# electromechanical arcade games



## rusty (Mar 30, 2011)

Sometimes a fellow just ends up being in the right place at the right time in this game.

Took a load of scrap to the landfill, a fellow pulls up next to me, as he is unloading these nice clean cider blocks. I say to him they wont be here long as I'll pick them up on my way out. 

He wanders over and become curious about all the computer cases in the back of my truck, then asks me if I pick up scrap. Turns out during the late 1960's through the 70's and 80's he had a milk run where he would place coin operated arcade games. After the bottom fell out he stored everything then eventually sold off some of the premium games but told me he still has a barn full of parts and miscellaneous games in poor condition.

After he returns from some business in the big city we are going to touch basis to clean out the storage, he is tired of warehousing this stuff and wants it gone.

I just did a quick google and found that a lot of the contacts used in these old electromechanical games are flashed with gold, I have my doubts that any of this junk will see a crock pot.

How much do you think I should charge for this undertaking, after all I may have to make several trips.

Best Regards
rusty


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## Oz (Mar 30, 2011)

If they are full size arcade games that work they are worth 100 times or more than their scrap value. The older the better!


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## glondor (Mar 30, 2011)

Just a few thoughts. Your contact knows where the land fill is. He has a truck. The bug has been planted to clean the barn. He may look at the cheapest route, and just dump them.

He may determine they have value and try to charge you. 

However if your land fill charges by the ton as ours here does ($135 tonne) I would offer to take them at the dump rate but he must help load. 

It would be to his advantage to take your offer as now it will cost him the same for disposal but he will have free help and an extra truck -you!

Reselling the games may be a tremendous pain in the tail as they were stored because they were second rate or broken. 

Nice score


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## rusty (Mar 30, 2011)

glondor said:


> Just a few thoughts. Your contact knows where the land fill is. He has a truck. The bug has been planted to clean the barn. He may look at the cheapest route, and just dump them.
> 
> He may determine they have value and try to charge you.
> 
> ...




As soon as he mentioned the arcade games my mind went into overdrive, always having my customers best interest at heart discussed the possibilities of marketing. It was during this part of the discussion that it came about that he had already sold off the premium games.

What is left in storage are games with broken glass and box's of parts which he now just wants to get rid of because of other interests that require his building.

Never take a man thats has been in business for a fool, and never appear to be a vulture looking for his next meal.

One time from an estate sale i was given a 1 hour Fuji photo lab, when I came back to pick it up with my crane truck found the silver canister which was very heavy. Knowing what it was told the fellow that he should send it in for refining, he said take it.

His father had a Camera repair shop and radio shack store combined, many people had brought in their camera for an estimate, abandoning the camera after given a quote. We hauled NOS radio shack computer stuff and tons of cameras and lenses taken apart then put into wiser lock box's we hauled from the estate for 2 weeks and sold this stuff on ebay for almost a year.

Unfortunately the old projectors were to costly to ship and ended up as car stuffers for the crusher, my wife annoys me at times with her damn paper, There was box's full of advertising literature and owners manuals for cameras that she listed on ebay, every scrap of paper sold.

I call my wife the paper hanger, two examples of her dirty work. These notes were found in an old dresser under the news paper lining the bottom of a drawer that had been discarded at the landfill.

http://tinyurl.com/4ph7nb5

http://tinyurl.com/4vkky6a


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## Anonymous (Mar 30, 2011)

Hey gill,I have a friend that has spent thousands of dollars on vintage coin operated arcade games.Please do not scrap those.
ADDED*
I just got off the phone with my buddy here,and he said he would love to know exactly what you end up getting!I'll send you a PM in a few.


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## rusty (Mar 30, 2011)

mic said:


> Hey gill,I have a friend that has spent thousands of dollars on vintage coin operated arcade games.Please do not scrap those.
> ADDED*
> I just got off the phone with my buddy here,and he said he would love to know exactly what you end up getting!I'll send you a PM in a few.



Don't worry any repairable machine will be fixed and sold.

I'm looking into replicating the graphics to replace on machines with broken glass. I believe this could be done if all the broken bits could be recovered then reverse engineer the graphics and paint codes.

It's even possible that someone is already offering replacement glass complete with graphics, if not this could turn into another paying hobby which kinda ties in with my renewed interest in photography.

A large format ink jet printer will produce the positives needed to silk screen the new graphics onto new glass.

As for any of the newer electronic type games, it seems that capacitors have a limited life cycle. Chances are replacing the caps would put these machines back into working order.

Regards
rusty

Rolling Stones Pinball: Price $4,675.00.00


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## Harold_V (Mar 31, 2011)

Gill, 
The young guy (48 years old) that has been helping me with my CNC mill has been involved with pinball machines, and owns a few. We were talking about them some time ago and he mentioned that there's people out there that provide replacement glass for them. He made it sound like there's not much you may need that isn't available. If you're interested, I can put you in touch with him. Let me know. 

Harold


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## goldenchild (Mar 31, 2011)

Arcade games are definately worth more as arcade games than scrap. It would be a shame to scrap a work of art like that pinball machine. http://www.jammaboards.com is one of the best sites to find anything you may need to repair arcade games. Here's a picture of the goons enjoying the neo geo on poker night. I have about 150 games for it.


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## Oz (Mar 31, 2011)

Rusty is spot on with the graphics being the most difficult to replace or repair. 

Many years ago I used to manage arcades and amusement centers and was paid very well because I taught myself to repair the machines (read that as component replacement, when the smoke goes out, replace it) as most were intimidated by the electronics. Mind you this was before people had computers in the home and many of these games cost over $10,000.00 new. The going rate for a repair technician at the time was $100 an hour with a 2 hour minimum, plus travel time at the same rate. Those are early 1980 dollars we are talking about. Minimum wage workers at that time had a take home pay of $100 after taxes for a 40 hour work week.


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## jimdoc (Mar 31, 2011)

Here is a good book on video game repair;

Atari The Book
http://pdf.textfiles.com/technical/atari_thebook.pdf


Jim


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