Awesome work so far, love seeing one of my favorite classic games getting the respect it deserves.
(Topic ID: 314451)
Linked Games
Black Knight
Williams, 1980
Topic Gallery
Broomfield, CO
Soak some shop towels in acetone and lay down for 3-5 minutes....
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First pass removal of the towels.....
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A little elbow grease with a couple of clean towels, and we're done in about 10 minutes total. Note: the shadows in my garage make the wood look darker than it actually is.
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Time to knock out the back. Staples are removed from the label, but that thing is stuck stuck stuck....must've been adhesive, too.
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The extent of the gouge damage really becomes clear after stripping the paint off. These are deep....will likely bondo the back. Previous owner must've set up this game against a wall of nails at some point.
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Going to have to scrape off the label....a bit tedious, but it's coming up with patience.
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Melbourne
Quoted from Mathazar:Time to knock out the back. Staples are removed from the label, but that thing is stuck stuck stuck....must've been adhesive, too.
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The extent of the gouge damage really becomes clear after stripping the paint off. These are deep....will likely bondo the back. Previous owner must've set up this game against a wall of nails at some point.
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Going to have to scrape off the label....a bit tedious, but it's coming up with patience.
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Thanks for taking the time to show each of the steps. Looks easier than sanding it off
Quoted from Mathazar:The extent of the gouge damage really becomes clear after stripping the paint off. These are deep....will likely bondo the back. Previous owner must've set up this game against a wall of nails at some point.
More likely it was stored up on its back with the legs off, and then pushed around on a rough floor and caught something sharp underneath it.
Quoted from Charles_Kline:That’s probably the nicest paint I’ve ever seen stripped off of a cabinet.
My re-doing the cabinet isn't really about the paint, it's more the condition of the cabinet itself (tho the paint on the backbox is rough whereas the paint on the lower cab is ok 50/50.....looks good when you look at it going 50 miles an hour from 50 feet away).
You can't really capture the extent of the cabinet roughness in pictures. In person, the scratches, dings, and gouges just totally pop out at you. Not to mention running your hand down the cabinet and feeling 40+ years of abuse. Plus the splotches on the front and the paint fade on the backbox. Pinball Pimp all the way....no regrets.
Quoted from Mathazar:My re-doing the cabinet isn't really about the paint, it's more the condition of the cabinet itself (tho the paint on the backbox is rough whereas the paint on the lower cab is ok 50/50.....looks good when you look at it going 50 miles an hour from 50 feet away).
You can't really capture the extent of the cabinet roughness in pictures. In person, the scratches, dings, and gouges just totally pop out at you. Not to mention running your hand down the cabinet and feeling 40+ years of abuse. Plus the splotches on the front and the paint fade on the backbox. Pinball Pimp all the way....no regrets.
I’m more of a preservationists. There is something to be said about originality.
New stick on stencils never look as good as original Williams metal stencil spray did.
Busy weekend family-wise, but I did get a few minutes here and there to work on that damaged right rear corner.
From left to right:
- Corner chunk fell off removing the leg and carrying the cabinet upstairs to the garage. Surprise!
- Paint stripped off. The area to the left of the missing chunk is indented, so I'm going to epoxy that up too.
- Kwick-Wood left to set overnight. Instructions say sandable in an hour, but I usually like to wait overnight.
- Sanded down smooth and feathered into the wood nicely. Close your eyes and rub your finger along the repair, and you can't tell it's there.
Should not be visibly noticeable after a coat or two of Kilz primer, and the texture will look nice and consistent after the first layer of base coat black is applied. Most of that damage is unseen behind the leg but I still wanted to fix it.
Progression (resized).jpgKnocked out the damaged lower cab back this afternoon.
Before stripping the paint - yikes!
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After stripping the paint - gouges are 1/4" deep in most places:
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I applied a thin strip of Bondo to the whole back, filling in the big gouges, smaller scratches, and lots of holes whose alignment suggest several things were stapled to the back over the years. Applying the Bondo took about 30-40 minutes, including mixing time.
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After a cure time of about 30 minutes, Bondo reduced with 80 grit sanding followed by 180 grit shaping. The back is perfectly smooth all over now and no hills/valleys/waves! You won't be able to tell there was repair work once the first, maybe second, coat of Kilz primer is laid down. Whole procedure took less than 90 minutes.
