23 replies to this topic

[Cucurbitace]

Hello everyone,

 

I'm almost finished with my project. I wanted to post it once it was 100% finished, but I know myself it won't probably the case as I will always be tweaking stuff here and there.

 

It all started last year when a friend asked me if I wanted to get two LCD monitors he was throwing away. As he told me they were respectively 4:3 and 16:9 I immediately remembered Visual Pinball cabinet I've stumbled a few years ago.

Eventually they were two 4:3 monitors, so I've put the project on hold for a short time. But luck was on my side; 10 days later, a friend was selling his old 24" 16:9 monitor for 25 €.

 

That's when my project really took off.

Budget so far: 25 €

 

I now have one 24" 16:9 and one 21" 4:3 monitors. After a quick search it seems I can use more ore less standard dimensions and divide them by two to get a plan to the scale of my monitors.

I still had some plywood from an aborted desk project from a friend, enough to build the frame and the back box. In the mean time I get two old computers from the girlfriend of a friend, her company were throwing them away. They are Pentium 4 HT with 512 MB of RAM and one them will find home in my Mini Pinball.

 

So it begins:

The first fist test with the monitors in the frame and the back box.

 

Another angle where you can see that I hadn't enough plywood to have the sides of the frame in one piece, so I've glued two pieces together.

 

Then it was time to think about putting the computer parts inside:

After a few tries I decide to go for the setup from this picture. By the way, this graphic card (GeForce 7600 GT was another donation from a friend when he upgraded his computer  )

 

My idea was to use the fan from the PSU to extract air from the box, but I have a problem: the connector for the power is located where the back door will be.

So I need to move the plug connector to the side of the PSU.

 

After opening it, good news! There is enough room in the PSU to relocate the connector.

 

Here is the new hole...

 

And here it is with the electronics back in place.

 

After a few searches about controls it seems a SideWinder Freestyle Pro would be the cheapest way to be able to nudge my pinball.

So I found a cheap one on eBay, 7.60 €. Including shipping.

Budget so far: 32.60 €

 

Here is the PCB of the controller, prepared for soldering.

 

Here is a picture of the first test of the hacked controller.

 

The next step was to had several other elements:

The 12cm fan comes from an old dead PSU and the power strips is an old one I found in the basement when I moved in my current home. But I had to buy the 2.1 audio kit, and I needed a small one. I found a very small one, which was also the cheapest on Amazon: 14.90 €.

Budget so far: 47.50 €

 

Another test fit, with another graphic card donated by an upgrader (GeForce 8800 GT). You can spot the hole for the power plug on the left too.

 

A view of the bottom of the main box, with holes for the ventilation, the power plug, the power switch and the subwoofer.

 

And now from the inside of the box.

 

At this point I kept on forgetting to take pictures for a lot of steps:

• The building of the legs, using the frame an Ikea glass coffee table found in the trash.
• The building of the hinges, using the metal case of the computer.
• The building of the whole wiring. For this I bought wires and connectors, total price: 17.27 €
• The buying of the buttons and switches. 26.70 € including shipping.

Total budget so far: 91.47 €

Now we reached the part where I paint the frame. I'm using my compressor and leftover paint from the building of my arcade cabinet.

 

Here is a shot of the box painted.

 

The paint was a bit old and some hard bits blocked the spray of paint, resulting this strange coloring. But as it mainly underneath and behind the box, I don't mind. And to be honest, I quite like the accidental result. 

 

The first shot with the legs attached.    And with the art on the side, it's just a laser print with a clear coating afterwards.

 

Time to put all the parts together!

 

Same parts, bottom view.

 

A close picture from the power strips modified to be switchable.

 

The same with the cover on.

 

The bottom plate is in place, with hard drive attached.

 

And it seems I cannot post any image anymore... 

 

[bosvrucht]

i love low budget builds!

[Cucurbitace]

i love low budget builds!

Thanks. And thanks to your post, I can post the following:

 

 

The hacked controller is now in place...

 

And now the switch are wired, messier and messier!

 

The custom board wired.

