R-Type
26th October, 2006
Tonight I put in the new light fixture that I bought to work in the game. I went to Menards to get one, I was pretty sure they wouldn’t have a matching bulb for the one already there and they didn’t. When I took out the old one, it was stapled down to the cab, and pretty tight for slack, but with the new fixture, I have no problem with that. I can plug it into the receptical and have no issue. It looks pretty awesome lit up finally.
23rd October 2006
Stopped this morning at King’s Electronics, two blocks from new workplace, to get some capacitors for my R-Type game. I got to leave at a decent time and I stopped by Menards to get a new light fixture for the game cabinet as well. I figured I wouldn’t be able to replace the bulb, but what I was concerned about was the voltage of the light and the length of the cord, neither of which I satisfied either. It was a gratifying experience to stand in the store like a dufus, wonder why they had 15″ light bulbs, and no 15″ fixtures, and 13″ fixtures with no 13″ light bulbs.
After dinner I started to take apart my R-Type. My first working game, I’ve had it working for three days, and the only thought that goes through my head is, “Let’s take it apart and see if I can break it!”. It took some time to solder off an old wire that was used as a jumper between the capacitor connections, and get all three of the capacitors into place on the board, but once I got it done, and plugged it in, I had blaring sound right away, no problem! Very exciting and fulfilling for me to have that work and be that easy. And there is a pot that is located right in the area to easily adjust the volume on the R-type as needed.
22nd October 2006
I went out to Radio Shack to see if they had the capacitors I needed to solder onto the board to make the sound work, but they didn’t. When I got home I removed the old florescent light, reset some of the dip switches back to pay to play, and took the cover off the inside of the coin mech that covered the switch to feed quarters.
Where I got it – The R-Type
I picked up a R-Type arcade machine in the dead row at the Indianapolis USAmusements auction in October of 2006. There was a note on the cabinet that said “works, needs monitor”. That is pretty risky to just believe, but I waited just in case. I couldn’t look inside of the cabinet, but when the R-Type came up for bid it didn’t matter. The arcade machine went for a whopping $25, and I figured at the very least I could make that money back if it didn’t work.
Justin was down for the weekend, so he had the van, which was another motivator because I could easily get the R-Type home. So, with the charge for parking added in plus tax and gas, I paid about $33 for the whole thing.