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I should be ready to start painting tomorrow or Sunday.
Got the primer coat down yesterday, and knocked it down with 220 today for a nice smooth finish. Hit it with compressed air inside and out, vacuumed out the interior, a quick wipe down with naphtha, and I was all set to put down the black base color when the rain clouds rolled in. 
I'll have to pick this up during the week. Meanwhile, I have some smaller metal bits in the tumblers, some larger metal bits out to be powder coated, and I've got to rewire the trough PCBs on my STTNG and get rid of a previous owner's hack job that I should have fixed when I got the machine a couple years ago.
IMG_1807 (resized).jpgIMG_1808 (resized).jpgIMG_1809 (resized).jpgIMG_1810 (resized).jpgIMG_1811 (resized).jpgIMG_1812 (resized).jpgQuoted from Mathazar:Got the primer coat down yesterday, and knocked it down with 220 today for a nice smooth finish. Hit it with compressed air inside and out, vacuumed out the interior, a quick wipe down with naphtha, and I was all set to put down the black base color when the rain clouds rolled in.
I'll have to pick this up during the week. Meanwhile, I have some smaller metal bits in the tumblers, some larger metal bits out to be powder coated, and I've got to rewire the trough PCBs on my STTNG and get rid of a previous owner's hack job that I should have fixed when I got the machine a couple years ago.[quoted image][quoted image][quoted image][quoted image][quoted image][quoted image]
Coming along nicely mate
1 week later
1 month later
Well....life gets in the way of pinball, doesn't it? I've had a hellava 40 days since my last update:
- Picked up two new engineering teams at my job resulting in a bunch more hours to get people acclimated and projects organized.
- My mother-in-law entered hospice and a couple weeks later passed away - spent several days in VA with family.
- I got knocked down for a couple of weeks with Covid. Only 3 really bad days, and the rest of the time I was just too exhausted and too apathetic to do anything.
On top of all that....I had one side of the cabinet stenciled already and during my pinball "downtown" over the last month a rack of shelves collapsed in the garage with some contents hitting the cabinet and causing some damage to the stencil paint, base paint, and wood. Instead of starting over on that side, I chose to strip only the damaged area, repair that wood, repaint that section, and make my own stencil to complete the artwork (fortunately, it was just a portion of a yellow stripe, not very graphically intricate).
I'm not very happy with the cabinet result. There are a few places where some edges aren't sharp - but as always, "perfect" is the enemy of "good" so I'm going to just let it go. The "reworked" area where I fixed the damage has a slightly different shade of black despite using the same primer and paint. In a not-so-bright room (like my game room) it will go unnoticed, but if you shine a flashlight on it from a certain angle you can see it. Again....I'm going to let that go.....it's time to move on.
Got a couple of minor touch up areas to do (a little yellow overspray on black due to a rip in my wrap mask) and then the cabinet goes downstairs into the rec room for the next phase. Before moving on to the backbox (which needs all the HW removed, paint stripped, and some wood repair), I need to freshen up the tilt board and transformer board and get the bottom cabinet reassembled.
IMG_1955 (resized).jpgIMG_1959 (resized).jpgIMG_1960 (resized).jpgIMG_1961 (resized).jpgIMG_1962 (resized).jpgIMG_1964 (resized).jpgIMG_1968 (resized).jpgIMG_1969 (resized).jpgQuoted from Mathazar:Well....life gets in the way of pinball, doesn't it? I've had a hellava 40 days since my last update:
- Picked up two new engineering teams at my job resulting in a bunch more hours to get people acclimated and projects organized.
- My mother-in-law entered hospice and a couple weeks later passed away - spent several days in VA with family.
- I got knocked down for a couple of weeks with Covid. Only 3 really bad days, and the rest of the time I was just too exhausted and too apathetic to do anything.
On top of all that....I had one side of the cabinet stenciled already and during my pinball "downtown" over the last month a rack of shelves collapsed in the garage with some contents hitting the cabinet and causing some damage to the stencil paint, base paint, and wood. Instead of starting over on that side, I chose to strip only the damaged area, repair that wood, repaint that section, and make my own stencil to complete the artwork (fortunately, it was just a portion of a yellow stripe, not very graphically intricate).
