If you grew up in one of the Golden Ages of Pinball then you will have memories of playing many great pinball machines. Whenever I played them as a kid I took no notice of the artwork, how nice the PF plastics were, were they cracked , were there wear spots in the playfield, did the cabinet have any scratches on it etc etc etc.

But these days, as a collector, I really do want my machines to look brand spanikin new again, I actually think that they deserve it and I cannot believe that so many fellow collectors I discuss this matter with around the globe are actually against doing anything to make the cabinet look nice again.

These same people will do a full playfield restore without blinking an eye or keep a lookout for a New or Repro Back glass which they would pay BIG $$ for BUT scoff at the thought of restoring the actual cabinet, some say it is best for " the value" of the machine to keep it original and I do understand that BUT if you have a machine that will be a "keeper" then why not invest some time and money and do something about that ratty cabinet that probably has scuff marks, gouges and possibly holes drilled into it?

If more people would consider this "upgrade" then maybe more companies around the globe would start to put an interest into producing and supplying re-painting stencils or re-producing the artwork onto large vinyl prints that we can simply stick onto our pinball cabinets.

There are some companies slowly growing in this area - like PinballPal, these guys are really doing a great job to assist us to restore some classic machines by producing a re-painting stencil kit that you can use once only to restore your favourite machine- they already run stencils for classics like Playboy, Star Trek, KISS to name just a few and have plenty more on the way such as Paragon and Evil Kneivel.

The other thing to be considered these days is to reproduce the original cabinet artwork exactly into a Vector image file that can then be taken to a sign shop and re-produced onto large vinyl stickers that can then be stuck onto the side of your machine, we did this with a Williams Firepower and it turned out perfectly as can be seen at my site here and it now looks new again. These stickers are the same feel and quality that are used on the more modern pinball machines, it is just that we are re-producing them to be used over the crappy old paintwork of pre 1985 machines- so what !

Another example of a machine that I have "stickered" is my Black Knight, take a look here and see if it isnt one of the better BK's that you have seen- albeit no longer the original paintwork , but as I said earlier , this machine is a keeper for me ( I will never sell it ) so I dont care whether it is worth $2.00 or 2000.00 , just as long as it looks great.

These days with the extremely high quality digital camera's that are available and the Internet to provide you with lessons on creating vector Art files, it is actually possible to replicate any old artwork and print it out for use today. It just takes a bit of time and effort and you may learn something along the way.

One other thing you can do is to reproduce stencils and totally re-spray your machine yourself as I did with a Gorgar, Flash and a Tri Zone, if you want to see how that is done then take a look at my site and I give you some great idea's on how to start, what to buy, what to do as well as many detailed images of a full re-paint as it happened. I have had a number of people email me pics of thier machines ( including Arcade Video Machines ) that they have re-sprayed successfully using the methods I show at my site. Here is an image of my Gorgar half stencilled and ready to spray-

So I hope this article can stir some of you into doing something with that old cabinet, it was written to show you that there are many options available these days in regards to this subject

Cheers

Wotto