Beat Machine pt. 7 - New Lights

2016-07-23 17:07

The top of the beatmania IIDX cabinet has eight spotlights designed to shine forward through the underside of the game marquee. The original parts are halogen spotlight bulbs with glass in one of four colors. Their part numbers are listed below.

Spotlight Color	Part Number
USHIO Blue Halogen Spotlight	JDR 110V-50WBM/K
USHIO Yellow Halogen Spotlight	JDR 110V-50WYM/K
USHIO Green Halogen Spotlight	JDR 110V-50WGM/K
USHIO Red Halogen Spotlight	JDR 110V-50WRM/K

My machine came with all eight spotlight bases and housings but with no bulbs. It wasn’t a big deal with the reproduction PENDUAL marquee, but getting that 1st style marquee made the empty spotlights very visible. I could easily order the original parts or compatible ones, but I don’t want halogen lamps heating up my apartment. We don’t have air conditioning, just window fans, so I take every opportunity to minimize heat sources.

Packaged LED bulbs and uncut squares of stage lighting filter material

These spotlights are a standard base and voltage, so I decided to just go for dimmable LED bulbs. 5W LED bulbs would give me about the same amount of light as the original 50W halogens, but finding them in the appropriate colors was a dead end. Instead, I got plain white bulbs and colored stage lighting filters. Actual stage lights have front-mounted holders for squares of the filter material, but the IIDX housings are just open at the front.

A spotlight filter disc cut to fit in a lamp housing

One down.

To make this work without replacing the housings I cut caps of the filter material and attached them to the lamp housings. A 64mm cardboard disc served as a guide for the size of the opening, and a second 74mm guide allowed a 1cm lip for attachmeht. After cutting the 74mm circles I went around cutting slits up to the edge of the smaller guide. Then the slits would be folded in and attached on the inside of the housing with gaffer tape.

Eight spotlight housings with installed filters

All eight ready.

I double-checked a scan of the IIDX 1st Style operator manual to get the order of the colors correct. They start with blue in the middle, then green, then yellow, then red at the outer limits.

New lights installed on top of a IIDX machine

Perfect.

They work! The spotlights add a ton of character to the machine and are especially noticeable during the attract mode when they pulse in a wave from the center to the edges, beckoning you to come push the buttons :)