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    🏋️ Repair log: The Incredible Hulk (Gottlieb, 1979)

    1979 Gottlieb Hulk Repair log
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    🏋️ Helping a Hulk learn to smash stuff again. This game wasn't booting up right. Some weird buzzing sounds, lamps turning on, and some garbage on the displays is all we got. There was some minor corrosion on the CPU. Probably not the root cause of the issue, but certainly the first port of call to get repaired. Board was stripped of bad components, neutralised, coated and repopulated.


    The J6 connector was tricky. The pads were almost completely destroyed by the battery puke, and would never make a solid connection with the original connector. In these cases I solder a 0.156" header to what is left of the pads, and lock them down with a good amount of solder. Then simply swap the connector for a typical Molex style connector with Trifurcon pins. 


    Some more groundwork... ground mods installed. Connectors repinned. Voltages all checked out OK (a miracle!). Now we got a little further into the boot process. Displays were showing zeroes now, but the boot wasn't finishing. This seemed like a slam tilt issue, which causes the CPU to hang up during boot. Simply install a jumper on the CPU board to disable the slam tilt switches; they're too finnicky on a System 1 game anyway. Once this was done we had a successful boot up!


    Gameplay was a bit wonky though. Left flipper and pop bumpers would not respond. The high current switches on these mechs were pitted and dirty. They were all filed down and cleaned, after which point they started working again.


    One last issue before I called it a day. The feature (insert) lamps were not working. Bulbs were fine. Fuse was fine. At this point I usually have to replace the rectifier on the transformer panel, but it was fine too. Since Gottlieb was still doing lots of shit with relays at this point, the next component upstream of the rectifier is the tilt relay. The switch for the lamps was WHT-GRY wires. It is an NC switch but was not making good contact. Adjusted it a little, and the lights came back to life.


    Game is working reasonably well now. Not the most exciting game of the System 1 era, but a cool licence nonetheless. 🧟


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    🃏 Repair log: Jokerz! (Williams, 1988)

    1988 Jokerz Repair log Williams

    Repair logs are quick summaries of workshop and on-site repairs. If your machine needs a service, 📬 Contact Us to discuss how we can help!


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    🃏 It's always humbling repairing a machine the same age as yourself. And some of them are in better condition than I am! How many other devices and appliances in your home are 38 years old? Not many, I'll bet!


    Anyway. A quick call out to get a Jokerz up and running again. There was nothing happening at boot up except for an "adjustment" message on the display. However, you couldn't read all of it as only the top display was working. The full message should actually read "adjustment failure" which means that the battery backup has failed. One look at the batteries showed why... they were toast! New battery holder and new batteries installed. Thankfully they had already been relocated from the CPU board at some point in the past. A great idea as it saves the CPU board from death if the batteries leak like this.


    Now onto the display. Voltages were all good and data signals all good. Took a closer look at the display to see what was going on. The display is actually made up of two separate glass panels. If you see white particulates and dark segments throughout the panel, it's a sure fire sign that it has outgassed, just like this bottom one had. New display on order.


    Gave the game a clean, changed some rubber rings, fixed a bunch of non-working lamps, and adjusted a couple of switches. Playing very well; it's a pleasure when older machines are taken care of!


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    🤖 Repair log: Transformers Limited Edition (Stern, 2011)

    2011 Repair log Stern Transformers

    Repair logs are quick summaries of workshop and on-site repairs. If your machine needs a service, 📬 Contact Us to discuss how we can help!


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    Minor service on a Transformers (Combo LE). A very popular theme but with only 500 of these LEs made, you don't see them very much!


    Slingshot rubbers were gone so they were replaced first up. Left slingshot was still not firing. Coil was working OK in test mode but the switch wasn't registering at all, so time to look at the assembly under the playfield. A broken diode on the switch was the cause.


    Next: ball hang-ups in Megatron. This is a common problem that was partially solved by code updates. Sometimes, a ball shot into the trough under Megatron won't be recognised. This trough is an odd design with only one entry and exit point, yet it must also be able to stack multiple balls for multiball. The fix here was to increase the pitch of the game a little so gravity helps the balls fall into line a little better. You can also put washers under the assembly to give it some more angle. In most cases the software should compensate by firing the trough coil weakly to "dislodge" any stuck balls. An odd mechanism design!


