Dave Santoro's "Arcade Replay" Game Cabinet

Tomorrow is when I will hopefully be putting together the main cabinet shape.  While my sketchup plan has ledgers holding the sides on, I have been thinking about it and I think instead I will use glued biscuit joints to hold it all together (where there isn’t laminate hindering a good glue bond.)   For structural integrity and to create a place to securely fasten the control panel, I will also be adding a horizontal shelf under the control panel.

I have been very concerned about safety when designing the cabinet.  I am concerned that due to the decreased weight and depth, it might be prone to tipping forward.  To help reduce that likelihood, I have decided to use heavier MDF boards instead of plywood for all the rear-ward panels and shelves.  I think the design itself is stable enough, but this should help a little more.

If it turns out that the cabinet is tippy despife these efforts, I will need to consider replacing the back-bottom perf-board panel with MDF also.

Welcome the the Arcade Replay cabinet site. This is where I will be posting construction details for my new slim LCD Mame cabinet.  There will also be some discussion of this cabinet in >My BYOAC Announcement Thread<. When the cabinet is complete I will be posting my Google Sketchup plans.

Thanks for your interest…

Dave

Here’s a quick overview of some of the parts I will be using.

Ultimarc Ultrastick 360 Joysticks.  This electronic joystick will be configured to adjust it’s behavior based on what game you are playing.  This will eliminate the need for a separate 4-way stick for games like Pac Man.

Happ 3″ Blue Translucent Arcade Trackball

A pair of Groovy Game Gear LED-Wiz ’s for controlling the lighting effects.

Groovy Game Gear Novamatrix LED Marquee Light

Happ Controls Over/Under Coin Door.

We made nice progress today, my son Ben helped out a lot.

I finally sold Mamenation to make room for this machine.  We anticipate staring work this weekend., and the kids are going to help a lot on this one now that they are older.  I will post an album of the progress as we go.

No news since October 2007…  yeah I know.  Work is super-busy and I started a regular workout routine so hobby time is a little sparse lately.  I should be able to start on it in the fall.  *crosses fingers*

I made some significant improvements to the overall shape of the cabinet. This is close to the final design.

It’s been four years since I built my “Mamenation” arcade machine, and we have enjoyed it thoroughly .

The technology has come along way in those four years and Mamenation is HUGE, protruding rudely into our den. With the recent LCD price reductions it is now possible to build a slimmer arcade cabinet than was previously possible with large, deep CRT tube-style monitors. All these facts, combined with the fact that I haven’t built anything cool in a few years, made me decide to build a new, slim arcade machine. I will be selling Mamenation to fund the new project.

Last time around I did paper sketches and it wasn’t conducive to quality work. This time around I used the opportunity to learn “Sketchup,” a free 3D modeling program from Google. It has a rather steep learning curve. I have spent about 15 hours with it so far and am now just starting to not be spastic with it. In the end it was worth it because it gives you the ability to look at your creation from any angle before it ever exists.

Here is the fhe first draft of the design I am leaning toward:

I have ordered all the parts that I need and should start construction soon if work doesn’t keep me working late too much.

Update 10/6/2008 – I sold Mamenation.  :{