Adding a Light to your MVS Marquee

Since the built in Mini Marquee LED lights are basically useless I was thinking of rigging up a back light in my MVS Marquee. Ideally I'd want it to be just bright enough to light up all 4 of my mini-marquee frames.

1. Has anyone done this and do they have any pictures of what it will look like?
2. How would you go about wiring up a basic light to the power supply? So it either turns on when you turn on the MVS or on a switch so you can turn it On/Off while the machine is on during play.

u can purchase a standard 18 inch fixture(what just about ever arcade machine usese for marquee) from your local hardware store they do not plug into your powersuply ever
they wire directly into the 120 v line

or i have seen several online arcade shops selling cold cathode lights made for arcade machines they are a little better since they do not create much heat so will not melt and yellow your mini's as fast


if you decide to wire in a 18 inch fixture let me know and i can give you some pointers on how to wire it up (i just installed 3 in some cabs i had that were running standard light bulbs)

discgolfer72 said:

if you decide to wire in a 18 inch fixture let me know and i can give you some pointers on how to wire it up (i just installed 3 in some cabs i had that were running standard light bulbs)

Click to expand...

I'd be curious to hear how you did this as well.

Do you have any links to retailers selling those cold cathode tubes? Is the installation the same?

http://www.happcontrols.com/lighting/95263000.htm
there is a link to the cold cathode lighting(there is a pdf on how to install the cathodes in the link provided)
and here is the 18 inch fixture (i got mine at home depot but it cost me 21$ for the fixture and i had to buy the light tube seprate
http://www.happcontrols.com/lighting/91021100.htm

as for wireing in a 18 in fixture
you just add a set of wires after the power switch to the fixture ill loook a bit and see if i cant find some inst on how to do it (i suck at explaining thigs without the stuff right in front of me)

http://therealbobroberts.net/fixture.html

Connecting to+12 VDC power: The CCFL kit can only be powered by +12VDC (+13 for IGT). This can
be obtained from the machine or from an optional power supply.
See accessories below. If using the optional 80-0414-20 +12VDC power supply, connect its 4-pin
connector to the CCFL power harness. Plug the power supply into a switched service outlet inside the
machine.

Do MVS have swiched service oulets on their power supplies?

unshure about the original mvs ps mine all have peter cho switchers

but it would be the same steps as adding the 18 inch fixture just buy the powersuply that plugs in to a wall socket(i.e switched service outlet ) chop off the plug and wire it into the 120v line on the on off switch inside the cab

edit

if your mvs has the original crome looking ps it should have a wall outlet style plug on the outside by where the power pc style power plug goes to that is the service outlet they are talkng about

I'll have to take a look to see what type of PS I have in my cabinet. How do you access the PS again? Is there a panel in the back of the standard MVS cabinets that opens up? I've only messed around with the front control panel when removing the MVS main board.

Hard MVS shows this as the standard PS. I don't see any power outlets on it though...
http://hardmvs.com/html/powerSupply.htm

ok looks like that one does not have a power outlet i have one in my dynamo cab that looks just like that but it does have a service outlet
if yours does have an outlet you can kust look at the back side of the cab and look where the power cord goes into you should have a hole that you can see the crome thrue and there will be a power outlet there

if your cab has no service outlet then you will have to tap into the 120 v power on the on off switch to run either the cold cathode or the 18 inch fixture

on a side note if you have the original el pcb (the pcb based lighting)inside the cab it may have 12v(if i rember correct it does) wiring already going to it but im unshure you will have to look at a schematic to see if it does, if it runs on 12 v then you should not need the power suply for the cold cathode lights and should be able to tap into that power to light the cathode

I do have all of the original wiring for the built in PCB lighting for the mini marquees. Can you tell on the wiring itself if it's a 12v line or do you need to look at the schematics?

well looking at the manual for the 4 slot it shows a service outlet on the ps

in the schematics it does not list a voltage on the wires that goes to the marquee el pcb so i cant tell. about the only way to make shure is to test the wires with the system on using a multi meter (if you dont already have one they are a must if you own a arcade machine)and see what voltages you are getting

i rember when i was maming a 4 slot (dont worry it was fubared lol) that i pluged in the 12 v from one of my pc power supplys and it lit the board so im thinking one of the wires up there should be 12 v and there is def a ground
but im unshure if the control board up there converts voltage down to 12 v or not

http://www.hardmvs.com/manuals/MVS-4-25.pdf

Thanks for your help!