Day 9 - 20th May

Following the operation we were hit with a bit of typical British Weather and some family birthdays which has meant four weeks has passed since I was last able to work on the cabinet.

Today's task - to fit the monitor bezel and perspex overlay. If successful this should totally hide the monitor behind a sheet of darkened acrylic - the screen should only be visible when turned on.

First the monitor bezel was cut to size and four holes drilled to form the curved corners of the screen edge

The screen was cut from the bezel using a jigsaw

A router was used to add a bevel to the screen edge. This will reduce the width of the bezel near the monitor edge to aid with screen visibility

When doing the bezel there was a slight slip with the router. No harm done - nothing a bit of wood filler won't fix

Bezel is screwed into place and monitor put in position to check alignment - perfect!

Bezel edges are filled and sanded and bezel is re-attached

When attaching the bezel I caught the vinyl slightly on the right-hand side. This will need to be patched up later.

Bezel is vinyl wrapped pior to perspex being put in place

Perspex is installed with seven small screws - these will be painted black later
Monitor has been re-installed and cabinet tested once more.

And with the monitor off, monitor is not visible - MISSION ACCOMPLISHED
Next up mounting the motherboard and speakers

Day 8 - 22nd April

Today will be the last time I get to work on the cabinet for a few weeks as I am going in for a minor operation and have been advised not to lift or overdo it for 3 weeks after the op. With that in mind I am hoping to get the two side pieces in place today - I will be ordering the artwork for the side pieces at the end of the project as do not want to risk scratching it during the build.

Vinyl applied to left-hand side

I had previously already cut the side pieces during my first attempt and so just cut down the existing side pieces in width. Unfortunately I do not have pictures of the original sides being cut though it was the same process as all other pieces and involved marking out, using a jigsaw for the rough shape and routing all edges to allow the T-Molding to be added later.

Vinyl was applied to the inner faces of the two sides before being attached to the cabinet as once in place these sides would be harder to access. Vinyl was not applied to the lower 1/6 of the panel to allow for a better contact when attaching the panels.

Once both panels were cut and vinyl applied to the inner face it was time to attach to the cabinet. As I had no one to help lift the panel with me the best way I had to do this was to place the base of the cabinet on its side and to prop it up using books to the same level as the TV Cabinet. This allowed me to rest the side piece across the TV cabinet and the arcade cabinet base. Once in position 11 screws were used in a grid pattern to hold it in place. Glue was not used as I wanted the ability to disassemble the top from the cabinet at a later date if required for mobility etc.

The two sides attached

Two sides attached

Monitor re-installed and cabinet tested

Day 7 - 21st April

I had ordered a roll of 10m matte black vinyl earlier in the week for covering the base and inside edges of the cabinet - basically any surface not requiring artwork. The goal this weekend was to vinyl wrap the panels of the cabinet. To do this the first step was to dismantle the cabinet parts and Vinyl wrap the inside faces. Once this was done the cabinet could be reassembled, screw holes filled with filler and smoothed and then the outer surfaces were vinyl wrapped also.

Cabinet after reassembly and wood filling ready for vinyl

The first side is vinyl wrapped - this went on very smoothly

The second side is wrapped, again relatively easily

The front is vinyl wrapped, an absolute nightmare and by far the hardest part of the project so far. This was made hard due to the curve/angle and the fact it was a single piece of vinyl.

Vinyl is applied to all base surfaces and the Street Fighter logo graphic is applied to the control box

Day 6 - 15th April

Having applied the vinyls to the control panel it was now time to attach the new control panel and to cut the perspex top layer. I managed to source the perspex at a good price from Trent Plastics and as they were not too far from me I had been able to collect these on Friday once I knew the artwork would be arriving. I had ordered four pieces of perspex in total - two for the marquee, one for the control panel and a large dark tinted piece for the screen (more on that later)

The new control panel is attached to the cabinet

The acrylic sheet is cut to shape and drilled and rested on the control panel

The control buttons are attached holding the acrylic sheet in place

Joysticks are added and checked for clearance

Once the control panel was attached it was clear I would have to add some screws to  hold the perspex more securely as it could be lifted at the corners and anywhere where it was not being held in place by the buttons and joysticks. I would get some small screws and enamel paint later in the week to tackle that issue but for now I decided to spend the rest of the build time today on reconnecting the wiring for the controls and applying the vinyl for the marquee. Applying the vinyl to the acrylic was actually far harder than to the MDF - something which I had not anticipated as due to the smoother surface the acrylic really stuck and became much harder to work with. Nevertheless the graphic was applied.

