofing on my basement at the time so around the entire front perimeter was a 6' deep 3' wide trench. To get in my front door I had a 2x10 board that extended over the trench, one end on my front door ledge, the other on a set of half demolished concrete steps. To get a game in we'd put it on the tank dolly, unstrapped, pull it up 4 concrete steps then a few feet over an unanchored 10x2 board with about a quarter inch clearance on either side of the wheel base and the board ends.
I had already moved a couple of games in without incident so even though the set up was hairy, it worked.
I was almost done bringing in a Centipede with a friend when one of the dolly wheels started to scoot off the board. I felt it happening so pulled back quickly on the dolly to get it through the door. The wheel fell off putting the wheel shaft on the board. When I pulled on the dolly, instead of pulling the game, I pushed the 2x10 board forward. The end of the board fell off the front door ledge, as the game started to follow, my friend jumped back and I let go of the dolly so I wouldn't follow a Centipede into the hole.
The game gods smiled on me this day. The game fell backward so that the top half was in the door entrance and hit the door ledge at about the half way point of its height. Because it wasn't strapped on the dolly and the dolly back was rounded, it twisted to the side at the same time when it hit. The game wedged itself in the doorway rather than tumbling into the trench after the board end.
I now had a Centipede wedged at an angle half in my house and the other half hanging over open space with a tank dolly trapped underneath it as well.
My friend climbed in the hole and pushed up on the bottom of the cab while I pushed down on the top of the cab. We first had to wrestle with it to get it off the dolly and the dolly untrapped and out of the way so we could get it on it's back in my house. Then we just pushed it in and set it upright again.
Worked fine and my buddy stopped answering my calls whenever he knew I was doing a game pick up.
 
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My first pick up was a Big Choice claw machine. I got it for a steal and was excited to pick it up. It was an hour drive from me and unfortunately I knew it wouldn't fit in my SUV as it was just too tall.

I rented a truck from Uhaul because it was only going to cost me like $50 total and I was getting a working machine for cheap anyway... I drove down and met the guy, he helped me load it on by having me drive down to the bottom of his driveway which was on a slope so the machine didn't need much effort getting on. Loaded it up on its back just fine.

Drove home happy as could be (and way too slowly haha took no risks)

Got home and then it dawned on me... It was late... I was alone... no friends nearby to help me... and I had to unload a 350+ pound claw machine from the back of a pickup truck. I started thinking maybe I could just easy it down myself... Rookie mistake. I managed to slide it to the edge of the truck bed and got it about halfway off. I slowly tilted it down... sloowwwly... and...

Okay it rested on the ground... But I forgot one important detail... The thing had wheels on the bottom. So now I have this game at a 45 degree angle, sitting on it's back wheels. I can't pull it forward because the wheels want to roll. I can't leave the machine because the wheels want to roll. If I let go of it, it's going to roll right down and crash on it's back.

I'm sitting there sweating and holding this thing up and panicking... Luckily a neighbor just got home and was walking from his car. I asked him if he could help out and he looked bewildered...

Fortunately he helped me and it took both of us grown men all of our strength to rock the thing forward while fighting the rolling wheels... and getting it upright safely.

Finally did it and the guy was more than happy to go on his way. It was an easy time rolling it on the elevator and then into my place but man... lesson learned.



Or was it... because later I was working on my Mario pinball machine and decided I wanted to lower the legs on it. By myself. So I thought gee whiz, I can just take one leg off at a time... lower it, and then be good to go!

Took off the first leg carefully and then reattached it to be lower... great!

Then I tried to lower the game down so it rested on the shorter leg and had the 3 longer legs left. Good.

Then I tried to start taking the other front leg off... I felt the game start tilting on the short leg... Too late to stop it, I tried grabbing it to no avail. The game tips over and crashes into a bookshelf and a cushioned stool. Fortunately all of that stuff broke it's fall. Unfortunately... it shattered the cheap bookshelves and exploded the red light dome on top of the game.

From there I actually used my brain and put chairs under the game to give it stability... but god I've never felt stupider than that moment.

Fortunately no harm to the game really other than the busted light dome which I found a perfect new replacement for.
 
Some shitty $100 converted Tempest with some shitty air top-down Taito game in it in horrible shape fell off my handtruck because the base was falling off, hit my mint 1970 pinball machine I just had shipped from California (>$400, plus machine cost), and then hit me (I didn't fall over), then the ground. I was super pissed and that was the day this hobby got me the closest to angry crying because it took irreplaceable paint off the mint side of the machine. I got over it, but I still try not to think about it. You don't notice it in the row of games and still looks great thankfully.

People on Pinside did mention I could have easily knocked over the pinball machine, causing much more damage, and/or breaking the "impossible to replace" backglass, so that made me feel a lot better. If that pinball machine tipped over I would have FLIPPED...

I bled a lot but I was fine. Just was angry and sad.
 
Great stories, meth dens, trench's, stairs from hell, dolly breakage, runaway cabs... so many ways for sh*t to go south! Thanks for sharing, I knew there had to be some doozies. Sometimes you literally have to bleed for this hobby.
 
Great stories, meth dens, trench's, stairs from hell, dolly breakage, runaway cabs... so many ways for sh*t to go south! Thanks for sharing, I knew there had to be some doozies. Sometimes you literally have to bleed for this hobby.



Sometimes folks underrate how hazardous this addiction....err hobby.....can be!
 
These are the two worst situations for me, both resulting in bodily injury:

  1. Rush the Rock - A buddy and I went to pick this one up. Fortunately it was one of the cabinets that was in 2 pieces. So we quite easily got the part with the seat out to one of our SUV's. We had to go down 2 steps from the seller's front door to the walkway. I'm on the downward side as we're bringing it down the 2 steps. My buddy loses grip on it and the whole thing comes down on one of my feet. Broke 2 toes.
  2. Asteroids Deluxe - Moving games around at my storage unit one day...I had Asteroids Deluxe on the dolly and it hit a slight divot in the concrete. It twisted sideways and was going to fall. Instinctively, I reached out to grab it and at least slow the fall to a gentle one. I successfully did that, but ended up using my body to slow the fall which was not what I intended. The machine put a big bruise on my thigh, tore a 6 inch gash in my leg, and broke another toe.
Moral: machines seem to like to break my toes.
 
I had a few close calls so far.

Wacky Gator

It was a really icy day and I was slowly pulling the machine up my wet ice covered trailer. I was using a blue hand truck about the same as the image attached with a good sized handle in the center.

It stopped quick because the wheel doesn't quite make it up the lip. The guys at the bottom start really pushing. I pull hard, slip, slide under the Wacky Gator, and come millimeters from crushing some rather sensitive parts.

Carnival King

This guy was in a big black cabinet usually reserved for buck hunters. About 450+/- lbs. I was moving it around my garage and it was tipped back. Taking it around a corner wasn't too much of an issue until I clipped a second machine and it started falling on me.

I started feeling my back give way as my feet got closer to the back of my head. Giving one life saving heave I was able to stop heading to the floor and get it upright. I had no interest in moving it for awhile after that.

I was only a few feet from the floor by the time I was able to push it back up. Happened to someone else with the same cabinet. After that I straight up sold it. Shame though. Carnival King is a fun game.
 

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