I'm not very happy with the cabinet result. There are a few places where some edges aren't sharp - but as always, "perfect" is the enemy of "good" so I'm going to just let it go. The "reworked" area where I fixed the damage has a slightly different shade of black despite using the same primer and paint. In a not-so-bright room (like my game room) it will go unnoticed, but if you shine a flashlight on it from a certain angle you can see it. Again....I'm going to let that go.....it's time to move on.
Got a couple of minor touch up areas to do (a little yellow overspray on black due to a rip in my wrap mask) and then the cabinet goes downstairs into the rec room for the next phase. Before moving on to the backbox (which needs all the HW removed, paint stripped, and some wood repair), I need to freshen up the tilt board and transformer board and get the bottom cabinet reassembled.[quoted image][quoted image][quoted image][quoted image][quoted image][quoted image][quoted image][quoted image]
Sorry for the loss - condolences to you and your family. You've definitely had a rough time of late.
I totally understand wanting something to be perfect and can often get stuck because I don't want to accept good, but it sounds like you've got over that one and you've done a great job in repairing the artwork. Hope you've kicked any post-covid symptoms, I had a lingering cough for several weeks after but have heard of others who really struggle with brain fog. Anyway look forward to seeing the resto progress.
All the best mate
Even under the harsh(er) 100% lights of my basement rec room, it doesn't look too bad. I think I'm getting happier. We normally set the brightness of the rec room to about 35%-50% for most activities (0% during movie time).
IMG_1974 (resized).jpgIMG_1975 (resized).jpgIMG_1976 (resized).jpgIMG_1977 (resized).jpgIMG_1978 (resized).jpgIMG_1979 (resized).jpgTime for the tilt board. Going to run some of the metal bits thru the tumblers tho they don't look too bad as-is. I just noticed the cap on the bell switch has a leg broken - will need to replace that, tho I never had a problem with the bell before. The wire harness is going thru the dishwasher now and I'll be sanding and repainting the board later today. Tilt board build date: March 4, 1981!
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Quoted from Mathazar:Time for the tilt board. Going to run some of the metal bits thru the tumblers tho they don't look too bad as-is. I just noticed the cap on the bell switch has a leg broken - will need to replace that, tho I never had a problem with the bell before. The wire harness is going thru the dishwasher now and I'll be sanding and repainting the board later today. Tilt board build date: March 4, 1981!
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Interesting that Black Knight which was released in Nov 1980 has a bell, while Firepower (Feb 1980) has a knocker. I’m not overly familiar when features (like the std knocker) became common place, but would have thought having no bell would have minimised parts costs … maybe some of the major distributors or operators didn’t like the knocker??
Black knight has a two or more player mode that causes the bell to ring. A knocker may not have drawn enough attention to the extra time feature.
The bell also rings when you get an extra ball or multi balls.
First time I got the bell to ring while playing it on location, I didn’t know it was there and it scared the heck out of me. Even now I jump when the bell rings!
Quoted from Manny65:Interesting that Black Knight which was released in Nov 1980 has a bell, while Firepower (Feb 1980) has a knocker. I’m not overly familiar when features (like the std knocker) became common place, but would have thought having no bell would have minimised parts costs … maybe some of the major distributors or operators didn’t like the knocker??
Space Shuttle that was released in 1984 also has a bell. It all depends on what the designer wanted.
Finished refreshing the tilt board today. The metal bits turned out nice - overnight in the tumblers, a little Flitz and polishing by hand, and things look pretty good. Wire loom no longer leaves dirt and grime on my hands after a trip thru the dishwasher. I was going to put it in the cabinet tonight, but I just realized I don't have enough new grounding braid length to complete this job and that needs to be done before the tilt and transformer boards go in. The red should look nice against the black interior.
IMG_1994 (resized).jpgIMG_1995 (resized).jpgQuoted from Mathazar:Finished refreshing the tilt board today. The metal bits turned out nice - overnight in the tumblers, a little Flitz and polishing by hand, and things look pretty good. Wire loom no longer leaves dirt and grime on my hands after a trip thru the dishwasher. I was going to put it in the cabinet tonight, but I just realized I don't have enough new grounding braid length to complete this job and that needs to be done before the tilt and transformer boards go in. The red should look nice against the black interior.[quoted image][quoted image]
Yep that's a great vibrant red - what brand and colour did you use as I'm wanting to do something similar on my Firepower?