 

The box filled!

 

 

At this moment, I've bought plastic brackets to hold the back box monitor and the glass: 7 €.

Budget so far: 98.47 €

 

Being the idiot I am I tried to cut the brackets with a cutting knife... not easy. And that's when the accident occurs:

I've slipped and cut off the tip of my finger.   

 

Here is a friend playing, as it not easy with a finger in such a crappy state.

 

So I had to put the projects on hold for a couple of weeks.

 

After recovering:

This is taken from the hole for the future coin door.

 

Here is the mechanical plunger, made from scrap metal and a plastic handle (1.50 €).

Budget so far: 99.97

 

Here is the plunger in place, very simple mechanism: the tube rolls the wheel for the Sidewinder. Unfortunately it gave only 25% of the wheel capacity, so I had to find a trick...

 

So, after a few thoughts, the easier for me was to use a gear. It's a leftover from a hacked generator pocket lamp.

 

Here is a shot of the inside from the coin door.

 

And the actual setup from the back door.

 

So, here is my build so far. And I realize there are still a lot of things I didn't take pictures of, like the custom lockdown bar and the custom coin door with the very custom coin switch.   

 

I'd like to thanks everyone on this forums, each time I met a problem I found the solution here.

 

Thanks guys!

    

[russdx]

that has to be one of the cutest little cabs ever LOL, the plunger mechanics is class lol

[blur]

Brilliant build!

 

So with vp with additions from koadic - you can use sidewinder accelerometer for nudging and wheel for plunger, how does it work - can you nudge the ball around and shoot plunger precisely from any point?

[settingsons]

Excellent work. Very innovative!

[htamas]

Awesome job. Very creative

 

So with vp with additions from koadic - you can use sidewinder accelerometer for nudging and wheel for plunger, how does it work - can you nudge the ball around and shoot plunger precisely from any point?

 

I second this question... more information please.

[Cucurbitace]

Thanks for the appreciation. 

 

Awesome job. Very creative

 

So with vp with additions from koadic - you can use sidewinder accelerometer for nudging and wheel for plunger, how does it work - can you nudge the ball around and shoot plunger precisely from any point?

 

I second this question... more information please.

 

To make it short: it doesn't work great, but let me detail...

 

• The wheel for plunger is working good, I can shoot the ball where I want 90% of the time. I blame the 10% missing on my crappy skills.
• The "problem" with the plunger is that the gearing system adds extra resistance and now the feeling when handling the plunger doesn't feel as natural as a regular pinball, but heavier.
• I have an extra issue with the nudging; every time I restart the computer the calibration is different. Sometimes I cannot play as the controller reports such an angle the ball won't go into the playfield. 
• Then it depends on the table, on some it very satisfying, on others I have to slam and shake the body to a point where I would probably damage a real pinball.

At this point I'm wondering if my controller is not a bit defective, the calibration issue really puzzles me. I guess I will create another post to discuss this particular issue when I'm done with the hardware. 

[Cucurbitace]

I've took a few more pictures to illustrate some parts I haven't fully mentioned yet:

 

The inside of the back box

You can see the location of the speakers. Definitely not the best, but I had no room left elsewhere. And making room for them underneath the monitor would have broken the proportion.

You can spot also my tentative to filter the bass frequencies with capacitors to get rid of saturation in this extremely cheap audio kit. 

But it doesn't work very well, I still got a lot of scratches in the sound. 

 

The back box folded on the body with the back cover on.

 

The back of the pinball, here you can really spot the failure of the spray paint. But, again, as it is not visible, I don't care much. 

You can also see the cooling holes: an array at the top protected by a grid, but without fans. Then at the bottom the fan of the PSU on the left and an extra fan of the same size on the right.

 

A shot from the full front. Please don't mind the bits and parts at the bottom. 

 

The same in the dark to enjoy the lights.

 

This is one of my next big stuff to finish: the coin door. The base is here, but I still need to put a lock and wire a control panel to the back.

 

Here is the second attempt at a lockdown bar. It is made of MDF, and as it quite comfortable I just need to sand it, add some filler and paint it correctly.

