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Scratch Built Aussie Coctail Cab


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I've been a lurker on this forum for a while and have enjoyed reading it, so thought it was about time I contributed something.

 

Being a child of the 70's I played my fair share of Space Invaders and Puckman, so coming across Mame many years ago reawakened interest in playing these games. After destroying a few keyboards by pounding away I built a laptop control panel which was a huge improvement but still not the real thing, so I started surfing the web looking for cabinet plans and inspiration.

 

A pommy mate started building a three sided cocktail cab but I wanted a more traditional, what I remembered as an Aussie cab - they were trapezoidal, black and had bolt on legs. I didn't come across much in the way of plans for this style of cab. Eventually I found one in a local pub and took up a tape measure and sketch pad and over a few beers sketched and measured it all up.

 

An old mdf wardrobe had been dumped in the lane behind my house and I thought this would be a good source of wood and bits of hardware. I missed taking pictures from the very beginning, but have got some along the way which I will add to this thread.

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My plan was to cannibalise an old pc to run Mame and use a pc monitor. When you start measuring there is not a lot of room - maybe that's why the other boxier style cabs are popular? I was also concerned about heat so went a bit crazy drilling holes in the monitor surround to try and encourage some air movement. I used some little steel rectangular section bolted into the side of the monitor to support the monitor, sort of hanging it from the shelf.

 

ps. I notice that I'm a nong who can't spell, so if anyone reading this has the ability to edit thread titles perhaps you could correct my spelling of the word cocktail

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Oops - as well as making a spelling mistake in the title, it seems I've started this thread in the wrong section :redface

 

If a mod is reading this could it be moved to the appropriate forum section, which is (i think!)

 

Mame Cab and PinMame Projects and Discussion

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Great thread!

 

I really love seeing people recycling stuff for their own purposes and this is a great example.

 

I'll be following your adventures, I'm looking forward to seeing the finished product.

 

I'm currently building a Robotron style cab using recycled chipboard and computer parts and having a ball doing it.

 

Keep the updates coming! :)

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Interesting approach to leave the monitor in the casing - I took mine out, and I think most others do as well. I took it out so that the glass would be as close as possible to the top of the cab, without the restriction of the bezel - but if it works for you to leave it in then I'd suggest it's probably a better option.
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Thanks for the comments and encouragement.

 

Some people use LCD's??

 

To me an LCD didn't look as good. Additionally I had a few reasonable quality pc monitors available cheap (free!).

 

Interesting approach to leave the monitor in the casing - I took mine out, and I think most others do as well. I took it out so that the glass would be as close as possible to the top of the cab, without the restriction of the bezel - but if it works for you to leave it in then I'd suggest it's probably a better option.

 

I tried removing the case and it all seemed a bit flimsy so I left it and used it to hang the whole show from. I'm not up on the terminology but my plan is to use it as a pc monitor driven from the pc and not as an arcade style monitor with separate chassis. I know the resolution and refresh rates won't be correct, but for ease this is my plan - future upgrades are possible.

 

It also occurs to me that I could use the monitor case to mount a fan and so direct cooling airflow if I find things too hot.

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  • 2 weeks later...

The control panels were a bit of a pain to build because they fit on at funny non orthogonal angles. I also only went for two buttons - a reflection of the simpler style of game I like. There is space for more should I find a killer game I need more buttons.

 

Here are the control panels going on.

 

[ATTACH=CONFIG]20740[/ATTACH][ATTACH=CONFIG]20738[/ATTACH][ATTACH=CONFIG]20739[/ATTACH][ATTACH=CONFIG]20737[/ATTACH]

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....I tried removing the case and it all seemed a bit flimsy so I left it and used it to hang the whole show from. .... I know the resolution and refresh rates won't be correct, but for ease this is my plan - future upgrades are possible....

 

decasing the monitor will still work, the brackets on the front corners of the monitor need to be bolted to the top panel to carry the weight. if it has a flimsy metal shield aroound it that is still good as it provides a measure of rfi protection, but the plastic case supports the chassis so if you did decase the monitor you woould have to support the chassis in the same posi relative to the monitor due to cabling lengths from chassis to tube and chassis monitor controls..

 

i'd suggest two fans in the bottom of the cab, one push on lhs cab (bottom end of montor), one pull (top of end monitor) to move the air thru the cab. careful choice of fan noise ratings and you should notice it. ay need a silicon fan quieting kit too if your do two fans.

 

nice job so far! looks lika a hankin!

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Excellent to see another 'aussie' style under way :cool:

 

I'm surprised you didn't find any plans, I list all sorts of resources for this type of cab on my web page, which googles well. Admittedly, it would have been much more fun to find one in a pub by chance, and then measure it up over a couple of beers (",)

 

With my monitor, I decased it, but then made a custom MDF case for it to hold all the guts together. This has huge holes hole sawed in two sides where I anticipated air flow to go. Two holes for where the circuit board mounts. And also, as you can see, the sides aren't exactly airtight :D Certainly never overheats...

 

http://dannygalaga.com/images/DSC00466small.JPG

 

http://dannygalaga.com/images/DSC00467small.JPG

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Scratch Built Aussie Cocktail Cab

 

Thanks for the comments guys. Danny I did find some links, but none that really suited my needs, also the project has been going on for some time - years really, so the initial searches were a while ago and then my planning and building has not exactly been at a trailblazing rate! I'm still not really sure on the decasing or not of the monitor - it looks better without the case, possibly has more room, probably runs a bit cooler, but it's a bit of reinventing the wheel if I have to make another frame for it. The original case will give good support. I guess everyone will look, think and come to there own conclusion - that's one of the benefits of sites like this - you get to see what others have done. Anyway, back to my construction ...