Quoted from Manny65:Yep that's a great vibrant red - what brand and colour did you use as I'm wanting to do something similar on my Firepower?
I use Rustoleum 2x Ultra Cover rattle cans (oil based). For Black Knight, I did Gloss Apple Red, Gloss Sun Yellow, and Gloss Black.
It's coming along real nice man - I just built my rotisserie last night and will plan to pull my playfield to begin stripping/prepping for hardtop.
You've been a good inspiration for me to get off my duff and get moving.
Refresh of transformer board done. Some new paint for the board and cage, wire harnesses cleaned of 40 year-old dirt and grime, new ground braid, and a new (much safer) AC cord.
Not sure what I'm going to do with the cover that was over the noise filter. It's made of paper, but really heavy paper (way heavier than the 96lb card stock I have on hand). I could try to clean the original up a bit, but it likely would get soft if it got wet. My buddy has a 3D printer....maybe I'll try design a plastic one in the shape of the original paper. Or maybe I'll just leave it off.
Next up is re-populating the lower cabinet, but I likely won't get started on that until the weekend.
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It's Fish Paper. I have some if you need. Let me know the size and i'll cut you one.
Sadly no more Sysy7 machines here.
Transformation of the lower cabinet rear. All of those scratches and 1/4" deep gouges are gone. One of the nicer fixes on the restore and, ironically, one that no one will see since it'll be backed up to the wall when it goes back in the lineup, lol. Still, I'm proud of it.
New ground braid and refreshed Tilt and Transformer boards going inside the cabinet tonight.
IMG_1308 (resized).JPGIMG_2040 (resized).jpgGood progress on cabinet assembly this evening. Got most of the new ground braid in, all but the front coin door area. The rust-covered lockbar receiver is still soaking in Evapo-rust (and looking better) and that needs to go in before putting in new ground braid in that area.
Tilt board, transformer board, and side rails are installed as are the kickstand, grills and a new speaker. I'm enjoying seeing this come together like I had it pictured in my head.
Will hopefully finish up the lockbar receiver and get this lower cab done over the next week. After that, it's on to the backbox (which needs a lot of attention) and coin door.
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Finally finished the lockbar receiver and got it installed, along with finishing the new ground braid. Pretty pleased with the results, except the power switch cover I had 3D printed red looks more like orange when sitting next to the other red parts. Will work on that later.
The white game start button (original) doesn't look very white anymore, even after bleaching. Next Marco's order I'll pick up a new one.
The coin door trim and bolt heads really polished up nicely, but after putting them on I don't think I'm going to like the silver amongst the "blacked out" Black Knight theme I'm going for. I'm likely going to powder coat them, and the doorskin, black as well to go along with the side rails, legs, etc.
Tear down of the backbox starts this afternoon.
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Tear down of the backbox has begun. Looking forward to getting scratches out and fixing the wood that's chipping in places. I'm especially looking forward to fixing the 6 or 7 areas on the back where someone torqued down screws that were too long and breached the wood surface! New stencil job and a new lock will cap off the refresh as well as shining up the exposed bolt heads on the cab exterior.
I was going to replace the grounding shields with new, but these are in pretty decent shape and should clean up nicely so I think I'll keep them in and save a ton of work in that area.
I already fixed one of the more annoying things that this backbox has been doing since I bought the game a couple years ago....the backglass rattles when you nudge. 5 second fix - too much of a gap between the back of the backglass and the block of wood with foam on it in the upper left corner of the backbox door, so I added a felt footie on top. Bingo - backglass is nice and secure, no more rattle. When putting the backbox back together after repainting, I'll do something a little more elegant looking (i.e. replace the flattened OEM foam with something thicker).
And something I hadn't noticed in 2 years of ownership - someone did a structural repair job to the upper right side of the backbox. Not too bad, but it'll feel nice and smooth and the paint will look nice and even after stripping down to bare wood and filling in areas with glazing putty.
