The Control Panel

The Control Panel
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The Control Panel
Initial Inspection
Monitor Shelf
Game Details
Replacing Corners
Marquee and Front Glass
Speakers
Internal Wiring
Stripping The Cabinet
Sanding The Cabinet
Patching And Filling
Painting/Priming
Checking The Monitor
Leg Levelers
Gutting The Cabinet
Coin Door

 

Although I don't have the cabinet painted yet, I decided to work on the control panel.  I had a stand alone box with controls in it that I was using on a PC.  The box is going to be cannibalized and used for the control panel.  The problem I had with building the control panel is that I wanted to put too much on it.  My Defender cabinet is only 26" wide and the stand alone box was 32".  I had 2, 8-way joysticks, 6 buttons per player, a trackball with 2 buttons and one 4-way joystick.

The first step was to cut the wood for the control panel.  This may sound simple, but there were a couple of unknown angles I had to figure out.  Using trial and error, I found out that a 35 degree angle was perfect for the back of the control panel (which sets against the backglass) and a 10 degree angle was perfect for the front.  Once I had the panel cutout, I pulled out a ruler, a joystick and a pushbutton and started drawing.

On a 24" control panel I had to finally admit defeat and just put 2 8-way sticks with 6 buttons each and a trackball with 2 buttons.  Everything fits but it's VERY tight!

This is the cutout control panel.

Control panel sitting on the cabinet with some controls in place.   Trackball and 1 stick is missing.

 

After painting and assembling the control panel, the final  product looks quite nice.

S04BI003.JPG (128761 bytes)

 

Second Chance Arcade

E-Mail: todd1814@yahoo.com