ok guys, i think it's time to reveal ...
...
THE MASTERPLAN!!!for that, i have to elaborate a little bit! when i had the chance to get the cabinet back in december, i knew about the condition it was in (missing parts etc.). in order to make a restoration even possible, i had to make sure i would be able to aquire all the parts needed to bring the cabinet back to life. for that, i asked around on the klov forum and as luck would have it, i found a guy named pat who was just about to dump a badly water-damaged vindicators cabinet. i asked him for pics and my wish was his command
it seemed as if everything i needed was there, so i asked pat if he could strip the cabinet for me before taking it to the dumpster. he kindly agreed and took everything out, but this left us with an even bigger problem: how to get all the stuff over to germany without me paying a fortune on shipping costs. once again i got lucky, because not only was pat kind enough to salvage the parts for me, he also happens to be an airline pilot! and we all know what airline pilots do: they fly to other countries ...
back in the winter months, pat was scheduled to fly to spain and to england, therefore we thought about him bringing the stuff over to wherever he was travelling and shipping it from some european country over to my place in germany. that sounded like a good plan, because shipping costs would be minimized a lot by doing so. we checked back and forth for the cheapest options (england or spain? which postal service to use?), but were not totally happy with the solution, so i asked pat if he would be flying into germany anytime soon. and guess what, at the end of january pat told me there might be a chance he would be flying to frankfort at the end of april (which is only 1 hour 15 minutes away from my place). with that promising outlook, we decided to put everything on hold and get in touch again in april to see whether it was going to work out.
jump to the beginning of april: i was contacted my pat confirming that he would indeed be coming over and that he could bring the stuff with him
. the date he mentioned was april 19 which seemed like a perfect date first, but then i realized that i had a parent-teacher meeting in the late afternoon exactly on that date which was impossible to postpone. "what the f***", i thought, "this is a chance i have to take no matter what!". pat gave me the address of the hotel he and his crew were staying (located in mainz which is pretty close to frankfort), we made an appointment for that day and all i could do now was hope and pray everything was going to work out as planned ...
jump to april 19: i rushed home from school and threw my stuff on the floor
i even took the time for the usual statistic pictures
leaving lauda on a beautiful spring afternoon
some serious building going on here
planes are coming in - i must be approaching frankfort airport
that's what i call a futuristic hotel
mainz is an extremely green city ...
... with some nice old buildings
i was delayed by 15 minutes because the autobahn exit i was supposed to take was closed because of road constructions - who would have guessed. i had to take a detour of roughly 5 kilometers through the city center, but managed to reach the hotel eventually
at the front desk, i called pat on the phone and he asked me to come up to his room - let's take the elevator!
fourth floor - where are you pat?
because he knew I was on an extremely tight schedule, pat was already on his way with a huge heavy box in his hands
the arcade stuff loaded into my car: a big mystery box and a smaller one with the pcbs inside
the street lights are still out - i might make it in time for my school stuff
one last tunnel before hitting home turf
341 kilometers travelled, ...
... 17 minutes ahead of schedule - i made it!!!
the next day, i dragged the heavy box up into my apartment - ready to be inspected and approved by my cats!
pat told me that he had wrapped the box in gift wrap paper because he wanted it to feel like a birthday present for me - and because of that, let's tear it open!
looking very american underneath
let's check out a few items that were inside, for example the entire marquee assembly
looks like someone bought this at an auction
also inside, the two speakers
finally, not one, but
two fully populated control panels. while the sticks are rusted as well (but no problem, powdercoating will do the trick), the panel itself and the overlays are in much better shape than the one i already have - totally usable!
there was more inside of the box like a complete wiring assembly and the power supply, the only things i'm missing now are the lower fan guard (pat told me the one on his machine was damaged beyond usability) and of course the monitor!
it was a combination of sheer luck and some careful planning which has brought me to this point and which is now going to allow me to bring this game back to life. i would not have been able to do this without the help of pat and i will be forever grateful for his patience and dedication - once again this proved how great this hobby and the community are!
thx so much, pat, you rock!!! what do you think of my masterplan?
