Saturday, November 1, 2008

Im-bezeling

"Flynn--are you embezzling?"

I've been doing some work on my Return of the Jedi cabinet. This machine and I go way back. When I bought the machine, it had a bezel (cardboard monitor surround) in it, but it wasn't in very good shape. Years ago I removed it, traced it, and scanned the artwork. Then I put the machine in storage for a while. Fast forward to now--I was able to find the tracings and the file for the artwork, but not the original bezel. (I must have put it somewhere safe! :) Anyway, that has left me playing a machine that looks like this:



I got tired of the 'exposed wood' look this weekend, and used the tracings to make a new bezel:



(I still need to trim the bottom piece a bit, but you get the idea.) I ended up hunting around a bit before I found the right material. The stuff they had at the big box office supply stores was either too thick or too thin. This image does not do a great job of showing the 3D nature of this bezel. It consists of several pieces, folded and interlocked. (Building one of these is a bit like origami!) I still need to get the instruction decal on there--then I can start looking for my monitor glass.

In addition to the bezel, I did some work on the Audio Regulator II board in this machine. One of my speakers was buzzing like crazy during gameplay and attract mode. I got an AR II capacitor kit from Bob Roberts and replaced all the capacitors on the board. The buzzing is gone, and the game sounds a whole lot clearer too. Thanks again Bob!

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