 

I still need to the same for the legs, by the way. 

[RipleYYY]

c'est sympa les idées "low cost", j'avais cette même ligne de conduite pour le mien, en récupérant un max de "vieux" matos...

 

et ton doigt va bien ?

 

[blur]

So calibration is pain in the a... and you have to do it on every reboot but after calibration it nudges fine. I'm checking side winder freestyle pro description on wiki and they say it detects rotation not acceleration, and it is not very precise (actually quite opposite  ) and you never know if you are in zero position or not. Probably after every reboot you have to set zero position again. All would be great if driver would auto zero after some time of inactivity.

After calibration do you see x-y axes marker in game controllers properties going nicely up and down, and left and right?

For sidewinder to really detect something you would have to rotate your cab left-right and up-down but probably nudge will also give you some small movement. That's the problem with pinball and sidewinder - sidewinder excepts that you rotate it for 360 degrees and you really rotate it for just a few degrees.  

 

When you pull the plunger all the way down - is the speed of plunger fast enough to push the ball with full speed? It looks like all that gears would slow down plunger so much that the ball will hardly come out.

 

Edited by blur, 31 December 2012 - 02:41 PM.

[faralos]

why a coin door? if it's a hyperpin why would you want to deface the front

for a non operative coin slot? it looks great otherwise

[nebrunner]

You are a genius. You are also much too modest, your paint application looks amazing. You should not tell anybody that the coloration was an accident! It looks like you are a true airbrush artist. Bravo.

[Cucurbitace]

c'est sympa les idées "low cost", j'avais cette même ligne de conduite pour le mien, en récupérant un max de "vieux" matos...

 

et ton doigt va bien ?

 

Ca va parfaitement, j'ai eu une perte de sensibilité pendant quelques semaines, mais maintenant on ne voit plus rien. Le corps humain, c'est quand même bien foutu. 

 

So calibration is pain in the a... and you have to do it on every reboot but after calibration it nudges fine. I'm checking side winder freestyle pro description on wiki and they say it detects rotation not acceleration, and it is not very precise (actually quite opposite  ) and you never know if you are in zero position or not. Probably after every reboot you have to set zero position again. All would be great if driver would auto zero after some time of inactivity.

After calibration do you see x-y axes marker in game controllers properties going nicely up and down, and left and right?

For sidewinder to really detect something you would have to rotate your cab left-right and up-down but probably nudge will also give you some small movement. That's the problem with pinball and sidewinder - sidewinder excepts that you rotate it for 360 degrees and you really rotate it for just a few degrees.  

 

When you pull the plunger all the way down - is the speed of plunger fast enough to push the ball with full speed? It looks like all that gears would slow down plunger so much that the ball will hardly come out.

Fortunately for me the pinball is not that heavy, and it is doable to recalibrate the Sidewinder by moving the body of the pinball directly. But still, I can't agree more, a huge pain to do it every time. 

The movement of the marker after calibration is smooth. Not as smooth as if I unscrew the controller and do a "regular" calibration, but it corresponds to the strength I nudge the machine.

 

It seems to me that it is at full speed, I'll make a video as soon as my camera will be fully charged to show you how it does. But yes, the gears add extra resistance.

 

--EDIT--

Here is the video:

 

why a coin door? if it's a hyperpin why would you want to deface the front

for a non operative coin slot? it looks great otherwise

The coin slot will be operative! Of course it will only be a coin switch, not a coin validator. This way to add a credit you'll need to put a round object in the slot. This is to get the feeling of the true machine. Furthermore, all the extra control (from the two screens, hard reset for the PC and extra buttons for VPinMame will be located behind this door. Like this if I want to tweak the system, I just need to open the door. And thanks for the appreciation. 

 

You are a genius. You are also much too modest, your paint application looks amazing. You should not tell anybody that the coloration was an accident! It looks like you are a true airbrush artist. Bravo.

Thanks a lot.   But, really I wanted to have a plain orange color for the body. I guess luck was on my side for this one. 

