Zaxxon Cocktail Restoration

johnoffunk

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Hey guys. Been reading the forums and posting very sparingly over the past year or so. I have two fully operational cabinets currently, a Capcom CPS2 generic JAMMA cabinet, and a 4 slot Neo Geo. Last night I added picked up #3! It's a Zaxxon cocktail cabinet. From my limited poking around for info on it, it seems to be on the rarer side of Zaxxon cabs.

The cab is in fairly decent shape. I was so tired by the time I got home with it last night, that I literally didn't even have time to plug it in (I had just run a mile race with some old buddies from High School). I know the monitor isn't firing up currently, but the former owner let it sit in a garage for several years, and didn't try anything to get it up and running when he found out the monitor wasn't functioning. He claims last time he turned it on, the game appeared to be working properly minus the monitor, with sound coming out and everything. I'm hoping it's a fairly simple fix, but I'm totally fine with having to get the chassis refurbished or even sticking a new monitor in there eventually.

The only thing that I probably wont really be able to do anything about is the control panel. Unfortunately, it isn't an overlay, but an actual painted metal plate. It's been scratched pretty badly, and the area under the dust washer (well, former dust washers, they're actually missing), is completely down to bare metal. I will probably just clean it up as best as I can, and keep it around.

Things beyond the monitor I know I want to do right off the bat, several of which I could use advice on:
1. New glass top. Anyone have good advice on affordable places to get new tempered glass cut? Specifically in the Chicago area is even better, or maybe this is a standard thing a lot of places can do.
2. One of the coin ejectors(?) is missing. I'd love it if anyone knew where to find replacements. Along the same lines but super picky, the little doors in the coin return slots are broken off. At some point it'd be nice to get replacements.
3. Take off the metal legs and get them cleaned, polished and shiny. Tips are more than welcome.
4. Refurbish or completely replace the joysticks. I can't deal with anything but a super tight feel. I'll know more when I give the thing a good once over this weekend.

More to come! I'll post pictures tonight. Thanks guys. You're all awesome crazy kids.
 
I could see the sticker on the monitor, but it was in such a crazy place I could't read it. Then I looked down in the cabinet and saw there were three extra stickers just collecting dust. How sweet! Apparently it's a Nanao MC-2000-S.
 

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Pictures

Here's some general pics of the project at hand. Let me know if there's anything you want me to try and take a closer look at.
 

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And more pics

Here's the rest.
 

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Great project. It will clean up very nicely. I have a frogger cocktail that is exactly like this. When you replace the glass, you'll see the black is painted on the back. I didn't bother to paint the new glass, cause the woodgrain top looked nice enough, but you could. New glass on a cocktail looks awesome.

Also on my frogger, the control panels were scratched and painted over. So, I used a generic blue overlay from Arcadeshop. You'll see that the screen printed portion separates from the rest of the control panel, that makes it easy to cover and it will look good when it's reassembled.

Also I bought the sega cocktail glass clips from Arcadeshop. They fit very well and are a cool powder coat finish.

Anyway, good luck with the project. That's a cool game to have in cocktail form.
 
Two quick questions as I continue to really get a clearer view of what shape the cabinet is in.

1. Anyone have spray paint recommendations? There's a pretty decent amount of rust on the control panel and a few internal parts that I'm pulling off, so I want to strip them down and paint them.

2. Any tips for removing old tape? I want to avoid scratching up the control panel as much as possible, but one of them was literally taped together what looks like 10 years ago. All that just because they were too lazy to pull apart the control panel and replace about 3 bolts.
 
Update City

Hey kids. Finally coming to the home stretch of a really LONG 2 weeks at work, including working about 40 hours of overtime last weekend, and can get back to this little project.

Pulled apart one of the control panels, and harvested all the bolts I need to take to ACE to get new ones. I figure I might as well just make them all new and shiny. I wanted to only do 1 at a time, in case I forget where something goes, so I still have the other one to reference. The bolts which secured the entire control panel to the cabinet were a serious pain in the ass, immediately becoming stripped. I moved to vice grips, and got one off, but the other two immediately busted. After more digging inside the cab, I found that the nuts were completely rusted. Not a big surprise. Thankfully nuts and bolts are cheap fixes!

After a few nights of the gentlest scraping with a plastic scraper hoping not to scratch her any further, I got as much of the physical tape off the control panel as I could. After that it was on to a good amount of Goo-Gone, which finished off the task. And it even smells of oranges! I haven't used the stuff in quite a while, but was happy to find I had a practically full bottle under the sink in the old cleaning products bin.

