Fathom

Fathom was purchased March 4th, 2002 in good overall condition but is in need of some attention. The cabinet is okay on one side, the other side is a mess so a complete re-stenciling will be done. Playfield is in very good condition thanks to day 1 mylar. Typical wear spots near the rollover lanes. Backglass is in excellent shape though needs to be sealed as one corner has started to lift. Boards look fine with no corrosion. Mechanically/electronically the game was fully working when received. Let the fun begin!

Update 4/3/02: I have completed the mylar removal and am preparing the playfield for shipment to Bill Davis for some touching up and clearcoating.

Update 5/23/02: The playfield has finally been shipped to Bill Davis for touch-up and clearcoating. We had to recreate the lettering on decals for the area near the rollover lanes as it was pretty worn, and it took a lot longer than expected. Bill will apply the decals and clear over the top of them. See below on how the playfield was prepped for shipment.

Update 8/23/02: The playfield is back after a lot of hard work and dedication by Bill Davis. The results are absolutely amazing. Click here to go directly to the playfield section.

Update 2/11/03: After a lot of begging and pleading, Scott Farrar will be doing the cabinet restoration! Check out his webpage on the excellent work done so far on his Fathom.

Update 4/15/04: What can I say... it's been over a year since I updated this page and have made little or no progress on this project due to so many other projects going on. I did receive the re-stenciled cabinet back from Scott and it is truly amazing, he did an excellent job. All the pieces are in place, I just need to put it back together now, hopefully later this summer. Stay tuned!

Click the thumbnails below to see a full picture, and use the back arrow to return to this page.

Welcome Home:

These pictures were taken shortly after delivery.

Mylar Removal:

Tools of the trade... Naphtha, Goo Gone, spam credit card for scraping, syringe for applying Goo Gone, razor blade for trimming, and of course rags. Unfortunately my cat is diabetic, so I fortunately had tons of used- once syringes.
Squirted a little Goo Gone into the seam and let it sit for a minute or two to soften things up. The syringe was only good for one to two refills. After that the Goo Gone softened and expanded the rubber plunger to the point that it was very hard to squirt. I used about 30 syringes to do the entire playfield.
Slowly and carefully peel back the mylar, squirting more Goo Gone along the seam as necessary.
Playfield underneath is in excellent condition.

The remnants of the mylar removal carnage. As you can see, some paint stuck, mostly around the pop bumpers and the edges of the inserts. Most other places only a few small pieces the size of a pinhead came up.
After mylar is off I squirted GooGone over the area and spread it around with my finger. After letting it soak for a couple minutes, scraped away the old glue with the bogus credit card. Be careful around the inserts!
Upper area of the playfield where 95% of the touching up will be needed: Worn spots near rollover and missing paint around the pop bumpers. Mylar is still on the lower half of the playfield.
Overall shot of the playfield after mylar is completely removed, glue scraped away and removed, washed down with Naphtha, and polished with Novus #2. What a shine!

Shipping Prep:

Playfield was fitted with "skates" to allow it to be worked on a flat surface without affecting the components still attached to the underside. Existing holes in the playfield were used to attach them.
Another angle.
Boards were 1" x 4".
Underside.

Playfield and the crate shell.
Sheets of insulating styrofoam were cut to size to protect the playfield surface in the crate.
Crate with playfield in place but not yet sealed. 3 sheets of 1" thick styrofoam were used. I put tape around the edges of the styrofoam to keep the "pellets" from coming loose and getting all over the place.
Sealed crate showing bottom side of playfield. Some small wood blocks were used to lift the playfield away from the bottom brace. No styrofoam was used.

Top side of sealed crate. Shiny side out, foamy side down.
Crate in the shipping box. Again, more styrofoam was cut to size and used on all sides. I probably should have put a "cap" on both ends but the box wouldn't have been long enough. Notes: The final package weighed 60 pounds! Best price on shipping I found was FedEx ground: $27 from Phoenix to Illinois with $800 insurance. USPS quoted $34 and UPS $38. The styrofoam sheets were purchased from Home Depot at $2-3 each. They had about 4 or 5 different thicknesses. I used 1" for the most part. One used in the box at the left was 2" as there was extra room. 6 sheets total were used.

