sWEating HYDRAtion

Treading water with air

Compressed air: lifting dust, grit, and grime out of rusty screws and old interior crevices soaked 409 clean now of brittle nicotine heated plastics oh my &^*$ yucky. So too when the time came to clean the dirt and dust out of newly sanded wood, 120' CFS air cleaned so a fresh black could be applied after the glue for the chipped corner dried solid under the clamps. Restoration also means time to dry (after true applications of whetted sweat slowly concentrated patient wet painting labor glue whatever).  Fun stuff.

This Hydra had been docked since October 2009 and actually suffered water damage while bookending an Atari row that stretched 120'. It was the baby of the line @1990, topping the last 'Atari Games' cabinets after the 720º and Paperboy. Sweet white complex cool molded star wars yoke it reminded me of game #1 fiberglas mold and how 20 years bookending Atari video games was kind of neat when you literally set them next to each other. Sorry, I have no photos of getting of this Hydra #106. Caked dust tar darkened squeaky non-op peddle no yoke control shoot non-kinda-working off-location 1994 filthy beauty fun boat racing game! Then, because it was in the corner, it got leaked on by a faulty roof one torrential rain (another bad landlord story of misfortunate costs and loss). A 1936 Bally playfield was damaged in that storm leak as well as the Hydra base --hydrated swollen particle wood t-mold meh. OK fast it to having a need to fix that wall behind the whole 120' row (some idiot almost skewered a hole through with a forklift from the other side shop insanity). So Hydra came out easily fast front near the PONG and screamed: I'm OUT it's MY TurN! I also had a sincere need to place it somewhere else pronto. Queue my great friend helping me store some games in his garage. It only makes sense as he's got a beast of a boat that looks like it should be in the game!

2011 earliest photo showing lilting yoke and extreme dirt. This corner location damaged with water leak 2016.

4 torx security screws to remove yoke assembly

First thing was to disconnect the pedal for complete rebuild. Sand blasted both rusty pieces and thick glossy black powder-coated them before reassembly with cleaned parts and re-soldered pot leads. This was very sweet piece to complete after finding that perfect chunk of snowboard grip tape for it! So cool it turned out that I couldn't wait to throttle the game and it compelled me to complete things asap. I swear I took some photos during that rebuild but I can't find any! :/ Thanks again to Focused Light for all the METAL help!

(I've since purchased a great torx security bit set), but I had a helluva time getting these 4 bolts off the base plate. No way the upper shroud comes off until the joystick yoke assembly is removed!! Rust Never Sleeps! Soaked these a few days in liquid wrench and had to borrow a better set/wrench to literally get the correct torque on those torx to turn! Again, compressed air blowout after more oil and wire brush a few times, each bolt head became cleared enough for the bit to seat and grip nicely. These 4 are intrinsic (hard-to-replace) bolts that need to work again, so it's important not to be hasty with incorrect tools and stupidly strip the heads. Countersunk specific to the control plate, they keep it flush to the base and there is no room for any other bolt head. Just be careful in 'sledgehammer need' efforts. Like a Pitman Arm and y'er ol' Ford, it is very gratifying to get that stubborn m*&^%* to give it up! :)

YAY! So the joystick assembly goes to my main bench for a complicated take-apart/rebuild. Now too I can finally remove the upper shroud and finally access the speakers, marquee, light, turbo buttons, bezel space, and CRT glass.

Disgusting. I sprayed it with Greased Lightning or 409 multiple times, sopping out the brown pools in the corners with towels until it was all gone somehow. (I prefaced this post about the air compressor, yeah)? I had since pulled away the speakers, marquee, and buttons. Like all my games, I like to clean all those parts as they come off, getting down to the root part they all have to go back to and ...then working back with all the cleaned, repaired, or replaced parts. White plastic suffering hot arcade grime since 1990 then dusty storage 'til me 2017.

WTH was I supposed to do with this #^%$n  *&$m swollen base?? Rebuild the whole thang? No no no no .. not here, that kind of repair was overkill and outta my scope and tools (and this was not the same as the Asteroids Deluxe problem). Moreover, this swell reached up the sides and, well, ambition runs only so far. The game is still solid, standing, and the t-molding is intact. I glued it back into the channel in many places, using it as support for the wood filler, sanded out the swell on the foot base and got it as flat and flush as possible. No, I did not remove any of the duel t-molds, as it kept the edge to sand to and bolstered the side to fill with the wood filler. Leveled and sanded, I could at least match it back to the gloss black that was still molded to the grey sides.

.. (much) more later.