11 replies to this topic

[duke atomic]

Hi Everyone, 

 

I'm about half-way through my first cabinet build.  While I'm basing most of the functional elements off tried and true strategies on the forums, I'm taking a different angle on the overall cabinet design.  I came to VP from a different path compared to most  folks.  I was never really into actual pinball growing up.  Only recently, I became hopelessly addicted to games like The Pinball Arcade on my iPad.  I have my iPad for work… but needed something to waste time and unwind.  This is how I stumbled on the VP scene and began planning my own build. 

I'm a fan of mid-century modern design in furniture, architecture, etc.  I like really quirky atomic-age pieces and the classic vintage shapes you find in motel signs and diners, etc.  My goal was not to recreate an authentic pinball cabinet.  But instead build something more "furniture-like" and re-imagined with a mid-century aesthetic.  Basically, I wondered, "What would a pinball machine look like if it was designed by the same guy who did this:"

 

Or, what would a pinball machine look like if IKEA sold it 

 

I did my design in Sketchup Pro.  Took about 30 iterations to get to a final "wedge" shaped design with tilt-up playfield and drawer slides for holding most of "the guts":

 

 

 

 

 

I will post up some pictures shortly of the cabinet progress. 

 

The main cabinet is mostly MDF.  I know MDF has a bad reputation and possibly someday I may regret it.  But handled and fastened properly, it can be useful.   Also, it is a great substrate for wood veneer, which was a major plot point here.  I had a lot of fun shopping for veneer.  Never having worked with it before, I found the process pretty manageable and there are so many cool options.  I ended up with Zebrawood (reconstituted, actually) and I've been really happy with the look and finish. 

 

The playfield is an LG 43" 4K (UM6900, I think).  It is an IPS panel so it has really nice view angles and gaming attributes. 

 

The PC is a Ryzen 5 1600 on an ASROCK B450M (mATX) motherboard and a Radeon RX5700XT video card.  I had always been an Intel/Nvidia "guy"… but AMD has been making some big leaps and the Ryzen chips offer some pretty stellar price/performance ratios.  After some crazy rebates and sales at PC Micro Center, I was really happy with the out-the-door costs of the PC for this one.

 

An Oak Micros Pinscape AIO (and Fuseboard) are doing the pinball magic.  I'm sure I will be preaching to the choir, but I can't say enough about the people and products underpinning this great hobby.  Really, between MJR with Pinscape and "The Guide"… to MikePinball… the folks doing VPX and DOF… it completely boggles my mind.  I'm into a few other "big boy" hobbies and there really isn't anything quite like the community here.  Sure, other communities and forums will help newbies with the golden rules to get started with whatever hobby it is.  But I don't see as much personal investments and sharing of oodles and oodles of work.  And Oak Micros with this quasi-commercial solution… it is SO awesome.  Anyway, Pinscape AIO FTW.

 

I'll lay out my audio, DOF, and other details such as the backbox in another post.  Gotta get back to work mounting some leaf switches.

 

[Hawyer]

What if... a pinball in a Fallout vault. I like that.

Edited by Hawyer, 08 March 2020 - 10:12 AM.

[duke atomic]

Things are progressing on my cabinet build.  Back in January I cut a lot of MDF.  The geometry of some of the cabinet "slabs" was tricky... a few mistakes... a lot of head scratching and arguing with Sketchup.  One of the toughest bits was the front panel.  It had compound miters that were tough to get just right.  Sketchup puts up a measurement of "about 10.6 degrees"... which is basically like saying 

 

 

 

The rear panel has cut outs for exhaust fans and a large access hatch:

 

 

Once I got the panels cut, I mated them up to the bottom piece which is 3/4" plywood.  I trust the MDF to hold its shape when it is affixed properly on the back, sides, and front.  But there was no way it would hold up to bearing the weight for the bottom.  Sag city.  So, ply for the bottom.  In retrospect, I would have done plywood for the rear panel too since it ended up being a more integral component (eventually, my design had it bearing the weight of the backbox).  

