Posted by Phydeaux Brigands Closet2Mame on 12, 2000 at 8:43 PM:
A year ago I was looking for a cabinet to convert. A friend of mine told me that his Grandfather had a cabinet in his barn. I told him I would give him $50.00 sight unseen. When I got to the barn, I found a Galaxian machine with good side art, marquee, and bezel. Instead of gutting it, being one of my all time favorite games, I decided to restore it. T-molding, new PCB, and a cap kit for the monitor and it was in AWSOME shape. But still no Mame cabinet. On Sat. Nov 11, there was an Arcade Auction in Timonium MD. I decided to sell the Galaxian and maybe get a cabinet I could use.
A new BLITZ game and CARNEVIL sold for $500.00. Another Galaxian with bad roms sold for $275.00. I was getting nervous. I was expecting prices like I see on EBAY. On EBAY, after you buy the cab, you have to pay $150.00 for shipping. I saw ugly Galaxians going for $600.00 on EBAY. I kind of thought that $800.00 would be good for my restored Galaxian. When the moment came, I got $475.00. Not as much as I wanted, but for this show, it was excelent.
To let you know how bad the show was. A working, good looking TRON with a problem with the spinner, went for $175.00. The guy turned to me and asked "Is that a good price?". He did not know what he bought. He was looking for any game at a good price for his livingroom.
One cabinet that I was concidering was a working Gold Medal cab. It went for $35.00.
But the two cabs that I had my eye on were two converted XENOPHOBE cabs. Large control area, and an up high monitor. As you can see from the picture, the monitor is on a pedestal. There is room for extra control buttons around the base of the pedestal. This will keep my play area clear of TAB, ESC, and such.
Along the front for the base of the pedestal are stereo speakers under a metal grill.
The first of the two cabs had PRIMAL RAGE. Fighting dinosaurs. The second was BOTTOM OF THE NINTH. Acording to the KLOV database on my Palm Pilot, these are both Jamma games, so I new that these cabs were already butchers, so I feel they are ok to convert to MAME. In looking at the two cabs, the PRIMAL RAGE is the best cab.. at least it has a new paint job.
The PRIMAL RAGE came up first. I got it for $200.00.
With selling my Galaxian for $475.00 and buying the XENOPHOBE cab for $200.00, I walkied out with $207.00 in my pocket. (Gotta pay the fees of the auction).
The Monitor is a 19" WG with slight burn-in. I will probably donat this to a Childrens home in Gettysburg PA. They have and AWSOME arcade there and can use it for the kids. I am going to sell the PRIMAL RAGE Jamma+ board, the DC and the AC power supplys on EBAY. The 2 new Happ Joys and 10 buttons ane going to be incorperated into my cab.
While at the aution, I met another guy who was there to buy a cab for a MAME conversion. He says he has been here and also to my page. He was looking for a JAMMA with a 25 inch screen. He had his eye on a MORTAL COMBAT. I left before I had a chance to see if he and his cohort bought it. C-Star (?) If you are reading this, respond to it and let me know what you got.
The auction started at 10:00am and I left at 4:00. At that time they were only half way done with the auction. They were selling a cab every 2 minutes. I saw a sitdown San Fransisco RUSH sell for $550.00. It would have been great, but my Wife would have killed me!