Edited by Cucurbitace, 31 December 2012 - 06:19 PM.

[RipleYYY]

tant mieux alors... mais bon, quand je vois (ton avatar) où tu mets ton concombre, je ne suis pas étonné que tu te blesses aussi au doigt... !!!

 

[blur]

tnx very much for the video Cucurbitace, plunger looks really great

 

can you maybe do a video how you nudge and how you shoot some slow skill shots - for example - 3000 points on fireball from starman, or upper a and b lanes on amazing spiderman from bob or something like that

 

i have my nudging done with one long tilt bob that is used for left, right and front nudge, plunger is digital

for few dollars sidewinder is a dream deal - you get analog nudge and analog plunger for only about $7 - i'm thinking about buying one, but only problem is this calibration on every reboot

 

do you know for some other gamepad implementation of analog plunger and gamepad? - i know rascal and some others did plunger with joysticks, i did some tests with joystick turned upside down for nudging, some devices have accelerometer for nudging - but never saw complete setup in "production" in cab like yours - great job!

[Cucurbitace]

tnx very much for the video Cucurbitace, plunger looks really great

 

can you maybe do a video how you nudge and how you shoot some slow skill shots - for example - 3000 points on fireball from starman, or upper a and b lanes on amazing spiderman from bob or something like that

 

i have my nudging done with one long tilt bob that is used for left, right and front nudge, plunger is digital

for few dollars sidewinder is a dream deal - you get analog nudge and analog plunger for only about $7 - i'm thinking about buying one, but only problem is this calibration on every reboot

 

do you know for some other gamepad implementation of analog plunger and gamepad? - i know rascal and some others did plunger with joysticks, i did some tests with joystick turned upside down for nudging, some devices have accelerometer for nudging - but never saw complete setup in "production" in cab like yours - great job!

 

I will try to post a video later, but at the moment I'm dealing with my custom control panel and as it's a mess of wires coming from the coin door hole, I won't be able to play until I finish this first.

 

And I cannot agree more, the calibration pisses me off. I was thinking of either a PS3 controller or Wii Remote too. What stopped me here is the price, I can get Wii remote with a discount, but it would still be more expensive than the Sidewinder.

Anyway, I think I will probably give a Wii remote a try. If it's more comfortable, I may switch for it.

[Nemo]

I really like these kind of builds, it has a guerrilla mod look and feel to it, love the size, love the effort you gave it !

 

It's just sweet !   

[xenon590]

Salut Neohpyte,

 

Je suis parti sur un gros budget (3000€) et je vois que j'ai jeté du fric par la fenetre......  

 

Ton lanceur est genial, crois qu'il serait possible de refaire le meme mais avec un vrai lanceur de flipper. Le look est meilleur mais l'idee des roues dentées, la classe car la precision est la.

ou a tu trouvé ces roues dentées et comment tu renvoies  à la rotation à ton controlleur ?

 

Cordialment

[Cucurbitace]

Salut Neohpyte,

 

Je suis parti sur un gros budget (3000€) et je vois que j'ai jeté du fric par la fenetre......  

 

Ton lanceur est genial, crois qu'il serait possible de refaire le meme mais avec un vrai lanceur de flipper. Le look est meilleur mais l'idee des roues dentées, la classe car la precision est la.

ou a tu trouvé ces roues dentées et comment tu renvoies  à la rotation à ton controlleur ?

 

Cordialment

Salut,

 

Ces engrenages viennent d'une lampe de poche à dynamo à 1.50 € acheté au bazar du coin. Je l'avais achetée pour en récupérer les LEDs.

Le système est ultra basique :

• La tige du lanceur entraîne la roue.
• La roue appuie sur la molette du Sidewinder et la fait tourner.

C'est effectivement précis, mais bien moins agréable qu'un lanceur. Si j'avais un lanceur "normal", j'aurais tout simplement rallongé la tige pour qu'elle vienne faire tourner la roue. Le feeling aurait vraiment été parfait.

Mais comme j'ai une course de même pas 4 cm sur mon lanceur, ça n'a pas été possible.