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Oh yes! Loved the video. First of all it’s great you’re completing it, and the documenting of everything — I assume you will be a big help for others in your (our) situation. Lets us say YES, it can be done for about 500 bucks. Awesome.
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Drumdude, yes I think you can absolutely build a full size cab for well under $500.
I’m probably going to end up at around $525 by the time I finish and paint this. But that’s with two big upgrades, an analog plunger and real pinball legs. I spent $137 on those two alone. That’s more than a quarter of the entire budget.
Had I bought the legs from Pinball Life and fabricated my own plunger mount, I would have come in under $500.
That’s all assuming my rails work out. I can’t see why they wouldn’t but you know what they say about calculating your poultry production prior to incubating their offspring to maturity.
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I tacked a simple back on and added a fan I had lying around to the top box.
While I was back there, I took a couple photos of my speaker solution. My speakers are connected where the PC monitor speakers used to be. I’ll replace this when I add Surround Sound Feedback. But it’s good enough for our budget build.
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Great job on getting that budget build done. I’m not good at woodworking so no way I could have done what you achieved!
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Great job on getting that budget build done. I’m not good at woodworking so no way I could have done what you achieved!
Kreg screws. It’s all about Kreg screws.
I’m not a very good carpenter either. A friend introduced me to Kreg pocket hole screws a few years back and suddenly I could pull off projects I never could have before. The only real “skill” needed is the ability to cut a straight line and there a lot of tips and tricks for that on Youtube.
I do have some basic tools including a small table saw, chop saw, small flush trim router, cheap Harbor Freight drill press, and a handheld circular saw.
The circular saw and router are all I’d consider essential for a project like this (and the Kreg screw kit).
The other thing I like about the pocket screw method is that I can completely disassemble this cabinet like an Ikea flat pack kit. That’ll be handy when I decide to add led strip lights, for example, and need to route channels for them.
I’d originally planned to go ahead and route those now, but realized I could wait thanks to the pocket screws.
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Finally! I got the aluminum for my side rails.
I think it’s almost time to take this apart and paint!
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Impressive build, but the location of the flipper (and magna save) buttons seem strange to me? Are you able to rest on the lockdown bar while pushing those buttons? Anyway, looking forward to see the progress!
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Love following the build but If its a penny over $500, I’m out.  I was promised $500 and that’s what we expect…
time to start selling stuff off the cab to get back on budget
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Impressive build, but the location of the flipper (and magna save) buttons seem strange to me? Are you able to rest on the lockdown bar while pushing those buttons? Anyway, looking forward to see the progress!
They are surprisingly comfortable there.
Earlier I mentioned the problem I created for myself by not giving myself a little more space in the lockbar/apron area. I didn’t have many options, but this actually works pretty well.
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Love following the build but If its a penny over $500, I’m out. I was promised $500 and that’s what we expect…
time to start selling stuff off the cab to get back on budget
Well, the title says “let’s find out.” ;)
No promises.
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Lol @ tom
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Starting on paint. I hate paint.
Trying out a spaceship stencil.
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Very cool challenge. Forget all the bells and whistles.
Lose the led lights, DMD, plunger, coin door etc. and focus on the basics. All the other stuff, you can add later.
Build the bare bones cabinet with quality in mind. If done right, it’s the one component that can last forever. You can update everything else later. It’s a big thing that will either sit proud in your cave or become a proverbial pain in the ass / dead weight.
Go do it and make us proud!
——- btw looking great so far!
Never take advice from me,
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Yeah, painting cabinets of any form sucks when you don’t really have good facilities to do it in.
It’s been a cool challenge to watch so far. Technically, we could have done Radiant Silverball (to date) at that price point, but we would have been in mini-cab territory. We’re over $1K in ourselves with a full vintage widebody design, and it wouldn’t have been much cheaper for us doing a standard body, plus we would have had to buy a playfield screen instead of using a screen we already had on hand.
Creator of the first PinupPlayer PostDMD mods for VPX - PostDMD for Masters of the Universe VPX and Jaws VPX.
Head Proprietor of Pisces Pinball, a VPX table developer.
