Joust
Williams, 1983You're currently viewing posts by Pinsider djblouw.
Click here to go back to viewing the entire thread.
Out of pure luck I managed to find a Williams Joust. It was quite the event to come to terms on purchase, and even more work to get it out of its storage spot. It will need lots of work, but I'm excited to restore it to it's glory.
Here's the pic of it unloaded in my driveway after getting it home:
After unwrapping it, you can tell that it's been in storage for a very long time. The dust that you see is what's left AFTER I cleaned it off at the warehouse to make sure the pf was still in the game. Yeah, it's going to require a lot of cleaning.
First thing was to get into it, since there were no keys included. I had to pop the lock with a screwdriver. The coin door lock will be a different story. Once I got into the cabinet I could unscrew the two side access doors with the boards. But I couldn't reach the under access doors, so I had to pop two more locks. Are there any other games that have 6 locks on them!!
Quoted from Houkaka:Nice grab! really want to see this one shine
Quoted from Rock914:Nice find! Looking forward to seeing you restore this one, and coming to play it.
Thanks guys. After my Flash Gordon & Fathom restores, I needed to get away from Bally SS games for a bit. So Joust will fit the bill.
After getting it open, the good news was that the batteries weren't on the MPU board.
The bad news is that they had corroded so much, they fell off the board all by themselves. The MPU is toasted. Driver board is salvageable, with just minor corrosion on the interconnect pins.
So, if anyone has a spare System 7 MPU, I'd greatly appreciate it.
Quoted from j_m_:if you reached out before having using a screwdriver, I could have told you that by drilling out one of the locks under the cabinet for either of the flip down panels, you could have simply removed the other 5 locks from the inside and saved yourself a ton of grief
Yeah, I know. I was thinking of messaging you, but it was a Sunday afternoon, and I didn't want to bug you.
I could actually reach the lock mechanism from inside the cabinet, but couldn't get enough torque on it to remove the catch. But actually, those locks popped remarkably easy, and I'd have to replace them anyways, so no big loss.
So, as the story goes, the guy that ran the arcade told me that they pulled the game because it wasn't making very much money. So this machine had been in a warehouse since 1985 or 1986.
They must have been in a huge rush to get it out of the location, since they didn't even empty the quarters out of it. I think this game is starting to pay for itself--haha.
So after destroying some locks, I got the glass off, and could look around.
Lucky for me, there was a mouse nest in the game. It looked like it had been in there since around 1995. So I put on the gloves and mask, got out the shop vac and cleaned it up.
After it was cleaned up I checked out the area. The mice were nice enough to chew some of the wires. So now I'll have some more work in patching the wires back together.
Quoted from j_m_:yeah, that huge power inlet hole makes for a nice mouse hole
at least the boards (power and sound) on the P2 side still look nice and clean. transformer sled doesn't look too bad, however I would check that large electrolytic capacitor (I still have no idea why williams decided to paint the wood on their transformer sleds from that era white
Yeah, boards on P2 side look good. I've pulled the sled already. A lot of this stuff will get cleaned and re-painted. Think I should leave it white, or paint it black to match everything else?
Cap will most likely be replaced. I hate to just start replacing stuff, but I'll end up doing the caps on the power supply too.
Quoted from j_m_:be aware that williams used a really strong adhesive under those end marquees.
Yes, I removed the carriage bolts, and discovered it was glued on. The marquees are in pretty good shape, just dirty, so I'm going to leave them in place, and just clean and polish a bit.
Quoted from j_m_:did yours come with the 2 pieces of 1"x1" square stock that rest in the channels above the playfield?
Yes, one on each side, that have to be removed after the lock down bar is taken out. And the pf support was still in place, held in with one wing nut--the other was missing.
I couldn't figure out how the support would actually work, so I didn't even try it. I just unplugged everything and took it out.
Quoted from PinballJeff:I'm with Chris. Hoping that being local may give me a chance to see this beauty when you get done with it.
My goal is to have this at PATZ for 2019, so everyone can enjoy it (unless I get offered stupid money for it before then).
But, if it's finished earlier than that I'll make sure to send out an invite to the locals to come play it.
Quoted from j_m_:I love how the stenciled text on my support bar reads: "support bar. do not throw away playfield", instead of "do not throw away playfield support bar."
Mine reads "do not throw away playfield" "support bar". Obviously their stencils were not all connected.
Random metal parts (resized).jpg
My support bar isn't the prettiest, and I'd love to re-plate it, but I'd have to make stencils to get the wording back on there. So I may wait on doing that for now.
Thank for the informative guide on how to use the support bar.
