Try this,go into game setting number 82 set to no.
Factory is yes.
This worked for me after having the same issues.

I agree, if you haven't tried this, give it a shot Corpse.

That said, it sounds like my lock works better than yours, but I still went ahead and reduced the number of hits required on my MET to 5-6-7

Hmm. Mine works to my liking. Doesn't always lock right after qualifying but is definitely not an issue. 100 percent registers every hit and no phantom hammers. I haven't adjusted 82. I have mine set to 5,5,7 and find it right on the cusp of being too easy to get to. For that matter I haven't lowered the snake either. Play it as it lies, each to their own. It is AC DC that my patience is running thin with and just don't find the constant drains fun to play.

Alan

For a non-owner, out of curiosity, what is setting 82?

Yea I went to 5-6-7 myself. Its a shame as is the one negative on this game, I still prefer it over no hammer
I think I may have tried 82 before, but dont recall which setting that is.

PinballCorpse, we are playing a Met this weekend who's owner claims it works perfect..will be curious to see I have my doubts !

Anyone with a Metallica where every shot to the cube comes gently back at the magnet has a very boring game. The fun of the captive ball shot is the ricochets and shots from ball to sparky or ball to snake. If someone "fixes" their game so that somehow every one of those shots gently roll over the magnet, that game will be ruined and a total dud to play. The coffin mb scoring wise really is insignificant compared with crank it up and seek and destroy - the other reasons for shooting that shot. I say lower the lock hit count so the game feels close to 25 hits to start the mb and have fun with the game.

This This This...Only This!!!!!!!! What PinGod Say!

I have new board and set 82 settings to NO and i have no issue,i am on 5 10 10 and i
almost get 2 Coffin multiballs /game.

Here is what I think

First two to avoid phantom hammers

82 if a switch is hit after hammer sequence starts abort
83 I believe this correlates to 82 but you can make it require 2 before aborting etc

84 I though this may activate magnet when you hit coffin for up to 5 seconds but testing seems to debunk this or it's not implemented

I just do Electric Chair until I can start coffin. Sometimes it's like after or during the third time. I can't remember if Coffin can start during Electric Chair.

Looks like 82 is 80 on mine? I just set to "no"

Geez. Update your software. Metallica got awesome on the last updates.

that hammer really disturbed me about which to buy (pro/pre)
i read so much things here & there...
and than i took the pro and i'm happy (even in my head) with it

as said, when the hammer stuff works perfect, its a very nice toy
when its buggy, and you have bought the pin NIB for your home, everybody can understand that its a real mess...

good luck for finding/getting a solution

Hammer is awesome...yeh it takes a bit of practice but once you learn your shots you should not need to change your settings. Lock a ball in coffin before you start a multiball then beat the shit out of it during multiball, then when you come out of MB you should be ready to lock your next ball. Coffin-snake, coffin-ramp and coffin-sparky(hardest) are some of the best and safest shots in the game.

To follow up on Markmon, if you want consistent play a video game. Pinball's appeal, at least to me is randomness. Everyone has their own threshold for this and it is why the opinions vary on the hammers functionality. The hammer is no different than the ball bounce out of a TZ lock, a bounce out of LoTR saucer, or a non lock for black suit MB. Shit happens and it's not a given. My game is not chronic missed lock but it does happen. I have had games where it has locked on 5 hits and other that took 7 or 8. If it is the latter, I consciously try to hit the right side of the cube and the snake jaw where it does deaden the blow and get the slow roller back. Does it work 100 percent, no but it usually does.

The hammer toy is the full experience of the game and I hate playing a pro without it, but that is me. To me there is NO issue with how the hammer plays and it should not make you settle for the pro if you want a prem/ LE. Some people have to have the M3 and others are fine with the base model. Options.

Ok, my game isn't like that. Can get at least one coffin MB in most games. If it bothers you that much, guess I was wrong. The pro would probably be the better choice. I can honestly say I'm not focused on this locks efficiency vs playing an exceptional game and enjoying it for what it is.

Sux it doesn't work for you as IMO your missing out.

Cheers

Jeff, seems like the poor ball mechanism has finally got you really frustrated!

I too wonder about those who say theirs locks better, I would like to see it in action !

In the meantime I would encourage a change in the code to allow qualifying locks after the first one is already qualified then only the last lock would be an issue.

I hope it can be made more reliable but not sure why it wouldn't have been done already if it could seems that would have been priority 1.

