Gutting Guerrilla War

 Last week a friend of mine who knows me as an "arcade guy" gave me a tip on a couple of cabinets that some people wanted to get rid of. The owner of the house the machines were in used to run his own business out of his house but had since had serious health issues. The state of the house had become pretty run-down and family members were in the process of clearing stuff out. The basement where the machines sat apparently had a leak or had been flooded at one point.

 Initially, I replied that I wasn't really interested in them because Guerrilla War looked like it was about to fall apart right there (despite the fact it magically still turned on and played!) and the other cabinet, a Double Dragon, wasn't of much interest to me as I'd probably not play it much.

 The next day it dawned on me.. if they only want 100-200$ for these, I could probably get that out of parts from the Guerrilla War alone. I also didn't realize that Double Dragon is a JAMMA-standard game with an 8-way joystick. That makes Double Dragon a great candidate to throw other game PCBs or even a multi-board into. Plus, it sounded like these people really wanted these machines out of there but didn't want to just give them away via a Craig's List ad or whatever. It's rare you see even a total piece of non-working junk sell at an arcade auction for less than 200$ anyway.

Picture texted to me of the game running in the basement of doom.

 So, the next day I rented an appliance dolly for 11$ and headed over to the residence with another friend willing to help for beer & pizza. Luckily, it was only 8 miles away. I preferred to take them one at a time so I could lay them down in the bed of my small truck. Moving them was not easy by any means. I've moved machines before, sometimes without even using a dolly.. but these were fragile and Guerrilla War was very heavy. Maybe because it had soaked up so much water (heh-heh)? The path from the leaky basement out to the yard where my truck was parked was covered in old wood, carpet padding, and other sorts of fun obstacles. After a lot of straining and a bruised arm, I got Guerrilla War home and onto the carport without it exploding into a hundred pieces.

The paintball splats on it give a bit of character!

 I don't consider this salvageable. The bottom of it had been so wet it was starting to separate.. as well as the top of it. Thankfully, things in the center and sides look like they stayed dry.

Front panel all busted up but control panel looks OK.

 At this point I have already taken out the marquee, but it was in good shape. The graphical bezel around the monitor was also in good shape.

With the plexiglass and bezels removed.

 This is the first time I have messed with a vertical-mounted monitor like this, so at first I tried to take the 4 screws out of the frame and pull the frame out. Nope. Stuck on something. Then realized "Oh duh, those are handles" in the wood around it. I put the frame screws back in, removed the 4 screws from the corner of the wood, and it came out very easy; a lot less scary and heavy than handling the 25 inch monitor in the Neo-Geo MVS2. I had already removed the wires to it from the PCB. I couldn't get into the back yet because it was locked and I didn't want to mess with drilling it out if I didn't have to.

Now I've just about got full access to everything.

 The monitor looked bright and colorful with the game playing before it was moved, just a bit of burn-in in the tube from the credits and score text. With that out of the way, I was able to open the back door lock easily from the inside and peer in. It was just as horrible as you would think, but honestly I'm surprised it wasn't worse.

Haha Oh, man.. yeah, I'll pass on even touching this.

 Good thing the main plastic circuit board is mounted half-way up the wall of the machine.

 

Nice and shiny PCB!

 The monitor has a Wells Gardner chassis (score!) and mild burn-in on the tube from the score and credits text. This will make a good backup replacement 19 inch monitor.

Backside of monitor sitting on t-shirts to prevent scratches.

 After removing the control panel, few more wires, and the JAMMA connector, I'm done rescuing all the good stuff with this. Tomorrow the cabinet will be busted up into smaller pieces for disposal. Next up: a bit of Double Dragon cabinet restoration!