Neo Geo project

[Neo Geo project]

Yeah but this lady plugged it in right after doing so. I'm just not comfortable getting electronics wet. Also I don't have a dishwasher and when I did I never used it. I don't even trust those things to wash dishes. Hand cleaning always works better.

[Arcade games in humid weather]

I live in Oklahoma myself. Got up to 115 last year and the humidity is pretty much always 100 percent. Just keep them inside somewhere and don't leave them on all the time and they will be fine. Besides some cosmetics work every now and then.

[Neo Geo project]

That's exactly what I plan to do with the marquee lights. Those things are just worthless. Plus it will look a lot better. As far as the electronics go I've already done cleaning but wouldnt risk getting it wet.

[Neo Geo project]

Hey guys. Haven't gotten to post yet so thought I would give it a try and show you a working progress of my new Neo Geo. Also I wouldn't mind taking some suggestions. Found a guy around town trying to sell a "broken" Neo Geo 4 slot for 200 dollars. After checking it out and taking with him he came down to 150 so I snatched it up. Now the restoration begins and I will try my best to update my progress as I go. Keep in mind I have a limited income so I can't buy all parts or tools or everything at once so it will take awhile. My personal opinion though is that if you get a restore done in a day you are not doing it right. If anyone has questions about the project or just some arcade stuff in general or tips then ask away. I am always down for helping.

 

 

This photo was on the facebook ad that a friend pointed out to me. He said it was broken but worked when he bought it. This particular Neo Geo was placed in a skating rink. Before that it was owned by an electrician. The real problem was that the image on the screen was compressed to the middle of the screen, making the games unplayable.

 

After a few minutes of practicing my first step when beginning an arcade restoration, which is checking for any loose plugs, I not only discovered a loose plug on the PCB board, but also a bent pin on the same port. I straightened it out and plugged it back in and now we have picture.

 

 

The monitor has color saturation that I will have to fix, but we will get to that later on. However, I must point this out. I'm not sure if the owner left the game on while the on screen image was compressed, or if the light was just so bright that it didn't take much to burn the monitor. Either way, I have this lovely monitor burn that is just a line in the middle of the screen from the compressed image.

 

 

Once the colors get fixed and everything is adjusted, it won't be too bad.

 

Now that I know the monitor comes on and the game is working. It's time to do some serious cleaning. I clean the "inside" of these cabinet's the same way I clean my walls and baseboards in my house. A bucket of hot water and mixed with some dawn soap. dunk a rag in the soapy water, ring it out very well and start scrubbing. You can really get up all the grim and dust with this method. PLEASE KEEP IN MIND. This probably goes without saying, but this particular method of cleaning is only for the wood. Don't be stupid and whip down the back of the monitor or PCB board with a wet rag. Sorry if that was too obvious, but I once heard my mother tell a story of a nurse at the hospital she works at spill a coke on a computer keyboard, then ran it under a sink to clean it out. She wondered why it wouldn't work after that. Anyway, I highly doubt any of you are that silly. Better safe than sorry. Some people use a vacuum, but I don't recommended that unless you have a special electronic safe vacuum. My buddy uses a pressure hose to blow out his cabinets. I personally don't like using those because I feel it puts to much stress on the electronics if it hits them, and it doesn't really clean it, it just blows the dust around inside of the cabinet and possibly getting it in places that you don't want it.

 

Anyway, keep in mind you can't get it perfectly clean, but the wood will look real pretty afterwards and you don't want dust coating the boards and burning them up. Also use a rag with a cleaning solution to go over the wires, but not the ports, to get them nice and clean. There is still fine cleaning that needs to be done, this is more for working inside without getting too nasty, and a basic cleaning just needs to be done first. Here' a before and after.

 

Before

 

After

 

Before. Note grimy edges and cracks.

 

After

 

Before

 

After

 

After that I started basically removing everything from the cabinet for cleaning. I used a toothbrush to brush out every pin and port on the PCB board, power supply, control panel, and anything else. Then I use a can of air to blow out the dust that I just broke up with the tooth brush. Also the tooth brush can be used to clean the board itself. Then I took the time to clean the actual Neo Geo carts. Removing dust and cleaning the insides so they can register better. Even if I have a manual telling me what pin goes were, I still find it very convenient to take the time and label all my wires. Especially for the control panel. Which will look like this.

 

 

Once you unhook everything in order to clean, it should look more like this.

 

 

Remember, all I'm doing at this point is cleaning, and I believe this is around day 2 hour 10.

 

Once that was complete I moved to the marquee. I found something interesting here.

 

 

Now I have a light problem. Only the first 1 is lighting up and barely at that, so I need to break into this thing to see what's going on. Then this huge pain in the butt came. There are two locks preventing access to the marquee. So my options are pick the locks, or break my arm trying to get waaaay up into the back and remove something I can't even see. But phones at least help you see what you are working with.

 

 

Before even attempting to do this. I got lucky. One of the locks was successfully picked!

 

 

The other was not so easy. Had to go with the breaking the arm method. After 15 minutes of fighting this thing. I now have both locks off. Now we can see what is inside. But remember, I am still just cleaning right now. Under the marquee and the light fixtures and the speakers.

 

 

After removing the speakers, I can finally start cleaning here too. At this point, The arcade cabinet looks like this.

 

 

After cleaning all the wood inside, outside, and all plexiglass and monitor. We can start checking out some problems. Mainly, the marquee light. Here is the problem. Unlike most arcade cabinets, this one does not use a florescent bulb. Instead it uses this.

 

 

As you can see, the small marquee signs for the games go directly over these flat lights. I don't like this. They are harder to replace, and they put color distortion in the small signs from being too close. So I'm not going to use that. Later I will probably be getting a different light and installing it in the cabinet. So we can just ignore that for now. Now that this is all said and done. We can start doing a little cosmetics work. Mainly the back of the cabinet. The cabinet looks like it was sitting under a dripping roof.

 

 

We can't have that! So here is what I did. Remember this is particle board so you don't want to sand it like you would regular wood. Do a light sanding over these bumps. Just enough to flatten it out all around the best you can. Now we can start painting. I probably didn't need to use primer on this part, but I did just to be safe and create a better surface for the paint to rest and dry on. which looked like this. Remember to take off your corners and edges.

 

 

I did the primer to the parts in which I felt that I really needed them. However, the entire back will be painted, not just the top. After doing a few coats on all of it, we can see that it looks much better all around.

 

Before

 

After

 

Then I moved on to the entire back. This is the final painted product for the back of the Cabinet.

 

 

Next will be more cosmetics work, t-molding replacement, and more! I hope you guys found this interesting.

 

Also, by this point your work station should look something like this.

 

[need help picking a joystick]

As someone who works on a lot of arcades and sticks, my personal favorite is always Sanwa. You can't go wrong with good Sanwa quality.