Playfield Touch-up/Clearcoat:

Prior to any work being done the playfield was in good overall condition, but there was some very noticeable wear in the upper half, particularly around the boat mermaid, rollovers, and pop bumpers. After hearing many great things about his work, I decided to give Bill Davis a try at doing some touch-up work and clearcoating of the playfield. My main objective was to simply protect it from further damage, with any repair of damaged areas being a bonus. After a lot of hard work on Bill's part, the results are in and I am truly amazed. It is very hard to tell the playfield was ever worn, not to mention the super shiny clearcoat that will protect it for a long time. I'm glad I took lots of pictures before because I wouldn't have remembered where the damaged areas were. Not only were the badly worn areas fixed, but the very minor wear spots were done as well. It's quite obvious great attention was paid to detail. For anyone needing similar work, or just a clearcoating in general, I highly recommend Bill.

I tried to line up the "after" pictures the same way I took the "before" shots. I did not use a flash on the after shots to avoid glare, plus it also made some of the colors look different. The shots without the flash have a more natural look. While the pictures look great, they don't really show the true quality which has to be seen in person to appreciate. Enjoy the pictures below and don't forget to click on them to get the full-sized version.

Before:

Before, lower section. Very little wear in this area.
Before, middle section. To be honest I never really noticed these until I saw the finished product, but very minor wear to the upper left of extra ball insert, general wear around most other inserts, and visible paint fractures in the original finish around the middle mermaid and above the 1-2-3 drop target area.
Before, upper section. Note the wear around cloud areas and pop bumpers.
Close up of the upper section. Pretty easy to spot the badly worn areas above and below the rollover lanes, in the text area below the rollover lanes, and around the top parts of the pop bumper area.

After:

After, lower section

After, middle section. All the minor wear areas have disappeared. I was especially pleased at how the paint fracturing is barely noticeable now and gives it an overall smoother look. It's like the aging process was reversed.

After, upper section. Notice how the clouds look much better after touching up by hand by Bill. This was done out of necessity to delineate the areas air-brushed but actually makes the clouds look more realistic and blends in perfectly with the areas around them.

Bill used some custom decals created by Kay and myself (from direct playfield scans) for the lettered areas that were missing as these would be near impossible to stencil in. The area around the decals is blended in to match the decal and turned out great. Note how the areas right in the rollover lane switch holes was cleaned up as well.

After - Miscellaneous

Stay tuned for cabinet restoration and all other related work.

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Tools of the trade... Naphtha, Goo Gone, spam credit card for scraping, syringe for applying Goo Gone, razor blade for trimming, and of course rags. Unfortunately my cat is diabetic, so I fortunately had tons of used- once syringes.	Squirted a little Goo Gone into the seam and let it sit for a minute or two to soften things up. The syringe was only good for one to two refills. After that the Goo Gone softened and expanded the rubber plunger to the point that it was very hard to squirt. I used about 30 syringes to do the entire playfield.	Slowly and carefully peel back the mylar, squirting more Goo Gone along the seam as necessary.	Playfield underneath is in excellent condition.
The remnants of the mylar removal carnage. As you can see, some paint stuck, mostly around the pop bumpers and the edges of the inserts. Most other places only a few small pieces the size of a pinhead came up.	After mylar is off I squirted GooGone over the area and spread it around with my finger. After letting it soak for a couple minutes, scraped away the old glue with the bogus credit card. Be careful around the inserts!	Upper area of the playfield where 95% of the touching up will be needed: Worn spots near rollover and missing paint around the pop bumpers. Mylar is still on the lower half of the playfield.	Overall shot of the playfield after mylar is completely removed, glue scraped away and removed, washed down with Naphtha, and polished with Novus #2. What a shine!

Playfield was fitted with "skates" to allow it to be worked on a flat surface without affecting the components still attached to the underside. Existing holes in the playfield were used to attach them.	Another angle.	Boards were 1" x 4".	Underside.
Playfield and the crate shell.	Sheets of insulating styrofoam were cut to size to protect the playfield surface in the crate.	Crate with playfield in place but not yet sealed. 3 sheets of 1" thick styrofoam were used. I put tape around the edges of the styrofoam to keep the "pellets" from coming loose and getting all over the place.	Sealed crate showing bottom side of playfield. Some small wood blocks were used to lift the playfield away from the bottom brace. No styrofoam was used.
Top side of sealed crate. Shiny side out, foamy side down.	Crate in the shipping box. Again, more styrofoam was cut to size and used on all sides. I probably should have put a "cap" on both ends but the box wouldn't have been long enough.	Notes: The final package weighed 60 pounds! Best price on shipping I found was FedEx ground: $27 from Phoenix to Illinois with $800 insurance. USPS quoted $34 and UPS $38. The styrofoam sheets were purchased from Home Depot at $2-3 each. They had about 4 or 5 different thicknesses. I used 1" for the most part. One used in the box at the left was 2" as there was extra room. 6 sheets total were used.