"So how does the pf look?" you ask. Well, it's covered in dirt. I'm pretty sure it has never been cleaned or wiped down. Since it wasn't earning at the arcade, they probably didn't care what it looked like. And then it went into storage.
Overall, I think it looks pretty good.
No planking that I can see (or very little).
No wear spots that I could find. Mylar still in tact on slings & end of shooter lane
Minor wear around some of the inserts.
I did a quick couple passes with Novous 2, just to see how bad the dirt and ball swirls were. I'm pleasantly surprised. With a little elbow grease, it should look very presentable.
Quick wipe of the pf (resized).jpg
All the plastics look to be in tact and not broken. The drop target decals & spinner decals are worn. But those can be replaced.
Quoted from CobraMark:Ok sir looking good. Maybe I need to shoot for PATZ 2019 also so we can have 2 available to play. Assuming the playfields get built before then...
Now THAT would be an impressive showing. 2 Jousts. Anyone have a King Kong that they could bring?? haha
So, while I was waiting, I started checking on the pf.
As previously noted, it's dirty. But all the plastics are in good shape. The cross over ones are intact. They need to be cleaned, but should be okay.
PF Before (resized).JPG
I got it up on the rotisserie, and stripped everything from the top side. Lamp sockets are corroded. And a couple of the threaded screws broke off in the tee nut. But, I was most likely replacing them anyway, so it should be okay.
Quoted from j_m_:yeah, williams managed to pack just about every square inch underneath that playfield. fortunately, the topside tears down pretty quickly (it took me about 30-40 mins to completely tear down 1/2 of the playfield in preparation for the CPR repro playfield, although I'm not relishing going through the bottom side
(I remember how much of a pain it was just to get to some of the screws for the drop mechanisms to remove & replace the stickers on the drop down targets
thanks for the photos (I'm not looking forward to re-doing the ground braid, but fortunately there doesn't appear to as much as I feared
Yes, topside was quick. Underside, not so much. It's odd that Williams used the ground wire for some of the drop mech coils but power wire is in the coil (hv) harness.
The ground braid is pretty simple, when compared to classic Bally games. That's the least of my worries.
The largest issue I have is that at least one screw in each switch stack has broken off (from rust) when trying to remove. So I have to either reposition each switch, or find a way to get the broken screw out. Ugh....
Quoted from CaptainNeo:I hope you got this one cheap. looks like a sweet score. I've restored a few Joust playfields over the years, and this one looks better than most i've done. Good find.
Meh, probably not a good deal in many people's book. If/when I sell it, I'll probably break even. But I do it as a hobby, so that's okay.
Quoted from CaptainNeo:also, nice score on finding that Williams Ringer.
Hehe. Yeah, that just kinda watches over as I restore games. I actually haven't been able to get it working yet. So if anyone wants to loan some time to help me fix it, I'll put you at the top of the list for playing Joust once it's put back together!
Quoted from rufessor:Looks awesome. Joust is on my list but its going to have to be a restore candidate like you found. Your making excellent progress. Be sure to stop and enjoy one and a while!
As for the screws that broke and are now stuck. I have an extraction kit and you may find this to be a fairly good solution depending on how far down they broke. What I have is designed mostly for removing stripped screws where you have a bit of the head left. Clearly this is not the case for you but the principal should none the less apply.
My kit consists of the following two pieces you use in series. Step 1 is the take a drill bit with a very shallow taper and cut a cone into the top of the stripped metal. Step 2 is you basically take what amounts to a reverse threaded die and start screwing it into the depression using a power drill in reverse- when the die hits bottom the threads grab and bite the metal and you back the whole thing out.
The issue is going to be two fold- can you actually get anything to hold center on the broken shaft and cut a shallow depression. If you can figure that out your golden and just need to find a small die that matches.
Anyhow- not saying I have done this for a broken screw and it could be extremely difficult given diameter of screw and the fact that you may not be able to hold center. However- you could use an oversize bit (like 1/2 inch) and take the top 1/8 inch of wood off from the screw hole on the underside- that would hold center over the broken shaft and generate a nice cone to grab with the die- if the screw shaft is up that high if the break is down the hole you may be up a creek as you could not do this without damaging the Playfield.
Then its just a matter of filling the small neat 1/2 inch hole and sanding and repainting the underside. I suspect your going to be filling a few damaged spots and painting this anyway so it may be worth a try.
Granted drilling a 1/2 inch bit into the bottom sounds sketchy but with the right bit I really think this could work and its not going to effect anything at all- filling is trivial and you can fill with a compound that will hold the new screw even better than wood if you wanted to so no loss in integrity if this works.
