Sunday, April 30, 2006

Arcade Cabinet Progress


I've been building an arcade cabinet for almost two years now, doing a little here and there, avoiding work during the cold winters. As you can see from the pictures, I've finally gone from pieces of wood to a fully constructed cabinet. The control panel is separable from the cabinet, so it isn't pictured, but that is also fully assembled.

Last night, I came up with a ToDo list of what I have left to do to officially complete construction:
  • Purchase some speakers, a marquee retainer, a monitor bezel, trackball mounting plate, a putty knife, some wood putty, a 1/16" slot cutter bit, foam rollers, a roller handle, some primer, and some black paint.
  • Cut out holes for the speakers in the speaker panel.
  • Cut out a hole for the middle mouse button.
  • Cut out the rest of the trackball mounting hole.
  • Cut slots into the sides and control panel top with the slot cutter for the t-molding.
  • Fix some of the screws that need better countersinking.
  • Fill in the screw holes and blemishes with wood putty.
  • Sand the entire cabinet, inside and out, then clean up all of the dust.
  • Prime the entire cabinet, inside and out, then sand lightly and clean. I will do this step twice!
  • Paint the entire cabinet, inside and out, then sand the rough spots until it is smooth and clean. I will accomplish this step many times until I get a smooth finish.


Once the cabinet is all painted and pretty like, I will need to get my marquee, control panel overlay, and side art printed out and affixed, place some Plexiglas on top of the control panel, and install all of the buttons and joysticks and trackball. This is mostly cosmetic stuff at this point. I'm still working out what my artwork will look like. The cabinet will be ready for playing games once I have a TV and a working computer installed inside.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

lookin' good man. How much is this thing going to cost you in the end? (I may want to build one) The labor alone sounds intense. I wonder if Eric (Pike) ever got his Grand Tourismo car built, I doubt it.