I started out day 3 by giving the outside some paint attention. The first coat was very light, but the second coat started to give some good results. There is plenty of paint, so I have a feeling I will end up doing 3 or 4 coats to give it a nice finish. For the moment, the sides are not going to be painted until I’m 100% happy with the position of the monitor.
Next up today was progressing with the coin door. I decided awhile back to do a custom coin door. This was a way to lower costs a bit, and since it won’t be sited anywhere apart from my living room, doesn’t need to be elaborate. The door itself was cut to size from left over MDF (there is still plenty left from the 3 sheets!). Holes were cut for the coin mechanism and lock. I then decided to use contact to cover the door (front, back and inside holes) rather than paint it black. This was to make it stand out a bit from the rest of the cab. This contact was originally purchased for the control panel (before I decided to purchase a proper Galaga CPO overlay). Then to finish it some aluminium angle was cut and glued onto the border. It’s come up nice I think – although I might replaced the blue sticker on the coin mech.
The remainder of the day was spent preping the frame for the screen perspex and control panel to sit on and soldering some wires for the power supply. I also raced around to the plastics place and printer to get all the perspex cut (marquee, screen and control panel overlay).