Do cab CRT's qualify in the fetish category, cuz I feel like my compulsion with my cabs' CRT's is bordering on fetishness.
Donkey Kong cab - CRT that came in it was a bit washed out, bought a replacement that came up on craigslist locally. Sent off the chassis that came in the cab to be recapped (before I was doing this for myself). Swapped the original monitor and re-capped chassis back in, still wasn't satisfied. Eventually realized it was a DK jr. monitor assembly, and both monitor assemblies I now had for the cab had more burn than I could tolerate. Tracked down an original DK monitor assembly with minimal burn (I mean unnoticeable unless the bezel is off and the monitor is in direct light). Swapped it in. Pulled the chassis and recapped it. Bought a test pattern generator, and messed with convergence until it got really good. Spent significant time color and white balancing. Now, I'm happy with it.
Capcom Big Blue - Flyback fried and did some extensive damage to the chassis. Bought and installed a replacement chassis. Sent off the original chassis, since the damage was deeper than I was troubleshooting at the time. Got it back, it was never "quite right" after getting fried and repaired. Monitor also had some minor "Insert Coin" burn, and a 3/4" scratch in the middle of it. Picked up an identical replacement (WG 25K7193) off of craigslist, with no burn. Recapped that chassis and replaced the flyback. Swapped it into the cab and discovered it had some heavy geometry issues, and the colors were still washed out after re-cap and flyback. Pulled it back out. Started from square 1 per the K7000 manual with converging, placing convergence strips, etc. Rejuved it. Put it back in. Spent significant time white and color balancing. Now it looks great!
MAME cab - originally a Wei-Yah 826HR or somesuch chassis, which was in desperate need of a re-cap. No info online about this chassis, tho. Did some measuring on the yoke, and determined that a K7000 should work on the monitor. Also, the cab had a standard 10-pin signal connector which mates up with a K7000, but was jimmy-rigged on the Wei-Yah. Recapped the first replacement K7000 that I got for Big Blue. Swapped it into the MAME cab. Spent significant time white and color balancing. Now it looks great!
Aero City - colors looked decent when I got it, but there was a curl at the top that was getting worse with time. Re-capped the chassis, had a wrong cap in the kit for one of the caps, which prevented it from powering (see thread on that subject around here somewhere). After weeks of posting across multiple forums, the culprit cap was finally identified and the original put back in. Curl is gone. Spent a little time white and color balancing, image looks pretty good, need to spend some more time dialing it in to perfection. A bit of off-convergence at the corners, the convergence strips probably just need a bit of tweaking.
Jaleco Lo Pro - original tube had a ton of burn. Swapped in the tube that came out of the Big Blue (with the light burn and scratch). Capped the original chassis. Rejuved the tube. Spent significant time white and color balancing. It looks great. Wasn't tolerable in my Big Blue, but is a massive improvement over the burned trash that came in this cab.
TL;DR version - I am extremely OCD when it comes to video image on my cabs.
I have everything in place and just need to start running a million cords. I also need to pick up a bunch of SCART cables. Nothing will be hooked up yet, but I will probably get some pics up in the next couple days. It's pretty intense in there lol
