What's the worst arcade related screw up you've ever made?

Letting another op talk me into setting up my new Ridge Racer 33" at SIX COINS PER PLAY. ($1.50)
"You can always lower the price, you just can't ever RAISE it."

That pissed a lot of people off and I dropped it to 4 coins after the first two weeks.
But man, that rubbed folks the wrong way even though it still made mad money.

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Dropped screw on Radar scope power supply when plugged in and heard it pop, never worked again.
 
While working on my space zap mini, I noticed a 2.5 amp fuse blown. So, on hand I only had a ceramic time delay 3 amp(bottom sticker on fuse holder did say 3A). Upon firing it up my audio amp created quite the fire show with the diode getting the worst of it. Not sure if I hurt anything else but never again will I make that mistake
 
i took a tube of a game [in newb phase] put it on concrete [scratched it], about a min later i fell back and necked it.

only positive it was dirty / stinky[smelled like fish] and had severe arkanoid burn.

its death wasn't in vain it taught me a valuable lesson :)
 
wheeling a newly acquired R-type off my trailer, late that night, in a big damn hurry, dropped one wheel off the edge before the other one. Lost the cab and it hit the ground on the side....stomach sank.

Picked it up...monitor was fine, glass bezel was even fine....cabinet needed bondo work already, so somehow an extra chip[ed corner in the particle board was the only result.

Bought a dolly with a strap the next week. Lesson learned.
 
Years ago, I dropped the control panel of my Dig Dug onto the monitor which was laying on the floor. Perfectly good G07 tube headed to the garbage.

While drilling a hole in a bracket, my crappy drill bit broke and what remained in the drill went through the tip of my left pinky finger.
 
I respond to a Craigslist add several years ago. Operator was selling everything I responded within minutes of the add. Another local collector ended up getting the call and unloaded a ton of great titles cheap. Not to mention about 5 minutes from the house. Now the screw up part. I was first but missed his call and skipped over the voice mail. So he went to the next guy a day later.

Another time I responded to a killer deal on Craigslist. Never heard anything so I went to resend another email realizing I put in my own damn phone number wrong who the f does that.
 
I installed a full set of side art not knowing you were supposed to remove the T molding first so I trimed around it.
 
I hooked up a power supply the wrong way and ruined a Mortal combat pcb and ruined the monitor that was in the cabinet also. :-(
 
Blasteroids.

It was a twofold screw up. The first mistake was owning a Blasteroids.

The second mistake was attempting to move that awkward, lead-based cabinet into my apartment by myself without a dolly. It nearly killed me twice that day when it's strange weight distribution tried to tip over and crush me.
 
Thinking I'd be fine working on a System 11 pin in a poorly lit room, I reversed the harness connectors (same connector w/different colors) and fried a row of transistors and traces. It burned up a totally unmolested motherboard. The smell was pretty ungodly, like burning tires.

It really bummed me out to do something so stupid and careless, and made me almost OCD with pinball stuff. They are really unforgiving compared to video games.
 
Sigh... thought I could solo moving my OG Centuri Phoenix into the basement. Removed everything from the cab, maneuvered it into position at the top of the steps, grabbed the handle on top, levered the top towards me, pushed it down the first step and...
WHOOSH - the cab toboggans down the whole flight of stairs on it's back, hits the concrete floor on the bottom and bounces, breaking the second to bottom stair step. There was no way I could hold it back once it started...
Busted both back bottom corners of the cab, could have been worse. Lesson learned, have a partner.
 
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