Peoria, IL
I picked up my first machine (September 2015) - a Mr Mrs Pacman. I've been fixing and tweaking ever since.
The MPU board wound up eating itself after a couple of weeks of use - a huge amount of battery corrosion. I was able to fix it myself after scrubbing the board and replacing about 20 components. I then turned my attention to reviving a Squawk and Talk board which was missing from the machine.
The one thing that bugged me about fixing the Mr Mrs Pacman, is that I couldn't play while I was working on it. So... I picked up another early Bally SS game about 6 months later - an Elektra. A bonus is that it has the same basic electronics. Now I can work on one, while playing the other.
I’ve never liked to read the instructions on a pinball. The fun is in discovering the scoring multipliers and advanced modes with a pile of quarters. It took my son and I a while to figure out most of the Mr Ms Pacman.
I was in High School in the early 80s. I liked going to the local arcade (Fantasia in Watertown WI) and seeing/playing many of the first video games. They had a row of pinball machines in the back that I played once in a while. I wish I remembered the titles. I really like the early SS machines. I can follow the electronic schematics and I've also done some 6809 embedded processor designs years ago. Working on these machines brings back a lot of memories.
I enjoy creating electronics projects in my spare time. I designed an LED version of the Mr. Mrs Pac-Man Pac-Maze and replacement sound boards - Sounds Plus Vocalizer, Squawk & Talk, and the early Bally -32/-50 custom sound board for Star Trek and KISS. The boards are available for sale and have been very popular. Check it out here geeteoh.com
Special thanks to the whole Pinside community. Everyone has been extremely helpful and supportive of my pinball electronic designs.
