I have a story to tell, I have nobody to tell it to that would "appreciate" all that has happened thus far except on here.
So I am going to lay it all out, maybe someone will give me the pat on the back I feel I deserve.
So my wife-to-be's father LOVES Galaga!!! He talks about it more and more since I started this arcade collection in my mancave.
In the mid-summer I decided, for Christmas I would create an arcade for his basement rec-room. I found a website selling 60 in 1's incredibly cheap and that got the ball rolling. What I wanted to do was buy an old whiskey barrel and make him one of those Barrel of Kong ('cept Galaga) that I have seen on here...
Locally all the whiskey barrels have been scarce for quite a while so sourcing one was next to impossible!
I finally decided to BUY a cocktail table. I looked locally and our 'arcade resale' scene consists of a few guys selling 60 in 1 cabinets for $1500 - or the odd steal of a
if you see the ad first. I almost got a dead pac-man cocktail for a lot of money but it was sold out from under me. - no biggie.
I finally decided the best and easiest way to get this - MY FIRST BUILD - rolling was to BUY a repro-cocktail cabinet and slap it together al-la Ikea!
I ordered on on ebay from someone in my country just a couple of Provinces over... Think New York to Montana.
I ordered and paid and waited and waited and waited... Shipping should take 6 day's at the MOST!
After ALMOST a month and a few emails back and forth with BS excuses... It FINALLY arrived - IN THE MIDDLE OF MY BATHROOM RENO!
So it sat a week before I could even look at it. At least the fellow added 2 joysticks, a speaker and a bag of buttons for my long wait.
Now this was NO cheap purchase, I don’t want to be laughed at but I forked over some serious cash for this.
Here is what I got: Particle board with dowels... you slap the pieces together (with glue I assume) and the access is through a hole in the bottom.
There is no place to mount any monitor only 1 hole for a speaker. It DID come with crudely cut T-moulding and for the GLASS top... the opening for the monitor had a ledge router'd out and there is a piece of plexi - THAT’S IT!
Keep in mind by the time all of this was discovered, it is the 10th of December and I don’t have time to argue with this guy for a refund and source a GOOD table and get it shipped to me in time to build something. Oh and my father-in-law-to-be is an ENGINEER so YOU KNOW he is going to be looking at it's
!
*He is a SUPER GOOD GUY!
I opted to do the best I could with what I had.
I bought some 1x1 strips and screwed both sides into each wall glued every piece that went together, pulled all the dowels out the top and added hinges on one side and CP clamps on the other to hold it down... I found a local guy who made me a nice tempered bevelled glass top and I replaced the plexy on a ledge with a thick piece of black art paper to make a bezel to go over the monitor.
My used 20" Dell LCD fit perfectly in the space.
Now all I have to do is put in the buttons and Joysticks and wire this up!! It had better work!
I am not going to bother with pictures, I am sure we have all seen a black cocktail table before...
As I got into this collection of mine I have tried to be weary of spending too much on a game I want - funny how the most money and most stress has been for a cabinet I am doing for someone else!
