I bought this machine a few weeks ago from this couple who had owned the machine for 30 years, they had not played it in about 10 years. Once the switch was turned on only the back glass lit up, start switch had no effect.

I brought it home, set it up and turned it on. After looking at it and online at pinrepair I figured that manually activating the start relay should do something, which it did, everything worked. I was able to play a game flawlessly.

I set out trying to figure out why the start or replay button didn't work, I checked all the fuses, checked/cleaned some switches and relays, finally the replay switch worked after the reset i had to manually activate the AX, once i did this everything started to work except for the ball wasn't being kicked into the shooters lane, nor did it count down the balls. I looked at the players unit which would stop turning a few times per revolution, closer look revealed that some of the ramps on one of the plastic cams was not allowing it to rotate enough for the ratchet mechanism to "click" a notch. It appears that most of the ramps on this cam might be worn out. I am sure that this is likely, but is it common? Am I going in the right direction so that the AX relay can cycle back to normal state?

I also have scores that intermittently reset and or do not count, such as the thousands.

Any help or advice would be greatly appreciated.

Can I post a video instead of a picture, I think this would be better as it would show exactly what is going on.

yes, the game will not do a full reset, the score will sometimes zero, the ball never kicks into the shooter lane, and the thousand score stays on zero. The game was working 100% before when I manually set the start relay.

I cleaned the replay button, the door switch, tilt switches, relays q, dx, w, s, v, cx, ax, bx, and switches on players unit. I resoldered a wire on one of the coils for relay bx as it was holding by only 1 strand of wire, I haven't tried the machine since though.

I will try to post a video of the cam in question.

Looks like i am unable to post a link to a you tube video due to my recent sign up. I will try to describe what is happening instead. The cam normally rotates clockwise, when it reaches the suspect ramps it doesn't advance further. Manually engaging/disengaging the solenoid only causes the cam to rock back and forth (cw/ccw).

The AXR relay is this the same as the reset relay? I'll have a peek at the score reels and switches.

I looked into the players unit a little more, the machine goes through the reset as it should but the cam on the players unit does not do a full turn due to what I think are worn out cams. If I manually turn the cam to activate all the switches it does the following, resets all the players scores to zero, changes player, activates the bonus relay and activates the AXR relay.

The playfield does activate but the ball still does not kick in to the shooters lane and manually activating the ball trough switch does nothing. Could it be that this is due to the players unit? When it jams the solenoid still activates but the cam just rotates cw/ccw slightly.

If it is the cam that needs replacing, where could I find a replacement?

Here is the link to the video of the cam in question, there will be a lever missing on the top of the ratchet gear, i had removed it cause it was very stiff. In the process of removing it the shoulder bolt broke.

Solar City player unit:

Here is a pic of the arm that was removed. I am not sure if it would cause the problem of the cam rotating back and forth. The arm in question is the one with pivot bolt.20140914_105337.jpg

Yes, there is 1 fin per cam. I went to a local pinball shop to get the bolt for the pivot arm, he told me that my problem might be because of this arm not being installed. I had removed, and accidentally broke the bolt, in order to clean and relube this arm as it was quite stiff.

I reinstalled the lever, now everything moves freely. The pinball will still not reset completely. The cam now seems to rotate properly, i may have to try it out alittle longer. Should the score motor keep turning until it resets or does it turn a preset amount? Also, is the players unit supposed to rotate a full turn? What I am trying to get at is, is the reset cycle supposed to take a given time or would it keep trying to reset until this is achieved? Mine does not keep going to find a reset, the event takes a few seconds.

I had a look at the video then I checked out the AX relay, it seemed to be fine just like in the video after his adjustments.

I did more testing here is what I get, power on is ok, pressing the replay button latches the AX relay, start relay, and DX relay, score motor turns only 1/3 of a turn, which is not enough to reset the score reels(player 1 and 2) nor enough for the players unit to unlatch the AX relay. If I manually turn the score motor (motor is actually turning under it power) another 2 full turns then this is enough to reset all score reels and unlatch the AX relay, playfield is then activated and all switches register scores but the ball still doesn't kick out, nor does the switch in the ball trough advance the players unit.

If I am reading correctly, the score motor should turn until all score reels reach 0 and the players unit switch P5A closes which unlatchesvthe AX relay, correct? I have seen many threads on the score motor not stopping but I am having a hard time finding anything related to it not continuing to turn. Any ideas?

The help that I get on here is really appreciated, I realize that it may not be easy to understand my posts or to give suggestions at times. I thank you guys for your patience and understanding.

Yes if I nudge it, it turns another 1/3 of a turn, I must repeat this procedure for the 2 complete turns.

to lubricate it, can I use 3 in 1 oil?

Score motor lubricated, no difference.

I did, just for the fun of it, disabled one of the zero switches on a score reel, i had the same symptoms but when it came to reset that reel, nudging the score motor made it turn but not the player unit. Not sure if this has any significance or not but the score motor should have kept running. This tells me that maybe a switch pnbyhe score motor may be out of adjustment just not sure which one.

I finally got some time to work on it again, I cleaned and adjusted the contacts on the AX relay, cleaned the motor 1C switch, and the S contacts. After I did this, it finally reset completely.

I had some scoring issues, thousands 9 switch was closed all the time, so I readjusted it. I then tackled the issue with the game never ending, the bonuses would never add up after the last ball (bonus unit would not turn), I adjusted a switch on the bonus unit. The last issue, hopefully, is the pf lights up when the power switch is pushed, this is intermittent.