After pulling the amazingly loose joystick off and taking it apart, things looked bleak. I could replace the micro-switches, but everything else looks to be completely unavailable. Most people seem to think it's a Wico joystick, but none of the parts look remotely related to any Wico parts I can find. So after some measuring and a lot of searching, I found that a Sanwa joystick with an S mounting plate should actually fit perfectly. It seems that the mounting bracket is a standard Japanese size, much to my amazement! I also measured the button holes, and it seems that they are Japanese standard 24mm, so I'll also be popping in some Sanwa buttons to complete the tight Japanese feel. Hopefully this isn't considered total sacrilege. I would love to stay original, but I would really prefer something that plays great, and for which parts are readily available.

On the monitor front, looks like a standard 19" monitor should fit perfectly. I'll probably offer the old one up dirt cheap for anyone who wants to bother refurbishing it. I just don't want to screw around with that odd 100v Nanao.

More pics soon, and hopefully this weekend I will finish stripping the rest of the control panel parts, and possibly even start painting.
 
Keep up the good work! I am working on a similar sega frogger cocktail right now (except has a 13" monitor). My CP's are the same. Not sure what to do with them. The main CP housing I will be painting with a black, textured paint. It's a krinkle finish that looks great on any control panel. If I can get someone to scan an original panel, I can get vinyl overlays printed. BTW, my glass is not painted & it looks very nice with the woodgrain underneith.
 
This is a standard Sega cocktail, used by Space Fury/Eliminator as well.

I had one of these that also needed the glass. I took some detailed dimensions of the glass and took them to a shop near Palatine, IL; I believe it was Michael's glass. Reasonable prices, I've had them do a few pieces for me in the past, but probably any glass shop will work. I just remember the corners of the glass had to be angled.

After I got the glass, I just taped off a few areas for the instructions and coin stickers and sprayed it with Krylon flat black.

Ah, I found the image that someone had sent me when I did mine!

http://www.ionpool.net/arcade/sega/Space-Fury-Glass.jpg

Note; looks like it doesn't have dimensions for corners; I think I just came up with something based on the table top shape and the corner clips.

http://www.ionpool.net/arcade/sega/coin.jpg

http://www.ionpool.net/arcade/sega/plays.jpg

http://www.ionpool.net/arcade/sega/push.jpg
 
Super sweet! I got a decent scan of my beater frogger cp's. I have a local co printing 2 new ones (he'll clean up the scan) for me for $30 for the pair. These are on smooth glossy adhesive vinyl like you might find on a barstool. I think this will be the most original looking way to go. I should be able to pick them up Tuesday. I'll post a pic once received. Here's a scan of my original. Rough!
 

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GAH! Two days in a row I've forgotten to bring my CP in to work to scan. Guess it'll have to wait until Monday. Excited to see how yours turns out roburt! I will probably head down that same road soon enough. I actually want to get it in illustrator and see if I have any skill left and can "vectorize" it myself.

I'm the worlds worst updater. Lots of little battles being fought with this machine, but I never remember to post pics. The biggest fight was removing the 4 completely rusted carriage bolts that held two of the inner mounts on. I ended up succeeding with a screw extractor and some vice grips to hold the nuts. With the exception of one, they all simply broke instead of coming loose. Works for me either way. I filled each stripped hole with wood filler, then drilled new holes, in hopes that the new carriage bolts would now have a something to grip to instead of just spinning free. We'll find out for sure once I finish painting the pieces and bolting them back in. Realistically though they should never have to be removed again.

Other advancements:
-Removed the horribly rusted old tee-nuts that were used for the screws on the bottom of the control panel, and replaced them with fresh ones. They fit perfectly!
-Completely removed the old power supply and popped in a new switching one from Bob Roberts.
-Cleaned up some of the harness wiring and replaced several Molex pins. Also wired in the connector for the Sanwa JLF joysticks. Can't wait to try those puppy's out!
-I have about 2-3 pieces left to strip before painting begins. The big cross brace between the two legs was a real mess, as was pretty much any piece of metal touching wood where water could get trapped and just rust to its heart's content. Tomorrow looks to be a sanding bonanza!

I'm sure I'm forgetting stuff, but the fight will continue. I'm really looking to make this a solid players game. It's not going to win any looks awards, that's for sure.
 
That's about what I'm trying to do with my frogger. It's a 13" monitor version. It didn't work when I got it & was in pretty rough shape. Just got the monitor in it today & found it has a collapsed picture. CPs are still apart (until next week) I still don't know if the pcb works fully or not. It obviously has a pic (even if it's collapsed). Not sure about the sound as the wiring for the Player 2 cp goes to the start buttons. I'll try to keep it updated. Good luck with yours & I'll try to help if I can.
 
I just picked up a Zaxxon cocktail. Any one know where to get the round keys?

Also, I've only got one lid latch. Are there supposed to be two?
 
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