 

 

Despite the odd geometry and my amateur-ish woodworking skills, I thought the pieces came together pretty well.  Not perfect... but well within my expectations.  I will mention that I looked into shopping this out to a CNC shop.  I think it would have been great and I explored several options on 100kgarages.com.  Ultimately, I figured that this was a one-off thing and I could afford some trial and error with cutting it myself.  Glad I did because I also made several on-the-fly design changes and a few head slapping "Ooooooh... I can't put that hole there!" moments.  

 

I built some pieces I call the "multi-functional supports".  They serve as the main playfield TV support / pivot point and also carry two slide-out trays for the motherboard, Pinscape AIO, and a few other misc. boards: 

 

 

How many times did I have to recut these because I either got the drawer orientation backwards or mis-measured the height?  Four times, folks.   Four times.  

 

Mounted in the cabinet: 

 

 

So, the main cabinet is done and currently in my basement being veneered and edge-banded.  I'll post those pics later. 

 

Here you can also see the numerous pocket holes I'm using to spread the fastening load across the MDF.  Some along the top edge are there to secure down the top slab which is not well documented.  Holes for the buttons are drilled.  I'm always amazed at the build pictures folks post around here with totally pristine plywood and mdf.  Ten minutes into my build and the materials are covered in graffiti, stains, holes in the wrong places.  I make marks and measurements one day... then come out a few days later and stare at it going "OK... 3/8ths what??"  

 

 

 

 

 

 

Next up is staining and polyurethane.  Plus my mid-century hairpin legs just arrived from Poland (Etsy) and they look super sweet.  

[GeorgeH]

It is weird but cool.  I like it.

[MikePinball]

Interesting idea.

 

I notice that you put shoulders on the flipper button holes. This might be ok but you also have clear buttons. These holes need to be straight-through (1 1/8") so that the RGB light has a chance to shine through somewhere that isn't taken up by the button plunger.

[duke atomic]

 If there is one thing Coronavirus has been good for is finding some spare hours to work on the the vpins, yeah?  

 

I made a lot of progress in my mid-century build that I've renamed "Wedgy!"  (yeah, I know it's usually spelled wedgie... but according to Marriam Webester:  

Definition of wedgy  : resembling a wedge in shape

 

The main work last week was applying veneer to the MDF.  I really enjoyed the process.  It was fun shopping for veneer - there are SO MANY cool, beautiful species you can get and it really doesn't cost that much.  A 4x8 foot roll of Zebrawood veneer cost me about $100.  Technically, I ended up going with "reconstituted" Zebrawood... fake Zebrawood.  But it's gorgeous and there are some advantages to the reconstituted stuff.  Mostly, I was worried about making mistakes and needing to order more veneer.  The recon stuff is very consistent whereas natural veneers can vary quite a bit order to order.   I also ordered "actual" Zebrawood iron-on edgebanding to cover all the plywood and MDF edge profiles.  

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I cut the veneer pretty close to the actual size of Wedgy's panels.  This is not the usual way of cutting oversize and trimming down.  But I had some weird considerations... mostly due to needing to sink in some pocket screws before applying veneer.  I used contact cement; pretty easy just apply a layer on the veneer and the MDF, let it 'almost' dry, then press them together.  I used a little hard-rubber roller tool to press it down.  Let it dry, trim it up and it's ready for finish.  

 

 

MDF absorbs the cement so I ended up doing two coats (not shown): 

 

 

 

Once the two layers touch, they are stuck.  So I used wax paper to pre-position the sheets... then drew away the was paper in stages.  Worked out pretty good. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

After the panels were veneered, I went around and ironed on the zebrawood edgebanding.  Then trimmed that nice and flush with a small block plane. 

 

 

 

And around all the edges of the backbox:

 

 

After veneer and edgebanding, I began to finish all the wood.  Stain was just Minwax oil based "natural" tone.  Staining veneer is especially easy because the wood is so thin and uniform. Somehow I only ended up with pictures of the backbox post-stained and pre-polyurethane:

 

 

The stain really makes the Zebrawood pop

 

 

After that, I started the process of applying 4 coats of oil-based gloss polyurethane.  Pictures to follow. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[BorgDog]

very nice. I love where this is going.