Advice- break a few screws off in a 2x4 and test this method before you try it.
Else maybe someone else stops by with a wiz bang trick and we both learn something new.
Good luck and I hope this makes sense.
That's great advice. Thank you. I had thought about a screw extraction kit, but was concerned the diameter of the remaining screw body would be too small.
The only solution I had come up with is to get a dremel and file a slot in the top of the remaining screw body. Then, potentially I could take it out with a flat head screw driver. However, I think the remaining screw will be too weak, as this is the part that broke, to support any torque.
Quoted from vid1900:Yeah, a #6 screw is going to be really hard to extract conventionally.
I'd just use a plug extractor, then glue a wood dowel into the hole.
~$10 at Woodcraft or Rockler
[quoted image]
Thanks Vid. This will be the route I have to go, since I tried the others tonight and neither worked.
Quoted from lmcdonald111:Nice !
Would you like me to place it in our Joust relatedcmachjnes databases?
Sure, that would be fine. Send me a link and I can add as much information as needed.
So after reading some of the reviews on the plug extractors, I wasn't filled with confidence. I'm sure a large portion of the complaints about them is user error, but I still wasn't excited about it. So a little bit more research yielded a product that had stellar reviews.
Here's one of the switch stack screws that broke off. Every switch had at least on break.
The miracle product is called UNSCREW-UMS. Yes, it a corny name. But as long as it works, who cares?
So for $40, I decided to give it a try. It seemed a bit pricey, but if it worked as well as all of the reviews state, it will be worth it.
And here it is after the screw was removed.
The hole is slightly enlarged, but this can easily be filled with bamboo stick, or toothpick. Easy to do.
Here's a look at the product. It comes in multiple sizes. I had to use the smallest size for the switch screw. And see all those screws at the top of the board? Those are from one half of the pf. This product is great!
So in summary, get these screw remover bits. They are worth every penny and work great. Follow the instructions and you'll be pleased.
https://www.amazon.com/UNSCREW-UMS-Handy-Broken-Screw-Extractor/dp/B06WLM8K5T/ref=pd_rhf_gw_p_img_4
Quoted from vid1900:What's the youngest date of any of those quarters?
Oldest coin is 1965. Newest is 1984. So, it seems logical that the game was pulled in 1985.
There was $32.00 in it, plus a couple arcade tokens. That should be enough to buy one flipper rebuild kit. Haha.
So I've been slacking lately and haven't been working on this much. I'd like to blame the weather.
Last night I repainted the underside of the pf. I had previously sanded down some of the areas. Here's half of it painted:
PF underside half done (resized).jpg
And here's the finished product:
PF Underside finished (resized).jpg
I've got a couple of spots to touch up, but this is a good step in getting this back together.
Quoted from lmcdonald111:I’m really enjoying this.
Would you be willing to do a story line and send me the step by step pictures.
I’d love to feature this restoration story at Joustmaster.com
Sure, no problem. One of these days when I have some spare time at work I’ll start putting some stuff together. Maybe when it closer to being finished.
As previously mentioned, there were mice in the cabinet. They chewed some wires. So, I spent last night cutting out the chewed sections, and splicing in new wire.
This wire harness was the worst, but could have been uglier. It ended up being about 15 wires that they gnawed on. Now the wire harness is ready to go back into the cabinet.
Lamp harness was next. All the sockets were rusty & corroded, so I replaced them. I spent the better part of Sunday doing this, as there are 30 sockets, which are the 3 tab variety, with a diode across them.
The only ones I didn't replace were the large connected sets. Those got sanded and polished to match up to the new ones.
I'm sick of soldering now. Time to move on to a different part of the game.
As mentioned, I needed to get away from soldering for a while. So the coin door was my target.
I stripped everything off it, painted, then reassemble. I kept the original operator sticker(s) since I liked the history of the game.
I really liked this wico coin door. This was way easier to take apart and clean then any other bally or wms one I’ve done before. It was simple, and straightforward.
Quoted from PM_Jeremy:Awesome progress
Quoted from g94:Great job on that coindoor.
It's a pleasure to follow your thread.
Thanks guys.
I got distracted by another project. But I'll be getting back to Joust later this week.
Ah, what a great day. I got my parts back from being re-zinc plated.
It is fun for me to sort through all the pieces, and look at how well everything freshened up. Its more fun than birthdays. I think I'm going to start celebrating Plating Day from now on. Let the rebuilding begin.
Quoted from rufessor:Looking good. This is a game I would enjoy restoring!
