Nice work! I'd love to do that to mine, but looks like a LOT of work!

It definitely looks MUCH better with the full red in the cabinet...

Looks great, very rarely do you get to see a JM with the red on the cabinet so prominent. Your hard work was worth it!

very nice! JM is a great game. I had one Chris H did just before he opened HEP. Man was that a nice pin! It is a great pin as well.

Damn, that looks great.

Looks Fantastic!
Johnny looks good in his new suit!

looks fukkin' nice!

great job.

Looks amazing! Too bad new decals for WCS aren't available It is amazing how different it looks with the red on there.

Are these the partial cab decals? I love mine but could be persuaded to do them again if there are full sets??....sorry for the double post too.

Are these the partial cab decals? I love mine but could be persuaded to do them again if there are full sets??

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Same here. Looks sweet!

Best looking JM out there!

mine could sure use some new decals as well..looks awesome

Looks good, what an improvement!

All that work and you put Keanu back on the cabinet?!??!?! Why not swap him out for a nice image of Dina Meyers

Just kiddin- looks great.

Looks great and where did you get the decals from?

I would love a set of those decals as well. Where did you get them?

Real nice man, that was a super faded cabinet and this game deserved the new decals.

Astro pm me too if you don't mind. I desperately need a new set. Thanks.

Pm me too please. Thanks!

I looked at those pics and thought, Johnny Mnemonic is supposed to have that much red in the cabinet?!

Clearly I've never seen one that had any red left in it.

Bravo!

Fantastic work!

One day, I'll get around to doing mine!

Hey Astropin - I was just thinking about this again. Having never taken apart a pin to the degree you did to get the new decals on, how hard is it to take the entire playfield out? Does it all just disconnect via molex connectors or is it more difficult than that? Same with the backbox? Did you repaint the cabinet and backbox with black before adding the decals? Maybe there's a better thread for this, but thought you might have some answers having just done it

Astro, on the partial side did you cut the old ones and install the new or did you apply the new over the old? I was looking to see how to cut it and it looks dicey, I mean it's easy to mess up the cut and realignment of the new to match etc....Might be better for a novice like to apply over the old one.

Overlay and cut it. Its the only way.

If you look at his pics you can see that is actually was stripped down to bare wood on the front at least... so it does not appear that it was just patched and on top of the old decals. As far as the fading.. I always thought also that the cabinets had an orange/red fade to it since literally all of the ones I had ever seen looked basically the same. The dead giveaway on the color is the RED under where the legs cover the corners... boom... red as a cherry. What I don't get is why do all of them fade? Just too close to windows without UV protection I assume?

Looks great! Nice work!

never put decals over decals. Ever.

Reds fade because of the pigment. It's fragile to UV. UV from sun and florescent lights will destroy RED and oranges in cabinets. Yellows too.

So how do you put the sides on if you can't overlay? To cut the old one and match it with the new sounds crazy hard.

This is my first post. I'm in the process of restoring my JM cabinet - which would have been impossible without Pinside and help in getting decals from some members here. I'll post some pictures when done, but may be able to help with some of the questions. I clamped a straight edge along the sides between the upper and lower parts and was able to strip the bottom half without a problem. Just used a heat gun to just soften the decal by the straightedge - do not let it bubble - and used a scraper to make a clean line. I've put on 3 coats of primer, covered the Keanu graphic on the sides with frisket film and plan to spray black tonight before applying the decals.

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Cool..thanks for the pics....

As someone that has painted a ton of guitars I've tried just about everything you aren't "supposed" to do and 9 times out of 10 all of the things you aren't supposed to do aren't a big deal and some that are result in cool alternate results. (here however we aren't mixing and matching paint types and thinners... just simply graphics with adhesive)

As far as a vinyl graphic unless there are huge dig marks and dings in the wood I'd think you could just lay it on directly over the original as long as the edges weren't peeling off. If not I'd think a light coat of primer and bondo on top of the primer and then sanded down it would work perfectly. Just my 2cents. If stripping down to bare wood is as easy to do with a heat gun as it "should" be than stripping works great.

I've applied graphics like this to some of the virtual pinballs I've built and bare wood or primed surfaces both look great as long as you are using finish grade wood with little to no "feelable" grain. Now.. having said that you aren't gonna get construction grade crap and put vinyl over it... you'll definitely see and feel it. The smoother the better. Also I suggest regardless of prep method use an 8-12" ROLLER to put it on instead of a squeegee. Squeegee's can scratch and most are small which makes laying it down without bubbles a lot harder.

When I saw the picture of the side with just part of the wood showing I wondered if the whole thing was new or just the faded part. I somehow missed the part where it said "partial" above. That is a GREAT place to replace it at since it is a clean break. Also.. doing it from there down you don't have to deal with the bolts that are on the sides of the cabinet. Either way it looks great. Mine has about 1/2 the fade that yours did to start with. Mine is mostly orange to orangeish red, but nice to know for relatively little this can be done. PM me too with some info on those.

can you take a pict of the GI lights with your backglass off? looks like some color LEDs?

So, luckymoey, how did they turn out? Were you able to line up the decals along the cut?

Anybody else take the plunge on this yet? Removing half the decal and try and line it up, or just decal over the bottom of the old one, any more thoughts on this?

I think I'm about to take the plunge (I have to think about these things for a LOoong time). I have a new machine coming in so Johnny can go out in the shop for the fall and get some new decals...

I'm planning to do this same project over the long weekend. I want to do it right, but I agree with the OP - I'm worried that it may actually look worse if I try to cut the old decals out.

I really wish the non-Keanu full decals were available (the ones with code fragments). Those are sweet.

Wow that looks great! Mine could use decals!

Tip at the hat Astro!!
Sweet looking JM, job well done

They partial sides turned out great. I don't think the line shows any more or less then if the side decal was not removed. Either way would be fine as long as you put the time in to make the surface just right. I'll post some pics tonight though and let them speak for themselves.

You guys recommend standard bulbs for game room/basements aka where pins are in the house? I suppose indirect light as well. Not that my basement lights are "intense", but just curious.