Cabinet Work Begins

As you can see by the date of  my previous post, it's been over a year since I did any work on this project.  The cabinet isn't exactly awful looking.  I guess the biggest issue I have with it is the stupid location of the added credit button.  At some previous date someone decided to drill a hole in the front of the cabinet and mount a button there for adding credits.  Its right there on the front panel.  Both myself and my daughter Kylie hit it with our knee while playing a game and its annoying to say the least.  The only way I see to get rid of the button hole is to fill it with Bondo and paint over it,  so I may as well take this time and repair the whole cabinet and repaint it.

So I finally try Bondo.  Awesome, amazing, I can't believe I didn't try it sooner.  It took a little getting used to how it works but its so sweet.  Basically you can build up missing corners and fill holes and scratches to your hearts content.

It took me maybe four applications and sanding sessions to get it right.  After that the cabinet was smooth as silk, and looking good.

As you can see, I had parts of the speaker slots missing or de-laminated and other splits and cracks here and there.  There was the usual security bar holes and a well placed button hole in the front, perfect for adding credits with your knee, installed there by a previous genius.

I then used a color code for some oil based paint I found on google:
Valspar Anti-Rust B-4 Clear Base and 107-7, 111-1Y26, 113-30, 116-32.5
from Lowes.

Well the paint was excellent, the color was dead on.  However, I suck at painting, and I won't even go into all the damn little gnats and flies that decided they should end there miserable little lives by flying strait into my cabinet.  Its time I invested in a decent paint sprayer, cause I certainly cant roll paint worth a damn.

As you can no doubt tell from these pictures, its a little too shiny.  Maybe that will change as it cures, but I'm not exactly proud of the look.  While all this was drying I took the time to sand down the nasty coin door and painted it with Rustoleum Hammer Textured Spray paint, then a light coat of gloss black over the door and top marque holder.  Those turned out to look near perfect.  I then added two new coin mechs that I had ordered from TwistedQuarter.com.  The coin door looks great, but obviously I couldn't be bothered to take a picture of it.

My next step is to let this cab cure for a week and repaint the black parts of the cabinet.