I have done nothing special with hammer magnet, if you get ball to go directly over magnet or slightly off to the side if ball is moving a little slower, my magnet grabs it every time. In saying that I to have shots that are frustratingly close to getting magnet to grab, but they are just off where magnet can pick up and grab ball.
If your expecting ball to stick everytime you hit the block...good luck. But once you learn the speed or deflection shots needed to have ball stick I get it about 90% of the time and I'm no pinball wizard.
Easiest way is to hit the jaw of snake when up, just to the left of centre you will get a hit for the snake and ball will normally run back over magnet.
Hammer is a great feature of the game and should approach it knowing you need a bit of strategy to achieve lock. If magnet was positioned like grave magnet then I would expect it to grab everytime and would be pissed if it didn't. But expecting a magnet that sits fairly open to grab a ball that shoots over it at less than 0.1sec good luck

THIS!

I'm sick of the physical lock. Done with it. Over it. I don't want another band-aid, I want the virtual lock option. As a consumer of the most expensive model, is it too much to ask that my game plays as well as the cheapest model? Feels like I'm driving a sports car with square wheels.

Sparky magnet is fairly open, and grabs the ball 98% of the time. Sometimes even yanks it down out of the air. Open placement is not the issue; the magnet's design is.

It's triggered by an opto, not by an eddy sensor. One working has absolutely nothing to do with the other not working...unless you can figure out how to put an opto in the middle of the open part of the playfield.

Not trying to be a smart ass! But you need to understand how the game works before you start saying things don't work properly. My magnet grabs every time the ball passes over the magnet at a speed which gives the magnet sensor time to pick up. Ball can be going quite fast and still will be caught but a full speed shot will not(never) be picked up.
As stated previously in thread it's a pinball, not a video game!
When you have played over 500 games you learn the best ways to get ball to lock. I know from watching my kids and partner play they have more trouble getting ball to lock....so I put it to you is it the magnet or the player skill level that's the problem? Think about it for awhile before you ripe into me...but I'm sick of reading posts about hammer not working.
Biggest issue for me is the bloody auto kicker...have tried many adjustments but can not get it to kick ball out of shooter lane 100% of the time, very frustrating during multiball. Ball does sit correctly on tynes and is centered.

To me the magnet is a minor annoyance, but no more so than the Hulk Saucer, Gimil Hole, etc... Neither of those shots are 'direct' shots that can be laser-beam shot from a flipper time and time again. When EB is lit neither the TAV or LOTR saucer shot is at all possible for me personally. Think of the magnet plate as a saucer that can't lip out, as that's essentially how it behaves.

For me, the Metallica magnet is a 90% success on backhand or forehanding the snake jaw, and a reasonable (75% maybe?) success backhanding the cube itself on the fly. The other way I can grab locks is dead passing the Mystery kickout into the right sling, off the fuel target. It's surprisingly repeatable on my machine.

This is exactly what I'm talking about learning what shot is required to be done to get it to stick. Cheers

I guess, but that's exactly my point. Comparing them is pointless because they're vastly different in how they trigger. I don't see any other way the feature could've been implemented in THAT location. Had the "coffin" been behind the inline targets and the drop magnet somehow placed in that channel, this never would've been an issue, for anyone.

It's simply not an engineering issue. You MIGHT consider it a code issue since Stern/Lyman are apparently unwilling to have the cube trigger an extended magnet catch when hitting it when the lock is qualified, but the issue with that is if a magnet is active right next to it, the eddy sensor won't WORK... the game just has to assume the ball is there and phantom pound the playfield potentially. I consider it a location issue...as much as I love Borg, it's just too close to the flippers for an eddy sensor to catch something that's almost always going to be moving that fast. Ultimately, this is why we decided to go with a pro and not worry about the premium stuff when the chance came up to get one. =|

I'd be okay dismissing the hammer lock as one those patented Gomezesque "never gonna work right" shots, if I hadn't played a Metallica pro where virtual locks work perfectly every time. If I didn't know what it's like to play coffin multiball with some regularity, I wouldn't miss it. But I do know, so it feels like I paid more for less.

I just want virtual lock compensation when I disable the LE hammer magnet. It can't be that hard to bring the code over from the pro. Shouldn't there be virtual lock compensation regardless, for when things break on location? Hopefully it's already underway and I'm griping for nothing.

I semi agree, but you need to realize Pro and LE are simply different games. If you want to compare scores and 'easiness' across two different physical machines and product lines you're dreaming. I'd just get used to it or move back to a pro if it's that big a dealbreaker. The LE/Premium is unfortunately not obligated to be 100% identical in play.