I won't be doing anything with the PCBs - I cleaned them up and refreshed them all with new caps about 18 months ago (that in itself cleared up a bunch of speech issues the game had). I converted the MPU from battery to NVRAM and re-pinned hundreds of connectors at that time as well for the ones that looked shabby, but I didn't do them all and I didn't switch them to Molex like I usually do. Game has been rock solid since that board refresh and selective re-pinning, so I'm going to leave it as-is. Hopefully I won't regret it, but if gremlins act up when I put this back together or later on down the road, so be it. I've got no more room for additional pins or projects so I'll just take it apart again at that time and covert everything to Molex, lol (supply chain permitting...some size connectors are getting hard to find!).
I was thinking of converting the displays to LED but they work perfectly and look great (when they're on). When they're off there's some obvious burn-in, but it's not noticeable when the game is on. It's an expensive deal to swap them out to LEDs, tho I do like them (I did that for my Mata Hari). I think I'll leave these originals in and if/when they start to "go", I'll invest in the LED swap at that time.
Metal bits going thru the ultrasonic cleaner and tumblers now. Need to mask off ground shielding and get the backbox ready for paint stripping.....maybe later this week.
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Chemically stripping lead-filled 40+ year paint is the way to go!
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Can't wait to fix this previous repair job and missing chunk. Previous repair job has some nail heads exposed....I'll tap those in and cover with wood epoxy for a cleaner, smoother look through the new paint job. Will also likely put some wood epoxy around the edges of the repair wood with original and feather in better.
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Haven't quite decided how to address this 1/4" deep gouge up the left side of the backbox and across the middle from front to back. It's very similar to all of those deep gouges I repaired on the back of the lower cab. Wood epoxy is the easiest to work with, but bondo (while messy) will give greater coverage and sand down a bit easier. I'll likely go that way, but we'll see how everything looks after the first sanding job (which is made a ton easier with the vast majority of paint now already removed).
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Quoted from Mathazar:I already fixed one of the more annoying things that this backbox has been doing since I bought the game a couple years ago....the backglass rattles when you nudge. 5 second fix - too much of a gap between the back of the backglass and the block of wood with foam on it in the upper left corner of the backbox door, so I added a felt footie on top. Bingo - backglass is nice and secure, no more rattle. When putting the backbox back together after repainting, I'll do something a little more elegant looking (i.e. replace the flattened OEM foam with something thicker).
That block is for shipping and should be removed.
The backglass shouldn't rattle if your lock mech is correctly locking.
Quoted from slochar:The backglass shouldn't rattle if your lock mech is correctly locking.
Interesting. That's the first thing I thought of, but discounted it because the lock mech, when locked, does hold the backglass in place to the point where you cannot lift it out. I assumed since you cannot lift the backglass out when locked that the lock mech was working ok. This is my first System 7 tear-down/restore and I've never seen one properly working before with which to compare.
I have some pictures of the lock mech before disassembly, but unfortunately I don't have any pics in the locked position, just the unlocked position. Can you tell if anything is incorrect or missing from these photos of the unlocked position?
Another potential variable - The backglass is a Mayfair repro, not OEM. But as I understood it, the Mayfair repro has a pretty good rep for fit and thickness along with color reproduction and mirroring on real glass.
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Got to sanding, wood epoxy, and bondo on the backbox today. So far, I'm pleased.
This 1/4" deep vertical gouge up the left side of the cabinet (along with the thin horizontal scratch) fixed up nicely. Here's what it looked like after getting the paint off:
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Bondo applied.....
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Bondo sanded off the surface. Really nice and smooth now. After the basecoat of black goes on, you'd never know those issues were there.
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The right side of the backbox had a previous repair (crushed corner probably from a drop) that was sturdy but looked fugly. And then by the lock hole, there was a chunk of wood missing:
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Sanded around the edges to get things level before putting on some bondo:
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Bondo applied.....
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Bondo sanded off. Surface is nice and smooth and the new paint will look nice and consistent over the corner repair job (where it didn't before).
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A few more little dings to take care of, then primer coat (perhaps later this week).
I know not very many people care much about the looks of the back, but I'm one of those people who does.
So if you recall from a previous post, some nimrod a/k/a Previous Owner used screws for the backbox wire clamps that were too long and several broke through the surface of the rear. Since I have everything apart already, might as well fix them.
Using a small ice pick, I pull apart the breached, broken fibers of the MDF to eliminate the "bulge" and expose a cavity for where the fibers previously resided:
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Kwick Wood Epoxy to the rescue....