[licwip]

Me too! Great stuff. I can imagine a lot of Christian Marche tables being played.

[duke atomic]

Wedgy is playing pinball! 

 

 

Big thank you to BrandonLaw, MJR, MikePinball, and all the forum users who have helped me over the hurdles.  My mid-century build is 99% done, minus a small punchlist of items, and it is everything I wanted it to be.  Thanks to the extra downtime imposed by the coronavirus, I had the extra hours to get it across the finish line.  I'm having a great time with it and really enjoy sharing it with my family.   It fits the aesthetic I was aiming for, it makes use of a lot of "found" or "I had it" components, and it is very playable.  As I have said before, I wasn't aiming to recreate an authentic pinball machine.  So, you will see many standard vpin components and features omitted for one reason or another.  No plunger, no glass, no coinbox, very limited DOF (pair of flipper contactors).  But overall I'm very happy with it and can't pull myself away from the flippers.  

 

Unfortunately, I don't have a good series of build pictures after the veneering process.  It was very unclear how long this corona thing would last so I just sprinted towards the finish without pausing to add to the historical archives.  Anyway, after the veneer and edgebanding was applied, I did the stain and about 5 coats of polyurethane.  Here is a better shot of the zebrawood veneer (over MDF) after finish: 

 

 

The gloss of the polyurethane is really nice plus it feels nice under your palms.  Although Wedgy has a lot of sharp angles, I took care to round over the side edges just enough to make them comfortable.  

 

I'm really happy with the legs I got.  I found them on Etsy... a small metal-work shop in Poland.  But they shipped fast and are extremely high quality.  I like the style and they offer more support across the bottom plywood "floor" of the cabinet.  They set me back about $325 (single most expensive component on the build, perhaps?) but worth every penny. 

 

 

This picture also shows my minimalist (and cheap) button array.  Those are just cheapy Amzaon arcade buttons but so far they are getting the job done.  

 

 

The backbox evolved from a lot of different ideas.  I always loved Wedgehead EM backboxes.  Then, one day, I was at a mostly mid-century antique store in Rochester, NY.  While checking out at the register, the owner caught me eyeing this old TV literally sitting outside on the grass in the rain.  "Take it", he said.  It was fun opening up a vintage TV... most of it ended up in the scrap bin and a an hour of dremel tooling later I had a nice fascade for my backbox. The plastic of the TV is just covering a big cutout in the 1/2" plywood+veneer front panel of the backbox.   I have a 27" samsung monitor in "portrait" orientation for the backglass and DMD.  Some black foam is hot glued to fill the "gaps" at the edges of the monitor.  

 

 

The DMD area is trimmed out in mahogany and I cut some old speaker fabric from a 1950's record player.  The speaker area actually houses one of my Bose desktop PC speakers (had them collecting dust... but damn they sound awesome).  

 

 

My Power On button is a reproduction vintage Lutron door bell

 

 

And the "speaker" area of the TV houses the other Bose desktop speaker.  I rigged up one of the original knobs to turn the volume knob on the Bose.  I still use Pinvol... but I thought it would be a good idea to have control of the speaker volume rather than not.  The other knobs are non-functional. 

 

 

My flasher bar is pretty standard RGB recipe.  I just mounted them onto a piece of hardboard (fiberboard?... the brown stuff about 1/4" thick) and covered that with a "chrome" adhesive foil.  Matching "wedges" fill the gap along the edge of the TV.  Gets the job done and my TV can still swing up.  

 

 

That's about it.  Once I rearrange my office to make room for Wedgy I'll take some more pictures and show some details of how the slide-out trays hold my PC and Pinscape AIO.  I'm a little embarrassed by my wiring inside the cab so that will probably wait until I get bored and re-work it.  

 

Thanks for reading.  Stay well! 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[GeorgeH]

It looks fantastic!  You obviously had a clear vision of what it would look like from the start.

[Hawyer]

OMG I love it

[ItchyRobot]

Is this George Jetson's table?
Kudos for trying something out of the box