One of the hardest parts of making your own Pinball cabinet is drilling the holes at 45 degrees for the leg bolts. If you have a kit such as the one from VirtuaPin then it is much easier. There are several solutions to this problem:
- Make your own jig out of spare wood but it may take several attempts to get the right angle and spacing.
- Fasten the leg brackets to the cabinet and drill from the inside. This can cause tearout on the outside of the cabinet; precisely where you don't want it. And you still have to drill again from the outside to widen the hole for the 3/8" bolts.
- Use the Oak Micros leg bolt tool. I created this tool for building my own cabinet.
A picture of the tool is shown below. The narrow channels on the left-hand side are 1/4" apart and are used for adjusting the height of the holes above the base of the cabinet. The holes are 2 1/4" apart and are made for the standard Williams/Bally leg brackets (part number 01-11400-1).
To use the tool, clamp to each corner of the cabinet at the height you need and make sure it doesn't move. The picture below shows Harbor Freight band clamps that can also be used for cabinet construction. The tool has three holes although of course you only need 2 holes on each corner. It is usual to rotate the leg brackets so that the front holes are higher than than rear. That is, you use the bottom 2 holes for the rear and the top 2 holes for the front.
A 25/64" drill bit is used to drill out the holes for the 3/8" leg bolts. This provides a tight fit for the 3/8" bolts. It is useful to insert a leg bolt after the first hole is drilled to ensure that nothing moves for the second hole.
After completing all eight holes, you can insert the bolts into the leg brackets. You may find the bolts are tight in the holes and a little hard to turn by hand but that is good because you don't want a lot of play or wobble when the legs are attached. A 5/8" socket is needed for the bolts and the nuts on the inside can be tightened down with a 9/16" socket. Don't forget to screw the leg bracket to your cabinet and add bracing behind the leg bracket. A full writeup for attaching the legs is in MJR's build guide.
This tool is easy to use and eliminates the risk of drilling holes at the wrong height or wrong angle. This 3D printed tool is available from Oak Micros and costs $10.
Note that the color of the tool may vary. The lead time for this product is 2 days as it takes quite a long time to print and I only create them as required.
The best way to contact me is via email at o a k m i c r o s at austin dot rr dot com rather than using messaging on this forum. See the link in my signature below for other Oak Micros products.
Edit: Fixed typo and added contact details.
Edited by MikePinball, 26 June 2020 - 03:15 PM.
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