Giant Atari Joystick Lamp

Step 15 Finishing, part two: Painting, and lamp assembly

All the pieces were painted with spray paint. The base is coated with black textured "hammered-look" spray paint. The raised ring is shiny black. The three rings and the stick are flat black. The button was coated with full coat of red, and then got a light coating of fluorescent orange.

The directional markings are craft foam painted golden orange and glued in place with spray adhesive.

I attached the three rings and the stick with hot glue, and then drove a couple of screws up through the bottom of the top of the base into the bottom of the stick to keep it sturdy (pilot holes were drilled first to keep it from splitting).

For the lamp assembly, I used an old cord along with a basic socket and a push-button switch from Home Depot. I fed the cord through a hole that had been drilled in the back of the base prior to painting, and set up the switch following the instructions that came with it. The switch was hot glued to a small wooden bracket I had glued into the base below the button hole opening. To the bottom of my red button, I attached a small block of wood with a shallow hole reamed into it so it would sit balanced and centered on top of the switch button. I used some hot glue to attach the red button to the switch through the the button hole opening.

Comments

[phreakincool]

This is an awesome project! Makes me feel very nostalgic. I'm not very good with wood-working projects, but friend is. He lives for this type of stuff. I'm going to see about making 2 of these. Very nice.