A few of us seem to have finally got round to busting out the arcade button mod lately and others are asking questions about the process.
Cutting the holes is the easy part, the crux of the mod is making your VCI look pretty again as the arcade button mod will leave you with unsightly holes where the original buttons once where.
One way of getting around this is to add some backing material inside the case and using a filler to fill in the holes then, sanding, priming, sanding etc etc. This is both costly and time consuming for those who don’t have the tools and and materials on hand, and if you don’t know what your doing it can come out looking really shit.
What I propose is getting some acrylic surrounds laser cut. These would sit between the flange of the arcade buttons and the top of the VCI, similar to the metal plate that is there already.
If we could get 10 people keen on this the cost would be around 15 USD and allow anybody to achieve a professional result.
As the acrylic is clear you could paint it any color you want, and without any prep-work asides from cleaning it first it will come out glossy and will never scratch as the paint is under the acrylic.
This would also work well for people who are getting the SE overlays as the acrylic will neatly cover up the holes in this as well.
If we get enough interested we could get the labeling engraved on the top as well.
Midifidler: So I would be able to get the acrylic for the Arcade mod, and also be able to have the SE overlay? (In case lasercut is not possible) If so.. it will be even better!
i would be interested in some plates cut to install those arcade buttons. i seen some 24mm buttons at the arcade website http://lizardlick.com/images/ps_14_d_k.jpg
and yes i’d like to have them printed or something but if its made of clear acrylic i could have my own solution to printing
i got a vinyl plotter at the shop i could maybe make myself some nice surface stickers under acrylic and make it backlit with LEDs .
and i was thinking about cutting holes for arcade buttons with a CNC router we have at the shop but i would need a correct drawing file of the plates to export to the program and im not a machinist…either can operate it.. my friend does it , he’s exporting Corel drawings to another program to control the router. if i could have the correct drawings with holes drawn and the correct dimensions and everything i could cut like 40 of them in an acrylic sheet. im pretty sure it could be less expensive than lazer but the cuts wouldn’T be as clean since its a rotary blade.
just wondering what you are saying there, the unsigthly holes .. you mean the rectangular button holes? you dont cover them with the new buttons?
if you get small enough buttons you could fit them all in the same row , centered in the original holes
original holes are 19mm wide and 6mm between each buttons
so there would be 3mm of meat to cut into the board on each side of the original hole so makes a maximum available space of 25mm for each button without moving any center points of the original switches
there is some 24mm arcade buttons available on www.lizardlickamusements.com/ but i am just wondering if 24mm is the total dia or the button(plunger part) itself…
but then again i guess its pretty usefull to have the buttons a bit spaced out so you dont hit two buttons at a time…
personally i dont juggle but i just hate the feel of the buttons and would like swifter ones this way i wouldnt miss a cue or whatever may be missed by a misshit. i dont wanna have to punch em hard all the time… maybe Vestax could provide the latest buttons from the SE who , according to Ean , seems to be softer and better… but at wich price !? lol
and i was trying to bring ideas up to help others for the mod
It would be cool if you could purchase a fully modified VCI-100 mimicking Ean’s old mod with coloured arcade buttons and jog wheels. I am not to cued (no pun intended) up on the overlays but would it not be possible to produce whole new overlay that fitted the arcade buttons? It could have many names to distinguish it from the Special Edition, how about Ean Golden’s Arcade Classic? lol. Im sure it would have no trouble selling.
Anyways this was my first post, all the way from dunedin, new zealand. Big shouts to ean, this website is fantastic and all your posts and videos are awesome and inspirational. Also to all the fantastic forum members, i have learnt alot from your posts.
Yipiie!