Can I finish the control panel today?

I'm writing this at the end of the day, and I feel like it's been very productive.

After the dentist (no work to be done there, thankfully) I'm putting together all the pieces cut yesterday.

I've used some long braces to strengthen the base, as it's put together from two pieces - not pretty, but as they say, out of sight...

[caption id="attachment_174" align="aligncenter" width="300" caption="a bit of a fudge?"][/caption]

Marked out for, and fitted the piano (continuous) hinge to the main carcass:

[caption id="attachment_175" align="aligncenter" width="225" caption="piano hinge - 1"][/caption]

Propped up the main carcass, to get that part to the right height to connect the other half of the hinge to the correct place on the tilt & front section:

[caption id="attachment_176" align="aligncenter" width="225" caption="piano hinge -2 "][/caption]

Then offered up the tilt & front and connected the other half of the piano hinge:

[caption id="attachment_177" align="aligncenter" width="225" caption="piano hinge - 3"][/caption]

So it looks like this when it's closed:

[caption id="attachment_178" align="aligncenter" width="225" caption="closed - 1"][/caption]

Notice the gap? Yeah, not particularly happy about that - I was hoping it would close flush, but with a bit of jiggling, glueing, etc. it gets better, but not great.

STOP THE PRESS - just at that point (literally!) the postman arrived with my buttons and sticks. Yey! - as you can see, a fantastic picture (not!):

[caption id="attachment_163" align="aligncenter" width="300" caption="box of bits"][/caption]

So, time to mark up the control panel section for the sticks and buttons (no real design for this, just "guessed" by putting my hands on the box in the places where they naturally rested when thinking about using sticks and buttons):

[caption id="attachment_179" align="aligncenter" width="225" caption="buttons design"][/caption]

I have a bench drill, and some nice bore drill bits:

[caption id="attachment_180" align="aligncenter" width="225" caption="pride and joy"][/caption]

Drill one hole, and inserted a button to test - nice! :

[caption id="attachment_181" align="aligncenter" width="225" caption="first button"][/caption]

So, plenty of dust and shredded chipboard later and it looks like this:

[caption id="attachment_182" align="aligncenter" width="225" caption="all holes cut"][/caption]

I'm going to put the "coin" and "1UP / 2UP" buttons on the front panel - I think it's more nostalgic like this:

[caption id="attachment_183" align="aligncenter" width="225" caption="1UP holes"][/caption]

And with the final woodwork construction done, it looks like this when open:

[caption id="attachment_186" align="aligncenter" width="225" caption="end of tuesday - open"][/caption]

And this when closed:

[caption id="attachment_184" align="aligncenter" width="225" caption="nice"][/caption]

I'm still not happy about that gap, so I'm going to get some decorative thumb-turns to hold the tilt closed:

[caption id="attachment_185" align="aligncenter" width="225" caption="thumbturn"][/caption]

Not ideal, but you have to be a bit "organic" when doing something like this, as the cabinet evolves into something similar to what you designed, but it'll never be exactly what you expected - well not for me, anyway.

I've done some glueing, and used some wood filter to fill the unsightly edges in, gave all the visible surfaces a good sanding.  It's not looking too bad at all.

Next stage will be to prep and paint the visible surfaces, then install the buttons and sticks, then do some wiring.  I'm making better progress with this than I expected.

Something's bound to go wrong.

Cost so far = £80.36
IPAC VE – £30
ROMS – £5
Buttons and Joysticks – £20.01
Piano Hinges – £4.38
Corner Brackets – £1.90
Chipboard - £13
Thumbturns - £5.98