Lead Technician of MC Chase Amusements, a private arcade in our home basement.You need to login in order to like this post: click here
Starting on the stencils. At this point whether/how much I go over budget comes down to how many cans of black spray paint I need. :)
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Yeah, painting cabinets of any form sucks when you don’t really have good facilities to do it in.
It’s been a cool challenge to watch so far. Technically, we could have done Radiant Silverball (to date) at that price point, but we would have been in mini-cab territory. We’re over $1K in ourselves with a full vintage widebody design, and it wouldn’t have been much cheaper for us doing a standard body, plus we would have had to buy a playfield screen instead of using a screen we already had on hand.
My painting challenges are a combination of lacking proper facilities, equipment, skill, and patience (all the things). It’s humid today and I know that’s going to affect how the paint turns out. But I might have to wait weeks to get a day that’s just right. Not gonna happen.
I’ve seen people pull off amazing finishes with spray cans. But I’ve never been able to get an even gloss coat. That’s part of why I’m going after a more vintage inspired wedge head look. I’m hoping any flaws will come across as age/character.
When I started this, I had a few scraps of wood, a couple arcade buttons, and two old computer monitors. The monitors became the back glass and DMD. I had to buy just about everything else including the playfield TV and computer. It runs VPX at 1080p just fine, including table like Medieval Madness, Simpsons Party Pinball, and Addams Family. Oddly it struggles with PinballX. I switched over to PinballY for my front end. It’s much smoother and less buggy. Not sure how it would handle Popper.
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I still have to paint the back panels, but otherwise paint is done.
With flash on so you can see the silver paint.
The answer to how many cans of black I needed was 2. That should be the end of the expenses and I can tally up the final budget to see how I did. But I think I’m going to wait until after it’s fully assembled and include that in a final post.
For the paint, I raided the paint shelf in my basement. I used every kind of white primer/paint I could find to lay down a base coat. I had 3 completely unused cans of silver spray paint. I don’t remember buying them for anything and neither does my wife. I wonder if they came with the house? Anyway, I used those to cover the entire exterior of the cabinet.
Then it was time for masking tape, stencils, and black paint. I only had a partial can of black and it was sort of a metallic black.. I used that on the inside of the cab and had to buy some new black cans for the outside.
Hoping I can reassemble tonight and tomorrow.
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Final assembly is complete! Everything went well, but I did run into one issue. Read on…
This is what a budget power solution looks like ;)
A power strip and some mounting tape is all you really need. The 5v for the lights in the buttons and the 12v for the fans comes directly from the computer.
Instead of plastic u-channel, this 1mm thick felt tape ($4 on ebay) lets the glass slide.
Except… here’s where I ran into a problem. I was so pleased with myself when I came up with this tidy way of finishing off the side rails. Only I forgot I wanted to be able to slide the glass out! I have some ideas to fix it. But they involve rebuilding the lockdown bar. I’ll come back to that at a later date. For now I just have to remove the side rails to take off the glass :(
I do really like the side rails. The offset aluminum angle (.75″ x 1.25″) looks really good. It doesn’t look like something from the hardware store. This was hard to find. I had to buy 3 pieces, each 46″ long ($34 on ebay from outwater-industries). So I have one left over, no idea what to do with it yet. I made a “brushed” finish on them with sandpaper and scotch brite pads.
Here are some videos of the machine in action.
Final budget update to come…
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And the grand total is….
$506
Here’s the budget.
The last item I added was 3 cans of spray paint, $4 each.
I started with:
- 2 old computer monitors ( backglass & DMD)
- 4 arcade buttons (flippers & magna save)
- Some scrap 1x4s and 1/4″ mdf
- A shelf of old spray paint
Pretty much everything else I purchased including the computer and play field TV.
My initial goals didn’t include a real plunger or legs and I managed to include both. Woot!
When I first discovered virtual pinball, I was impressed (and a little intimidated) by so many of your builds. The VP community is full of super talented people who have been incredibly generous with their time and knowledge.
I knew I couldn’t invest thousands of dollars in this project (I’ve seen those build threads and they’re amazing!) I wanted to lower the barrier to entry for folks wanting to get into this hobby with more modest budgets. I hope I did that.
Time to play some pinball!
Oh wait. Hey, would you look at what just arrived in the mail today.
Here we go… ???
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Congratulations and
for the last order 
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