The foam board illusion section mock up worked well, now it's time to lay out measurements onto the two-way and first-surface mirrors and prep them for cutting.



I scored and snapped the mirrors and then couldn't resist setting it up around the motherboard to see how cool it looked, and also to get an idea of what to do next.



I used the back piece of motherboard tray and the motherboard back plate as a template and then cut the sections of mirror out using a ripsaw blade.



I had to modify the mounting bracket for both video cards to make them fit right against the mirror panel, a Dremel and a metal file made short work of it.



The next picture shows the illusion section test fit inside the pinball table, everything looks good from this angle.



And it looks good from this side too, it's almost ready for final assembly and installation.



Below shows the finished modified motherboard tray, I rivet a couple pieces of aluminum-angle onto the top of the tray to hold the back mirror panel in place and I rivet a few more pieces of alum-angle around the side edges as mounting points.



Next up are the mirror panels and pieces of aluminum-angle that make up the illusion section, I'm waiting to make two more cutouts into the mirror panel on the right before they can be final installed onto the motherboard tray.



Another great company has officially come onboard as a project sponsor, thanks go out to Performance-PCs for supplying my pinball project with a kick-ass Scythe Samurai-ZZ CPU cooler.

I removed the TV speakers from their plastic mounting assemblies and then devised a fairly simple way to mount them into the front of the pinball machine.



Below shows the aluminum angle and pop rivet solution to mounting the speakers.



Here's a look from inside the table at the back of both speakers being test fit.



The bottom edge of the speaker has an angled piece of plastic that should help to direct the sound upward toward the player. The black plastic mesh covers I made will be fit over the speakers during final assembly.

Lookin' good! Keep it up!

I rewired to lengthen and then sleeved the wiring to the speakers to give them a more finished look, even though it will never really be seen.



I removed the lower back panel and drilled three holes into it to accommodate the rocker switches that will control most of the lighting, while it was off I spray painted it black.



Below is a close up of the rocker switches...



I put the back box face down and cleaned the back pieces of aluminum angle with alcohol and a paper towel, then I cut, positioned and stuck down some heavy duty Velcro.



I painted the back panel to the back box black, I also installed two 120mm fans and then lined up and stuck the panel down onto the Velcro.



Here is a view from the inside of both 120mm fans and fan controllers.



Close up shot of the freshly installed fans...

The Performance-PCs sponsored Scythe Samurai-ZZ CPU cooler arrived and I waste no time installing it.



Here is a shot of the CPU cooler in its new home inside the illusion... the mirrors work great, CPU coolers appear to go on as far as you can see.



Another shot, this time looking over the CPU cooler and into the illusion.



The only way the two-way mirror illusion will work is if the lighting inside is brighter than the ambient light outside, that said I cut some channel aluminum-angle the same length as the LED strips to make a lighting array.



I attached the six pieces of channel aluminum-angle to a length of corner angle with rivets and installed the light strips into the channels, four white and two blue super bright LED strips.



Below is the finished lighting array, the wiring will receive the sleeve treatment when they are final installed.



Here is how it looks on the illusion section, I will be cutting the side rail to allow more light onto the motherboard. Small problem though, the lighting makes the illusion section just a bit too much taller and it sits directly below where one of the circuit boards from the TV is located.



I would almost swear that this Sceptre TV was made to be modified because moving stuff around on it is super easy. Below shows the new power inlet and black power circuit board placement, well out of the way now.



Since everything else is basically done it's time to move on to masking for paint, well not really paint, it's actually automotive vinyl color. I masked off a 3/8" and a 1/4" strip over the SMD LEDs that run up sides of the back box.



Here is the front of the machine also prepped for paint...



This next picture shows the installation of the side vinyl masks, the two SMD LED strip locations were also masked off with 3/8" tape.



Here's a look at the installed vinyl mask and the SMD location masking, vinyl color comes next and that means it's not far now.

Looks like you're almost done! How much longer do you think it will be to complete it?

This is quite amazing so far! Very professional looking.

Hopefully soon.


Thanks.


Here is the entire thing completely disassembled, the panels were cleaned up and all the masked edges were tamped, so it's ready to spray.



Below shows what the acrylic panels look like after the first coat of black vinyl color.



Three cans later and the front side of each panel was sufficiently black. The backs of each panel were masked and then sprayed with blue vinyl color behind the vinyl decals.



Here it is with the all the masking removed, the shiny smooth blue letters look killer against the finely textured black surface.



Sapphire rocks and so does their window outline, vinyl sign material makes a great mask when used with automotive vinyl color, I didn't have color seep under the mask anywhere.



Time to install the Sapphire decal I had made, I lined it up and taped it along the top edge, then removed the backing paper and used the blue card to smooth it down.



It looks good, but I still have a little more to do on the back sides of the panels before they can be installed.



I cut the roll of light diffusing film into strips and black electrical taped them onto the inside panels over the SMD LED strips location, then I brushed all of the taped edges with liquid electrical tape to make sure they stay put. A piece of light diffusing film was also cut to fit over the Sapphire "S", it will also be getting some glow treatment.



Both side panels are finished and ready for installation... I still can't believe how nice they turned out.



