well, one week ago popped up this cabinet close to my place: the price became nice after a tight negotiation and the machine was close enought to be took up even if not a grail for me (I am more a post '83 guy  )

i suppose this was the laziest roadtrip ever - 35 km  ... lazy roadtrip, lazy driver, lazy topic: here are some pics of the machine after a lazy cleaning... just to keep you posted about the existence of such particular centipede bootleg dudes 





Sidearts: generic silkscreened arts 


"Millepiedi": i suppose they called this "millepiedi" and not "centipiedi" because "centipiedi" sounds somehow weird ... or maybe a perception of the future?! 




Yes, the control is a stick: i thought this game was unplayable with a stick but i must say that i was wrong. In addition, the MAME reports the stick as an alternate factory supported control (in the original PCB, a couple of sticks have their own pins to input the 4 directions). They never used those pins in a licensed cab, but made the bootlegger life more easy i suppose... 


Monitor: a 17 inches MTC900


PCB: it's a very common centipede bootleg


Less than 3000 plays on this


Unfortunately, i found no info inside the cab to identify it's producer... up to my mind i have just seen generic cabs like this, but i will be more shrewd in the future with this, now more familiar, shape.

Cabinet: Thunder Blade
date: 02 november 2012
distance: 190 Km one way

Some month ago i contacted a guy that was selling an Operation Wolf. I asked him to send me some pic of the cab (not a dedicated cab but a convertion, unforutunately) and eventually a list of games he was selling. There was nothing i was really interested on... apparently.

Some week ago a “weird” over-priced Thunder Blade was listed on ebay: the cab was not the common mini often used for TB (the same used for Turbo Outrun) but the After Burner upright cab! Man, i was diggin for an After Burner since day one!

Then, noticed that it was the same seller that gave me the games list some week before, i recontacted him asking for that TB, and the deal was ready!

Well, not really a cheap deal considering that i paid TOO MUCH for that machine, but you know: sometimes we must be ready to pay a little bit more to be the first of the list …

So, here i am with a roadtrip to share with you

The dealer was located in Ravenna, less than 200 Km from my place. I know wery well the street because i go there almost every summer with my girlfriend.



The real problem was the car: my city car cannot load it... hey: there's a friend of mine with a 2001 FIAT Doblò! Removed the passengers seats and unloaded all the stuff he use to work, the car was ready to go... apart from the 300.000 Km it had just traveld … well, finghers crossed!

The guy could not come with me, but fortunately my bro was in! LETS GO THEN!

Some random pic of the roadtrip …

The weather was not that good at start, even if the sun was “somewhere there"









Then, the sun could break the fog (maybe he was asking how in the world those two guys where trying to travel 400 Km with that smashed-up car...)!











Almost there!





Without problems (with the exception of a orange light on the instrument panel indicating an engine injection malfunction O_O) we reached the seller place... nothing of interesting there... but a fully working After Burner Deluxe I had the opportunity to play with (maybe for the last time in my life … sad sad). Too big and heavy for me (my pockets and my place). Unfortunately it was hidden by other big cabinets, so i could take only few pics when inside.





Back to the object of this roadtrip! Some pic of the loaded cab …





Yes! It's a dedicated Thunder Blade, uncommonly like the After Burner Upright !

Paid the dealer (Ouch!) we headed to a very nice reastaurant 5 Km away, to eat something and take a look to the sea (Adriatic) in autumn... i am here almost every summer (for 3-4 days) but never come in autumn …













I'm hungry now! Let go to the restaurant and have a talk with the sponsor of the trip!



Here it is: “Quarto di Litro” !! A very known brand here in Italy (also “Mezzo Litro” is common, but not suggested for roadtrips )



Risotto alla pescatora ...





...and frittura di pesce (fried fish) with fish caught the morning... no frozen food here. The sponsor is always there...  



Some pic of Cervia's  “porto canale”...









… then let go home, FAST!!















Unloading the beast …





and, finally, some detail of the machine ...







The sides: they are dedicated graphics for the cab





The internal part: there are some badass hacks here   , but nothing that cannot be rolled back  





the PCB, unfortunately, have the "dead battery" chip. Not a big problem being unprotected ROMs out there and for sure i have a MCM68000 CPU somewhere  



... both flashing lights and vibrator motor are working ...



400 Km, a total of 10 hours spent "on the road", a beast of 120 Kg saved, a good   sponsor found: this roadtrip was a success!!

Another "starter" Hi-Score  

118250

Original Hardware, Green label (Euro cab)
Default Settings

Hi all,

this deal started exactly one year ago (october 2010), when a nice guy called me to notify that the Race Driving that was lying in it's warehouse was going to be destroyed if no-one would buy it... WHAT THE HELL! I could not leave that beast be given to the flames, then i told him to keep it until i could store it somewhere (i am out-of-space at home and also my father place is fulfilled).

The machine was in discrete aestetic conditions, no side arts, but complete. The monitor (a 25 inces low res Wells Gardner with a damn Zenith Fly in it) was working and the PCB gave a GSP error... it was worth the price asked, anyhow!

Found the place to store it, (a semi-grounded garage), one year ago i decided to unmount the monitor, glasses, the mirror and other “easy-to-remove” components. This helped reducing the weight to a 70%. Here are some images taken during the unmounting (i took them in order to be able to re-mount everything )







There are no images from the backside, sorry. I had not the opportunity to take detailed images of the inside today, also, beacuse there's little to no room and the machine is close to the wall.







But this is not everithing: the last week i went to the warehouse, just to see if something new was there... i go there more or less a couple of times per month, to say the truth, and i had the opportunity to play with very nice machines, like Cisco Heat Deluxe, various PCB's... and an Electrocoin World Grand Prix. I really did not had the space to store it, nor i was in the need for it (even if i remember i played it in the 90's and it got me at the time)... then i decided to let it go.

Well, one year have passed and i received the awaited call: the Race Driving was ready to be delivered to me! Not sure any other ware-houser would keep the machine FOR FREE one year in it's place, so thank you very much Devis!

… and what about the WGP? Well, i could not resist and asked him if we could find “the nice price”... and we found it

… here are some pictures i took this morning of the WGP, then. As always, the place has very little space to move so images can be taken only from close distancies  …



I think that the control panel is a beauty!!


side art


only few games played


the PCB. This game was playable with up to 8 cabinets linked  


the monitor: Hantarex MTC 9000 20 inches


Here you can see the handle bar, from the bottom side: the big metal disk in the center of the pict is the force feedback weight. When i played the game the FF was not working, but i am confident that it could be activated and disactivated via DIP switches. The japanese deluxe version has also the possibility to activate manual gears (not present in the euro machine)


Manuals where inside: the one on the left can be found on the net, but the one on the right will be scanned and uploaded  




This two machines will be nice close toghether when working  

There's this cabinet for sale in a warehouse close to my place, but i cannot identify which game was designed for



The marquee has "Astro Fight" printed on it, but by my knowledge there's not an astrofight game by Taito... am i wrong?

Hi all,

having not found up to today a reasonably priced original Punch-Out control panel, i am evaluating the home made way (a freind of mine has a bender so i will ask him for "cheap" help  ).

To do so, i do need some measure of the panel 



In addition to these 4 data, i would need the thickness of the panel and eventually some dimension i am missing 

Could someone here help on this 

Thanks a lot

Hi guys,

for my new Super Hang-on i need a good scan of the CP 



Do someone has it?

thanks, as always

What do you think dudes: are the following original Zaccaria's or copies?





The side art looks familiar, but on the net i didn't find another Zaccaria with exactly the same arts....
thanks, as always!