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Sanded with 80 grit to shape the epoxy, then 220 to feather into the rest of the backbox surface. Smooth as silk now and ready for primer later this week:
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4 weeks later
Life gets in the way again! Seem to be finding less and less time to work on this project, but it's inching along.
Got the backbox primered and it wasn't until I saw it in white that I realized I missed a spot (lower left corner) when repairing the "bulges" created by a previous owner who used wire clamp screws that were too long.
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Going to drive me nuts, so fix it now while it's apart. Picked out the bulge and cleaned up the cavity:
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Got the backbox base black down and looking good. Then....something that hasn't happened to me before in my 6 previous restorations. After getting the black down, it was more than 2 weeks before I got to the stenciling....plenty of time to cure, right?
Left stencil down....
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Yellow applied, pulled up the stencil, and a bunch of black paint came up with it! Never had that happen to me before. I used the same black paint with the lower cabinet, and those stencils came up perfect:
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Gotta fix it....masked off some areas I don't want black on....
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Re-applied black.....
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Not perfect, but acceptable....
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Put down the red....thankfully, no further issues with any black paint coming up with stencil removal:
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I had a wild idea, inspired by the "Meteor" restore I did last year. Meteor has the "Meteor" text/logo on the back of the backbox, and even tho no one really sees it since the pin is usually up against the wall, I thought it looked cool. So I traced the "Black Knight" text/logo from the coin door and made my own vinyl adhesive masking.
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I figured if it turned out like crap, I'd just repaint it black and move on. Turned out good I think, so I'm going to keep it!
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Overall, I'm pleased with how the backbox turned out....here are some final shots after a few touchups:
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Next up: create reproduction stickers/labels for the inside of the backbox.
Quoted from Mathazar:I had a wild idea, inspired by the "Meteor" restore I did last year. Meteor has the "Meteor" text/logo on the back of the backbox, and even tho no one really sees it since the pin is usually up against the wall, I thought it looked cool. So I traced the "Black Knight" text/logo from the coin door and made my own vinyl adhesive masking.
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I figured if it turned out like crap, I'd just repaint it black and move on. Turned out good I think, so I'm going to keep it!
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Overall, I'm pleased with how the backbox turned out....here are some final shots after a few touchups:
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Next up: create reproduction stickers/labels for the inside of the backbox.
That looks awesome - love the custom job on the back. Did you finish it off with a clear coat? And was that just a single coat?
Quoted from Manny65:That looks awesome - love the custom job on the back. Did you finish it off with a clear coat? And was that just a single coat?
Two coats of Rustoleum oil based Gloss Black applied with a foam roller. Then rattle can Rustoleum 2x Ultra Cover Yellow and Red for the stencils.
Here's a Before and After for the backbox right side repairs. There was that somewhat ugly patch job in the upper left corner, the missing wood by the keylock area, and the scuffed and faded original paint. Pinball Pimp stencils aren't perfect in the alignment of every detail, but damn I'm pleased with the results. And I just noticed I've got a couple of little stencil paint blotches there I'll be touching up...no biggie.
Backbox Right Side Before and After (resized).jpgMade some backbox labels tonight. Three of the originals got destroyed trying to remove them (they were tattered, torn and stained anyway) and the one that survived yellowed to the point that it would look weird next to the other white ones, so I redid them all.
I did them up in Word of all things (Photoshop for the fuse holders and connectors) and printed them on glossy vinyl paper with adhesive backing. Will hopefully start re-assembling the backbox later this week. Oops...need to trim the top of the new "important" ground braid label.
IMG_2115 (resized).JPGIMG_2116 (resized).JPGIMG_2129 (resized).JPGIMG_2333 (resized).jpgSpent a couple hours with Black Knight today. I know this is overkill, but sometimes it's the simple things....
New feet for the underside of the backbox. There were three left on mine during tear down and they were all torn up and dingy and I have a bag of 100 of these in my parts bin so why not. No one will ever see it but I know they're there.
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For the exposed bolt heads that hold on the backbox door bracket, why leave them silver and mess up the art and color continuity when you can paint them, lol? Black for the top....
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Big milestone this evening - the backbox is installed on the cabinet!
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Next up - I need to tear down and clean the coin door. Likely will start that work next weekend.
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