It took a lot of patience and cans of vinyl color to get all the panels looking right, but at $9 a can I wasn't so worried about the back, if it looks a little splotchy it's because it is. I vinyl colored the duct to the PSU black and screwed it onto the now ready for install back panel.



Front panel unmasked and ready to install.



I am putting the back box together first, get those pieces together and out of the way so I can focus on the table part of the build... not far now.

The back box is assembled, now to put the side panels onto the table starting with the back. I also bought a seven outlet surge protector for the inside of the cabinet to replace of the six outlet adapter type I had originally planned to use.



Below shows where the surge protector will be installed, I will use the heavy duty double stick tape to hold it in place. The biggest selling point for this surge bar vs. what I was going to use... it has a 10 foot cord.



I installed both of the side panels and then finished with the front. Once it was all together I couldn't resist plugging it in to check out the lighting.



Here is a look at the front, it looks good and I had no idea at this point, but I had the legs installed and started putting the front together when I realized there was a problem.



The plunger is too long and sits too high, as such it is directly in the way of the TV, the plunger will need to be relocated lower on the panel... below is a freshly cut new front panel.



I used four screws and large washers to hold the old front panel securely on top of the new one, it is now just a nicely painted hole saw template.



Fast forward and the new panel is cut, masked off and ready for vinyl color.



I took the redo as an opportunity to fix a few things I wasn't happy with, the top panel in the picture below is now scrap and is only shown for comparison. I cleaned up the plunger hole and put the buttons below the plunger back into two separate holes, I also made the left side lower button hole smaller and fixed the edges of the speaker holes.



Next up are the legs, I could have just bolt them on the way they were but I want to make sure that the legs won't scratch up my machine over time. Below shows what I came up with...



Here are the four table legs, all felt up and ready to go.



Mounting the legs was no easy feat, dipping the bolt threads in petroleum jelly finally helped them go in easier. With all four legs installed it is actually starting to look like something...

I love the felt on the legs. Show's that you really care about the product.

I bought a few more parts for the pinball machine, two 6" USB extension cables five blue and five black SPST NO buttons, a 1.5" square blue LED pushbutton, a twenty LED automotive dome light, a metal plunger back plate and four rubber feet.



I rivet together a couple pieces of aluminum angle and attached the 20 LED dome light to it at the level of the side Sapphire logo, below it is the acrylic mount I made for the Pinball Wizard PCB.



I had to modify the metal plunger back plate and a few pieces of acrylic to mount the plunger. I also installed the side buttons and the front speakers.



Below is a shot of the front, I installed SMD LED strips to the underside edge of the table all the way around.



Here is a 3/4 view, ignore the wiring hanging out the bottom, it will all be neatened up closer to the finish.



Next up, another LED test video...

http://youtu.be/GG1IDoAcJRQ

The front blue LED button and LED jumbo push button are wired to power. I didn't like that when standing and looking at the machine the LED strips I installed on the table underside were visible, moving the strips back an inch did the trick.



In a darkened room the blue glow under the machine is pretty intense...

Keep it up!

The black tubular thing below the blue square push button is an arcade push button wrench, it only cost a couple bucks and for getting buttons fit tight it's worth every penny.



In the following picture I have all of my buttons and plunger wired to the Pinball Wizard/Mot-Ion controller, I also installed four push buttons into the bottom of the machine and wired up the square blue push button. Two 120mm fans were installed in front of the freshly meshed bottom vent/access hole



The TV controls were mounted on the inside edge of the front access/vent hole, beside the TV hand controls sits the IR remote receiver/power LED PCB.



Here is a bottom up shot of the TV controls and remote control PCB.



I cut a length of adhesive backed felt to line the back brace where the 16" monitor face will rest, the area under the sub woofer and any piece of aluminum angle that makes contact with the sub woofer were also lined with felt to prevent unwanted vibration.



The sub woofer and power supply are installed...



Motherboard, video cards and lighting are wired and installed. There are three separate lighting elements that make up the Sapphire window effect, two are shown below and one still has to be wired, each has it's own on/off switch on the back of the machine.



Here is a nice shot of the window...



Here's why two-way mirror was used, the video cards reflection in the picture below appears to go on forever.



I turned on all of the blue SMD LED strips to make sure they would not interfere with or over power the window.



The blue LED strips and window lighting work really well together...



It's starting to fill up with hardware, other than the 40" TV the table part is fully assembled and ready for some wire management.

I almost forgot to show that the Sapphire window is a mirror when the backlighting is off...



I mounted the 16" monitor into the back box and laid down some 3M screw strong tape along the top and side edges to hold the 23" LCD in place.



The back box is installed but the side LED lighting still needs to be wired, here is the view from the back...



With the back box attached it looks like a pinball machine, better yet it feels really solid. The two wires dangling from the front are USB extension cables that will be tucked away inside when it's finished.



The back box SMD LED strips are wired.



Here is another LED video, this one shows all three of the Sapphire lighting effects, the back box lights and the sound activation module that controls the blue LED light strips in the mirror illusion as well as half of the back box LED lighting.

http://youtu.be/c-8FXe7-seI

Here is a shot of the whole thing all lit up...