Archive for April, 2007

Working more on the Agent X sideart

Had some time to work on the artwork again tonight. I traced a ton of the smoke clouds coming out and around Agent X. I also got to other small bits and pieces likes some circles on the elevator doors.


Almost completed the Mr. Do! clown

Over the weekend I was watching some tv, so I worked on the Mr. Do clown enemy quite a bit, and he is nearing completion. So, between this character, the apple details I have left, and the almost done winged guy, I could have four main characters done by next weekend. Which is good, because I now have a blank sided cabinet to put the artwork on if I want.


April 23, 2007

Nokes was pretty good with guests down this weekend, only did thing that were typical of a puppy. This weekend we got a package from Brenda and Amanda with some great little gifts, some chicken flavored dog treats and two Tiger theamed items, a Tigers Collar for when he gets bigger, and a Tigers dish. We were going to have to get him a dish soon anyway, so that really saved us.

Sarah let him play with his first rawhide in a monitored setting this weekend. I am still really nervous about them, but the vet told us they are ok.

He gets really excited to play outside with the frisbee, and we did that with him a lot this weekend. Rachel watched him while we were wine tasting and played with him too, so he got a lot of that attention.

He has also started running up and down the fence with the neighbor German Shepherd. Before he was a little scared, but now he incites it a little, he will get really low in the grass and wag his tail, let out a little yip and start to do his little hobbled puppy run down the fence. The other dog wastes him in speed, but it is still pretty cute to hear him from the kitchen knowing what he is doing.


Sanding Pac-man cabinet, wiring Mr. Do!

Today was the day, and a long one.

We got the belt sander from Wes and got to work in the early afternoon. I sanded one whole side of the Pac-man cab before I felt like I really needed to go and get some more belts. We went and got a two pack, and a plastic bristle brush to wipe off the wood particles if the belt got clogged.

I then sanded the remaining three sides of the cabinet. The hardest seemed to be the back up at the top, with the small area, all the holes and areas where stickers had been. We took a scraper to parts of it to get some of the paint off. In the end, the whole cab looked great, back down to the base plywood for a fresh start.

I took some citrus cleaner and cleaned the bottom of the cab and the top a little bit, without spending too much time on either. The top isn’t really clean, but I was in a bit of a rush and knew we wouldn’t finish everything today.

Then I took some CLR and mixed it into some warm water and wiped down the inside of the cabinet. It was a little damp, so I put it out in the driveway in the sun, and went inside for an hour or so to let it dry.

Then, later we came back out and got started. The cabinet didn’t have the monitor mounting rails in it when I got it, because there was no monitor, so fortunately I had the rails from my other Pac-man cabinet so we used those. I will just have to find myself a cheap second set of rails for the game.

We put the monitor in, mounted it, and then Justin got to putting in the other parts. He put in the switcher power supply, the isolation transformer, and redid the wiring. He had to hack apart the Vs. Golf power supply for the cord, and for the fuse mounting because the other one was completely fubar.

While he was doing this, I was taking apart the old control panel and figuring out to do with the controls. The Joystick was a rusted piece of junk that was mounted too low, so I took out a bat handled joystick from a Ms. Pac control panel to use instead. I took off the buttons and the control panel overlay was just pressed between some composite board and plexiglass, so I was able to save that. I then had to get all the wiring right, so I had some soldering to do for the new joystick.

Justin got everything hooked up, including putting the power switch back in, and getting the gameboard ready, turned on the game, and Bam!, it looked great. Only problem was the screen was upside down, and there didn’t seem to be a dip switch to flip it, so we took the monitor out and turned it around. When we did that I realized the way the frame was facing that this was the correct way to have it mounted based on the other Pac machines I have seen.

I made a little tag for the connector to signify the parts side, and then turned my attention to the control panel. I took the extended clip racks off the old vs. control panel and then drilled some holes in my Pac-man control panel to mount those. First try, the control panel snapped into place in the cabinet.

So the last thing we did was test the controls. The joystick had to have two wires swapped, but because I use easy connects, that wasn’t a problem, and the game was working fine. I wasn’t able to mount the buttons yet because there is no spacer with the metal control panel, no wood like there was in the original, so I have to figure out what to do there. I also have to add some screws to fasten the joystick, and I would like to sand the whole thing down and give it a new coat of paint before I am done.

It was a really solid day of work. The marquee bulbs don’t work right now, but they are getting power, so that is good. And because they are just regular bulbs, they are easy to replace.

Next step will be mounting the joystick, and then figuring out how to mount the buttons, if I put wood on the back or what my choice is. Quite and upgrade from where the cabinet was when we first got it.


Buck Creek Winery, Mr. Do! control panel

After church we went back for our second visit to Buck Creek, and again it was much enjoyable.

We got back early afternoon, and I started right away in working on the cabinet. I had four sides to sand down, so it would take a while. And it did. I made some other arcade related calls, and ran a quick errand. We worked on it all afternoon, Justin helped, and he worked on the monitor chassis. After I finished sanding, I cleaned the bottom of the cab, a little bit of the top, and then the inside.

We took a short break to watch a movie about a school, the holocaust, and paperclips, and then ate some dinner. Then, finally, after dinner Justin and I had a fresh cabinet to start loading the Mr. Do guts into. I worked on the control panel, Justin put together the power supply. The first obstacle was the monitor, and we had to use the rails from my other cabinet, meaning I am short a set for a little bit. I hope to have another set next weekend.

The girls came outside for a little while to talk about our summer vacation plans, and we just continued working. There was a lot to do, and we didn’t get as far as we hoped. But by the time we went to bed after midnight, we had a Mr. Do that powered on with controls that worked as well. The picture looked great. The control panel needs a lot of work, setting the controls up permanently, but the main hard stuff is done, and it felt good to get that far. Said goodnight and probably goodbye to Justin and went to bed.


Photos of Our Dog Nokes

Right now we are just fostering him, but you know, we’ve given him a name, so seriously, I don’t think we are giving him back.

He was a real steal at the price of free, so this week we’ll have him checked out for anything major at a vet.


Bedroom Set & Wine Rack

Here are some photos of our new bedroom set that we got for a great deal, and the wine rack that was given to us.

Our New Wine RackOur New Bedroom Set 1Our New Bedroom Set 2