We started out with a Defender cabinet and tested boardset I picked up from MonkeyBug.  The cabinet was mostly painted black (one side partially stripped down to the original artwork), and had a ratty old quasi-jamma wiring harness in it.  Apparently somewhere in it's life, it spent time as a Shinobi in Pensylvania, or so the sticker on the marquee proclaimed.

I picked up the metal mounting plate, and a NOS defender joystick from AncientGames.





My student has been working on this for about a week, 2 classes in the morning (he's my co-op student), lunch hours, and one spare afternoon class.  So far, he's done all of the AC wiring, added a new switching power supply, added a new power switch, a new florescent light fixture and made his own Defender harness from scratch.  

The monitor, and speaker are hooked up.







Spit5Ace is loaning me a set of stencils.  After the coin door and control panel are hooked up, we'll refinish the cabinet by sanding it down to bare wood, patching all of the cabinet defects, and repaint it from scratch.

Does anyone have an idea what the graphics glitch is on the bottom quarter of the screen?  Apparently it's monitor dependant.  When we hooked the game up to the monitor in Joust #2, there was no glitch.  I can't seem to adjust it out using the monitor's controls.

Thanks to everyone mentioned above for being so helpful in getting me the parts I needed to start this project.

Quoted from Bish

Does anyone have an idea what the graphics glitch is on the bottom quarter of the screen?  Apparently it's monitor dependant.  When we hooked the game up to the monitor in Joust #2, there was no glitch.  

That's very odd...

"Usually" lines like that are typical of RAM problems.

...although that doesn't hold water if the problem is not there on a different monitor.

I'm fishing here..,, but were both monitors the same type (ie. both G07's or K4900's ? ).

If you want to swap out the RAM, I've got a fresh set I can spare...

LMK,
Cheers,
Steph

Quoted from Steph

I'm fishing here..,, but were both monitors the same type (ie. both G07's or K4900's ? ).

If you want to swap out the RAM, I've got a fresh set I can spare...

Both WG monitors, but different models.

I'd certainly be interested in swapping the RAM to see if it gets rid of the problem.  Let me know what you want for it.  

Thank you!

Starting to really take shape.

Brings a tear to my eye, after it was sitting in my garage for many, many, many years.  


Just make sure you don't get any overspray on that Stern behind there, when you redo the cabinet.  

Quoted from Monkeybug

Just make sure you don't get any overspray on that Stern behind there, when you redo the cabinet.  

We've been using it as a sawhorse.    Sorry for your luck.

Quoted from Bish

My student has been working on this for about a week, 2 classes in the morning (he's my co-op student), lunch hours, and one spare afternoon class.  So far, he's done all of the AC wiring, added a new switching power supply, added a new power switch, a new florescent light fixture and made his own Defender harness from scratch.

This is the next best scam I have heard since Tom Sawyer and the whitewash fence.

I think that was Huck Finn...

Quoted from MarkToo

I think that was Huck Finn...

Nope.  Definitely Tom Sawyer.

Quoted from necro_nemesis

This is the next best scam I have heard since Tom Sawyer and the whitewash fence.

As far as being a scam - it isn't.  Tech education is supposed to be about hands-on learning.  Maybe you think having the auto shop work on cars is a scam too?

I don't benefit personally from the projects I sell from the school...the money goes to buy new parts for the next batch of students to do the project the following year.  I also sell the projects from the school for the cost of the parts we have invested in them.  We don't make a profit from their sale.  

As for Defender, I've personally paid for all of the parts out of my own pocket.  I am quite capable of wiring the cabinet myself, but the student is benefiting from the experience, and is enjoying the challenge of doing it himself.

This project also gives kids an opportunity they wouldn't normally get in school, and it's a cool project.  The administration like it because the kids who come into the classroom to play the games at lunch, aren't in the halls making trouble.

It seems to be a win-win situation for everyone involved.

Just so you know - regardsless if you're joking or not - I'm offended that you've decided to make an off-handed comment insinuating that I'm some sort of a cheap scam artist for running this project.

All I can say in the vein of this conversation is - In high school, I had a fantastic electronics teacher.  It wasn't 'till years later I realised how much I picked up from him and how much he cared about his trade and us kids.  I think the type of project Blaine has going is pretty cool, and would have given anything to be involved in something similar as a student.  I have no doubt it would be easier just to teach from the standard curriculum and leave it at that instead of teaching the ins and outs of electricity and electronics in a very practical manner....

First ->  Many thanks to cooke for the coin door.  It's exactly what we needed.

Today, we noticed that there was about a 1/4" gap at the edge, when we test fitted the control panel we've been working on.  We realized that the cabinet edges had separated from the front, so we added carpenter's glue along the seam, and used a pipe clamp to bring it back into line.

Pictures:

June 4/08

Today, we noticed another section of the cabinet that had shifted.  The area where the top of the control panels rests was 1/8" out.  More glue and pipe clamps, and hopefully, we'll be able to proceed tomorrow.



Today, we also started working on the coin door.  We started to strip the original door down for parts to use on the door cooke gave us.





The original door was painted black, and was missing things like the bracket for the adjustment switches.  Between the two doors, we should be able to make a complete one.  

If anyone has the correct plastic "quarter" inserts for this style of door, and wants to part with them, we could use a set.  The ones we have are cracked in half.

Coin door and control panel are wired, and game is playable.  We still need to replace the buttons...these ones are crappy old ones I had kicking around.

Thanks to Steph.  The 4116 RAM chips he donated fixed the graphics glitch.

Does anyone know why, with a lithium battery mod, the game resets the high scores when it's turned off?  It usually boots up to the accounting screen.  It has a switcher in it.  I think I remember somewhere reading there were issues with using a switcher with Defender.

We're still looking for a set of "quarter" inserts for the silver "pinball style" coin door.







Next week:  Cosmetic restoration begins.