After a chance visit to an old, run-down warehouse on the outskirts of Lincoln, I’m back in the arcade building/restoration business.  My first trip didn’t yield anything except a pair of completely stripped Lost Tomb and Express Raider cabinets.  However, the guy having the sale turned out to be a treasure trove of old and abused arcade hardware.  After several trips between his house and my brother’s barn, I now have three Bally/Midway cabinets and a Neo Geo, all in complete working order.

The three Midway cabinets will all become 48-in-1/60-in-1 machines.  I’m keeping one for myself and restoring it to look like a Galaga machine.  The other two will go to my brothers, who will each be deciding the level of effort/expense they’d like to put into the restoration.  The Neo Geo needs almost no work at all, and will also be going into my personal collection after it gets cleaned up a bit.  The two “junk” cabinets will be used to test restoration methods (painting, sanding, etc) and might turn into working machines to be sold off at a later date.

Stay tuned for some step-by-step details of the restoration process.  In the meantime, here are some crappy camera phone pics of what I have to work with.