The Vinyl is applied to the perspex for the Marquee

The wiring is redone to the new control panel and tested

Day 5 - 14th April

I had already designed the artwork for the cabinet using Adobe Illustrator and had submitted the design for the control panel and marquee to JLS Imaging for printing. JLS Imaging are an Ebay store specializing in vinyl printing and were able to produce the graphics required and post them to me for less than £30.

The graphics arrived on the Saturday morning and when I unrolled them from the tube I have to say I could not have been happier with the results:

I had decided upon a two tone design for the control panel with the player one area yellow and the player two side in blue. I would also create a frontend theme in the software using a similar colour scheme

As I now had the artwork in hand I decided to concentrate on the control panel for the weekend. I had found a few issues with the shape of the previous control panel and also some of the drilling was not very well finished. Due to this I decided to cut a new control panel on the Saturday morning and then set to work on applying the vinyl

The new Control Panel is cut, drilled and routed

The control panel vinyl is applied

Holes are carefully cut from the Vinyl using a craft knife

Day 4 - 1st April

The focus of the fourth day was to get the buttons and joysticks wired up and tested. This was a preliminary test as once the artwork arrived all control would need to be removed so that the artwork could be applied. However, I couldn't wait to test the controls, especially as I knew nothing more could be done on the cabinet for two weeks as the following weekend I would be travelling up to Edinburgh for a family visit.

I had attached all of the buttons and joysticks the previous day but the micro-switches needed to be attached to each of the buttons. The first picture shows the buttons without the micro-switches attached. The second picture shows with all switches attached (note the micro-switches were included with the cost of the button)

Once the microswitches were attached it was time to mount the iPAC32 board. Again this had been purchased from Gremlin Solutions and is a sophisticated keyboard emulator and allows a computer to read input from the buttons and joysticks as if they were key presses without additional drivers being required. For more information on the iPAC click here

With the board and controls mounted the next step was to run a ground wire between all components ground (COM) connections to and from the ground connections on the iPAC board. The idea here being to create an earth loop for all components.

With the earth connections in place all that was left was to connect each of the terminals on the iPAC board with the corresponding controls NO (Normally Open) terminal.

With all components connected and loose wires taped down it was time to hook it up to the PC and test. The good news was that all components worked, the bad news was the joystick movements were reversed. A quick reconnect and all was confirmed as working as expected, four days into the project and this is the first time it feels like I have an arcade cabinet on the way. Next up the artwork...

Day 3 - 31st March

Drilling the control panel

The second weekend of the project I devoted entirely to the control panel. I had got some button layout ideas and templates from slagcoin.com. I had decided on a 2 Player Street Fighter theme for the cabinet early on though despite traditionally Street Fighter using a 6 button layout I decided to go for an 8 button layout instead. This would allow me (through control mappings within the emulators) to use different arrangements for different games and still keep the shape each game was intended to have at the Arcade i.e. SNK games four buttons in a row, Street fighter 3x2 etc.

Control panel drilled

I cut the control panel shape and routed as I had with the other panels. After testing for fit against the other panels I taped the template to the board and began on cutting the holes for the buttons and joysticks. I ordered all joysticks and buttons from gremlin solutions, an online UK based company specializing in arcade cabinet parts. I went for Happ Competition joysticks and buttons as these were the buttons I remembered from my youth - they were a little more expensive but worth every penny. Once the first holes were cut I tested for fit which luckily were perfect first time. All buttons and joysticks were test fitted ready for wiring and testing the following day.

Control panel buttons and joysticks installed

I began at this stage to also begin designing the artwork for the control panel. Originally the cabinet was going to be predominantly black with red and blue accents though I was not happy with my initial artwork as it seemed too modern and also a bit too menacing with a little one in the house. Instead I decided to use the character artwork Capcom had produced for Street Fighter 3 online and Street Fighter 2 HD Remix. This gave me the majority of the characters from the street fighter universe to play with an in high resolution. I sent the artwork off for printing to JLSImaging - an eBay store specializing in Vinyl printing.