So let's say you have an EM with 5 or 6 flashers on the backglass that all come on at the same time at Game Over, and you've put in identical flashing LEDs. Since they are turning on at the same time, how long will it take for the flashing to eventually look random? I've stuck with 455s so far since right off the bat they are random, like the spinning disc on my Black Hole.

Of course mixing fast and slow LEDs would help, but still won't be the same as lamps. Are their different brands of LED flashers that might blink at a slightly faster or slower rate than another brand? Would adding different resistors to the sockets (like when you put a high value one on to the eliminate flickering on an early SS Bally/Stern) make the flashing slightly faster/slower or is the timing still going to be the same?

Two minutes, yikes, didn't think it would be that long. I could see putting an LED flasher behind a 'game over' light or just to make a few select inserts blink on my games, but forget about the BH spinning disc.

So yeah, I don't think anybody would notice a single LED on a backglass is not blinking randomly, but a bunch of them turning on at the same time would definitely stick out and not just for a few seconds.

I'm going to order a few of the fast flasher LEDs for my Stern Lightning to try them out, but for the playfield. The extra ball arrows and special arrows rotate around at each of the three drop target banks when the slings are hit and you need to keep track of them especially during the heat of battle. Plus there are a lot of other red arrows elsewhere and the special arrows just blend in with them. Making them flash will make them stand out. Seems like a cool application, as if it was implemented in the software. 455s would look hokey since they have to warm up and the flashing is too random.

I used some ex-brite LEDs in my '51 Gtb. Poker Face backglass behind score/point indicators with the deep purple ink. That purple is so damn dark even 44s looked pathetically dim.

I bought a handful of fast Comet blinker LEDs to play around with and they stop being totally in sync on/off after about 15-20 seconds. But even after they have drifted apart, and lacking randomness of a 455, whenever you glance at them after that they are always in one noticeable pattern or another. But yeah mixing in slow ones would help.

I noticed a couple of the 455s behind my Black Hole's disc were burned out, and I only had a handful of used ones (most of them with some blackening) so I ordered a few boxes of new ones (the Chinese type I guess). They do blink slower than the old ones. But the filaments also go on and off much more softly, not so instantly as the old ones so oddly enough they have an even more pronounced incandescent quality. They must have a thicker filament or something. The slower speed doesn't bother me as long as I get the randomness.

I stuck a whole box of 10 of the memotronics ones in my BH backbox and timed them by videoing them for 20 seconds, yup, averaged out to 4.25 blinks in 10 seconds, slightly slower than once every 2 seconds. But that included two bulbs that blinked every 4 or 5 seconds. So you could get a slower one here or there.

However the old GE ones I still have behind the disc look to blink noticeably faster than every two seconds, and the on/off is very quick. More of a flash than a blink. And they can speed up/slow down like crazy.

I give these memtronics ones a big thumbs up though.

I don't think it's their fast speed, not the 'fast' ones anyway. A lot of the old GE 455s blinked faster than they do. Their drawback is their never-varying timing.

However I put a fast blink LED in the Game Over and Shoot Again lamps on an old SS's backglass, which otherwise are lit solid. Definitely 'works' for that kind of thing on an SS game, they look like they are being flashed by the software and grabs your attention. A 455 would blink too but the randomness would look dumb in this case.