Try dropping the hammer locks to 5-5-5 and you're back to a number of hits that might be more reasonable and comparable to the pro. Up the pro to something like 5-15-15 and now it plays like the Premium. It's such a minor and arbitrarily created issue I don't know why it's such a big deal.

That all said, I'd also like virtual locks for disabled coffin magnets - not because I want to play like the pro, but because if the coffin mech screws up and I have to wait on repairs, I'd like to keep playing all the modes.

Do you bring a straw man to every discussion?

1. Of course I realize they are different games. I have eyes, a brain, etc.
2. I'm not asking to compare scores. Am I "dreaming" to ask for a software option in the fully featured model that exists and works perfectly in the budget model?
3. It's not a dealbreaker, it just sucks. There can be middle ground between "get used it" and "buy a pro." I'm trying option three, "complain until they add virtual locks."
4. Of course it's not obligated to be 100% identical. Why would I pay more if I expected it to be identical? I just don't want the premium/LE to be worse.

Lyman has added already new lock options in the new unreleased next update. They are:

Added an adjustment for coffin lock behavior on the Premium/LE. The settings are:

1) Require Physical Lock, No Stacking Of Locks Lit (the current behavior).
2) Require Physical Lock, Stack Locks Lit (the behavior you are requesting).
3) Award Locks From The Captive Block (the behavior on the Pro).

The default setting will probably be 2), but I'm not sure yet. Of course you can change the adjustment to whatever you want. This will all be in the next release.

This is great news - setting 2 is the way to go I think. Thanks for that tidbit!

I hope Crank it up is a tiny bit easier to get to by default.

Do you think the same principal could apply to CIU items? Allow you to collect them toward lighting the next CIU mode after that item has been completed for the current CIU mode?

For example, I light the snake by getting 15 hits. Then I hit the snake 10 more times before I manage to start CIU. What if those 10 counted toward snake completion for the next CIU start?

I too am having trouble with the lock, I wouldn't mind if was a tricky shot to make the magnet grab the ball that's fun but the hammer smashing down with nothing there is bullshit. If this can be fixed so until the magnet has captured the ball the hammer will not smash down then everything would be perfect.

Good to hear that Lyman is giving options for those wh want it to play different. For me, I will leave it the way it is now. Figuring out how to play it efficiently is a feature in itself.

Alan

1. Of course I realize they are different games. I have eyes, a brain, etc.
2. I'm not asking to compare scores. Am I "dreaming" to ask for a software option in the fully featured model that exists and works perfectly in the budget model?
3. It's not a dealbreaker, it just sucks. There can be middle ground between "get used it" and "buy a pro." I'm trying option three, "complain until they add virtual locks."

I think your software request is reasonable but for reasons I explained above - not becuase the lock is tougher to shoot for, but because if the mechanism ever fails i want to play the game. Disabling the mechanism to revert to the pro (assuming that software appears - I think it will) is silly to me at the current level of functionality and I'd personally save the $2k and just go for an LED'd pro, but to each their own. I personally would only enable virtual locks from a maintenance and troubleshooting standpoint. (ie - if the damn phantom hammer mess ever comes back)

4. Of course it's not obligated to be 100% identical. Why would I pay more if I expected it to be identical? I just don't want the premium/LE to be worse.

If you ask many players, the pro is the better playing model on everything from TF, TAV, XM, MET.... doesnt mean the Prem/LE arent great in their own right, but a lot of those Premium machines listed suffer from features added to the game that arguably damage or alter the playability a bit, or a lot in many cases. I concede that one has the option to disable them in the aformentioned games, but again I just wouldn't, I'd buy the pro. I just see the Metallica hammer issue (now) extremely minor overall being that the actual lock sequence works great now, is super cool, and only adds a minor frustration of magnet detection.

In any case adding the option to disable the lock entirely would please a wide demographic though so hopefully we both get our way! I'm not 100% happy with how it works right now, but im certainly happy enough not to disable the mechanism.

Soooooo. Any insite you'd like to share about when the next update will be?

Woohoo! Best news I've heard all week.

Now I just need to order one of those newton ball cage things like the pro has. I know there's a ball with a single threaded post available, but I want the identical pro assembly, assuming the mounting holes line up.

Might even take my hammer off and try to get a pro plastic to cover the hole.

Excellent !

Adam, By the way ,i installed the new mag board and it made it worse in my opinion,, so i think i am putting it back in until this next code ..

Really are you still getting phantom hammers? The code is designed to work with the new board. I get no phantom hammers ever, but the lock is not super reliable.