 

I wanted it all switched off with one single under cabinet switch and wanted some level of modularity so things could be replaced / upgraded if and when they failed. I thought using the mounting plates from pc cases would allow this, so I cut out two, one for the power supply and one to mount the master switch and a fan. The pc is configured to shut down on a press of the normal motherboard on/off button but the other stuff - screen and speakers are still powered, necessitating a full power switch.

 

It's maybe not totally clear but what's happens is there is an IEC inlet in the centre mounted plate, alongside it is a master power switch that feed the terminal strip. The terminal strip supplies two IEC plugs - one for the monitor and the other for the psu and also a feed for the speaker plug pack. The power supply feed cable goes back under the power supply mounting frame and has a right angle IEC plug on it. This will allow quick easy replacement of the power supply if needed. I also ran the earth wire to any metal parts.

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  • 2 weeks later...
Here is some work on the coin box area. I wanted it to be accessible from outside the main cab, with no access to internals and electrical works. The coin mech feeds down a bit of pvc pipe, past the cats' whisker and then drops down into a lunch box. I haven't yet sorted the locking mechanism.
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nice work! although two things to look at.

1. the plug pack may overheat with its current mounting tucked into a corner on three sides

2. if the plug pack is mounted next to the door opening, then the exposed part of the pins need to fully insulated or that area covered for safety. think kids.

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nice work! although two things to look at.

1. the plug pack may overheat with its current mounting tucked into a corner on three sides

2. if the plug pack is mounted next to the door opening, then the exposed part of the pins need to fully insulated or that area covered for safety. think kids.

 

Thanks for the feedback Andy. I'm happy enough with the electrical insulation of the plug pack - it's a bit hard to see in the pics but there are insulation sleeves over the slide on terminals where they fit the plug pack. Also the idea is that no one needs to be or will be in that section of the cabinet except for service work - that was my motivation for making the coin box accessible from the front through the hinged flap.

 

The heat will be one to watch. It is 12V at 0.5A and a switch mode power supply, so an efficiency of say 95% so will have less that 1W to dissipate. Not the best arrangement with the back hard against the wood, I guess I could rotate the plug back so the back is up. I'll do a few finger tests to monitor, so thanks for bringing it up. The feedback is appreciated.

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  • 2 weeks later...
That plug pack is the main concern here, besides that keep up the good work, I personally would grab a power point and stand off bracket like used on solid brick walls and then plug the power pack into that, much safer,neater etc

 

I looked at stuff like this and there are smaller versions of mounting blocks - things that are used in roof spaces of commercial buildings where fluro light fitting are typically plugged in for fast installation. Space is really at a premium in my cab - speakers are yet to go in.

 

The steps I took are to solidly mount the plug back - it aint going anywhere with that strap and to insulate the terminals. It doesn't show that well in the pictures but the insulation rating on the terminal cover sleeves is equal to the rating of the wire insulation. The plug pack also has half the length of the pins that go into the power point insulated and finally I closed up the slide on terminals with pliers so they aren't coming off.

 

It's maybe not ideal and could be improved but I'm happy :)

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A few more pictures, this time showing the pc mount arrangement. I hacked apart an old pc case with a hacksaw, angle grinder and file and mounted this to the side of the cab. This was part of my desire to have it all modular so I could stick in a new motherboard if needed. I thought it would be neat to have what is effectively the rear of the pc case accessible from the top of the cabinet with the lid raised and the kb + monitor cable feed back down the hole on the left in the second pic. The smaller hole on the right allows the little cables for power + hdd leds + the pc reset button. Having done all the work, and it was a fair bit of mucking around, I'm not really sure it's worth it - the mounting is solid and upgradeable and has a spot to mount a fan, but would probably be ok just by screwing the pc bits to the box rather than using the frame, but I guess it looks relatively neat.

 

The hard disk is tucked away below the motherboard and is held place with a metal clip, seen in the last picture.

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just athougtht here. you say your speaker amp plug uses 12v .5amp.

 

your pc power supply has some spare HDD/FDD connectors with 12v & ground already. remove the plugpack, make up a joiner and run the speakers off the pc power supply. safety problem or perception is removed completely, and saves some space for you! :D

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just athougtht here. you say your speaker amp plug uses 12v .5amp.

 

your pc power supply has some spare HDD/FDD connectors with 12v & ground already. remove the plugpack, make up a joiner and run the speakers off the pc power supply. safety problem or perception is removed completely, and saves some space for you! :D

 

Thanks Andy, that's a very neat elegant idea :)

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just athougtht here. you say your speaker amp plug uses 12v .5amp.

 

your pc power supply has some spare HDD/FDD connectors with 12v & ground already. remove the plugpack, make up a joiner and run the speakers off the pc power supply. safety problem or perception is removed completely, and saves some space for you! :D

 

The only problem with this is feedback.

 

test before installing as you may find the speakers will get feedback from motherboard and will hiss, not sure why but they often do.

cheers

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Nice effort so far and it's great to see a scratch built LAI/Taito style cocktail.

 

May I ask that if you are concerned about heat, how many (if any) fans are you installing? 4 x 75mm fans would be great and if you are wise in where they are located you'll get some serious airflow happening.

 

Regardless of what you do there will be a bit of heat buildup, but obviously fans will help to reduce that somewhat.

 

Cheers,

Chris

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