    The captive ball has a toy Bumblebee car in it instead of the captive ball. However the car was getting stuck halfway up the lane and would not roll down nicely. The main cause of this appeared to be the design of the car. The base has a Bumblebee design embossed into it, which creates ridges that bind on the switch actuator in this lane. Some tape over the base of the car helped smooth it out somewhat, but replacing it with a different car would be the best approach. Unfortunately I don't carry extra Bumblebees in my toolbox!


    Balls were occasionally getting stuck on the top of the left ramp. This is a poor ramp design with a huge lip on the metal ramp that doesn't quite fit into the "slot" on the plastics it joins with. I couldn't create any more space here so some Mylar over the lip was the best solution.


    Of course this is only the first Transformers machine made by Stern. They've just released another one (More than Meets the Eye). Hopefully it will be a while until I have to feature one of those on this blog!


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    🚚 Pinball delivery: Getaway (Williams, 1992)

    Pinball deliveries are made after a purchase or for a hire. If you're interested in pinball transportation or hire, 📬 Contact Us!

    

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    🚚 Getaway is out at a conference hire for the weekend! Adding to the retro look of an impressive conference stand. Amusement games are the best way to attract attention to your stand in a crowded room full of lame freebies and bad coffee. If you give attendees something interesting to do that breaks the boredom of the conference, they'll spend longer at your stand and maybe you'll make a sale. Simple!


    So next time you organise an expo stand for your company, you will have two choices.

    1. Hire a pinball or arcade machine and make your stand the coolest in the exhibition hall! 😎
    2. Go with the classic "two dickheads and a trestle table" approach and give away free pens. Yawn! 🥱


    Choose wisely!


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    🎣 Repair log: Fish Tales (Williams, 1992)

    1992 Fish Tales Repair log Williams

    Repair logs are quick summaries of workshop and on-site repairs. If your machine needs a service, 📬 Contact Us to discuss how we can help!

    

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    🎣 Who doesn't love Fish Tales? It's one of my favourite games to play, and one of my favourite to work on as well! This one started off as a service call to install new rubber rings, but turned into a bigger service to fix much more than that.


    First, a playfield teardown to get to all of the old rubbers and give everything a good clean. Plenty of broken lamps to replace while we're at it, too. This took a fair while due to the disassembly, but once it was back together it was looking much better!


    A cursory check of the backbox as the game was not retaining memory. The batteries expired in 2015, so that's no surprise! The original battery holder was still on the CPU board with a bit of corrosion on the lower terminals. Thankfully, no damage to the board itself, so a new lithium battery holder was installed.


    It was impossible to drop the volume down, or do much within the test menus, as one of the diagnostic switches wasn't working. No problem with the connectors or CPU board; the switch itself had died. Replaced it.


    Playtesting revealed a few more issues. The flap at the top of the playfield was taped in the up position. That's a weird mod! This gate is controlled by a coil which opens the gate on ball launch, and also when shooting the right orbit when long cast is lit. Otherwise it is meant to block balls so you can enter the pop bumpers from a right orbit shot. It appeared to be propped open because balls were not making it around the orbit on launch. But this was nothing to do with the gate. The balls were bouncing off the ball guide at the very top edge of the playfield, losing momentum, and falling into the LIE lanes. This was caused by the metal ball guide at the top right of the playfield. It needed bending to guide the ball properly towards the orbit lane. A very fiddly adjustment which needed multiple bends to get right.


    Next: the drop target was not working correctly. It has a secondary coil which pushes the target down to open the shot to the Caster's Club. This coil wasn't working. Taking a look at the assembly, I noticed the armature which pushes on the drop target to drop it was totally missing. Found it lying in the bottom of the cab. It needed a new extension spring and brass armature. Both were installed and the assembly was working as intended again.


    Lucky last. Balls landing in the eject hole at the top of the playfield were not coming back out. I could hear the coil trying to activate, but there was no movement at all in the assembly. I noticed the nylon link was broken. This is surely it! Nope, even with a new link it wouldn't move. I took it apart and realised the plunger was way too long; long enough that it was hitting the coil stop when at rest. Absolutely no space for movement of the plunger, and therefore no action from the mechanism. Replaced it with the correct size plunger and it came back to life.


    Back to catching fish and telling tales! 🤥