Can you share the zinc replating service and cost to do this for your game. I have looked around a bit and was never quite sure if I wanted to follow through with this and curious to know cost and vendor you selected.
The company that I use just does it as a side project for me, since we do work with them at my regular job.
The cost is about the same as a decent night out for two people.
I've offered a few friends to have their stuff plated if need be--the problem is the shipping will cost about the same as the plating.
I see that 
Mirco has new Joust pf's and plastics for sale. While I wasn't planning on dropping another 1350 into this restore, it might be nice to have new pieces.
My current pf is in decent shape. No planking to speak of, but there is ground in dirt/ball swirls and key lining missing on some inserts. The plastics and aprons are unbroken, but still show wear in the usual spots where they contact metal.
So, what's everyone's take on this? Should I keep the originals, as most everything else in the game is original, and have a very nice survivor? Or should I go "all in" and have it look like brand new?
Both good opinions. I think going all in would be great, but it'd probably put me way over what I could hope to sell the game for--and I've done that on too many others that I own. haha.
@g94, I've seen your playfield restoring--it looks awesome. I wish I had the time to get that involved with this pf.
I'll have to think about it some more, before I make a decision.
I'll probably stick with the original pf since it is in decent shape. But I love to have everything perfect when I'm done.
In the meantime, I finished the upper cabinet (sans wiring). I've got a couple pieces left for the lower cabinet, and then I can put them together again.
Quoted from j_m_:I was initially thinking of doing the ground braid differently on my new playfield (when I get it), but now I'm thinking why reinvent the wheel, especially since I'm planning on putting in all new lamp sockets
I still would like to find a source for those black oxide #6 x 1/2" pwh (pan-washer head) screws used to secure the 6 brackets (and the ends of the playfield aprons
I had the same thought to re-route the lamp braids, but came to the same conclusion. There is enough other stuff going on with the underside, I didn't want to inadvertently create more work for myself down the road.
I couldn't find a good replacement screw, so I soaked mine in evaporust, put in the tumbler, and then repainted them. Now, they're better than new.
Quoted from j_m_:what's with the transparent red posts on the underside of the playfield?
oh, and here's a tip. install of the metal ball guides (the ones with the rubber sleeves on them) prior to attempting to install the drop bank or stand-up targets. there are at least 2 of them (per side) that are impeded by the brackets holding the 3-bank drops and the stand-up targets and few others that are a lot harder to reach if the larger assemblies are in place already
The star posts are spacers under the main display driver board. I don't have the other two on there yet, as they get in the way.
Awesome tip on the ball guide install. I usually have to find out the hard way.
If everything keeps progressing at this pace, I should be able to power the game on around Thanksgiving. Sweeeeeeet.
I fried my soldering station this weekend, which means I couldn't finish the solenoid harness. Oh well, it was time to step up to a Hakko anyways, so this helped push me over to actually buying one.
In the meantime, I have the lower cabinet completed, ready to mate up with the upper.
Quoted from j_m_:two issues with your rubber rings
the ones behind the 3-bank drops should be in a race track configuration (around those 4 posts). the other post in the back is just there (on some machines) to keep the cross over plastics from sagging
second, the one that you have tying the two posts behind the center stand-up targets should each have their own ring. this prevents undue tension on the wood screws holding them into the playfield
other than that, it looks pretty good (why is your player one ball trough painted white & red?
Thanks for the corrections. I was putting back everything the way it came off, since the manual doesn't have details for this. Here's what it looked like originally.
Oh, and the ball trough has some nice reflections occurring: white from the overhead lighting, red from the back of the restored Flash Gordon.
Quoted from djblouw:Thanks for the corrections. I was putting back everything the way it came off, since the manual doesn't have details for this. Here's what it looked like originally.
[quoted image]
Oh, and the ball trough has some nice reflections occurring: white from the overhead lighting, red from the back of the restored Flash Gordon.
And you can ignore the flippers too. They were just placed in there without being tightened.
Quoted from PM_Jeremy:Where did you get your blue kick out hole plastics? I've only seen white, red, clear, & purple.
They are re-used from the game. I was planning on replacing (most likely with red). But they cleaned up very well, and were not chipped/broken. I added a light to them as well, just to highlight the area.
Quoted from jake35:Just FYI, one of my slings locked on and blew a transistor and a diode on the coil. Turns out it was a leaf switch that needed cleaning and it works fine now, but it wasn't easy to troubleshoot (had help from a fellow pinhead at the Nashville show). The leaf switch had minor rust or whatever that is that coats the switch, and once it was wiped off it made contact and no more blown transistors.
Thanks for the tip. I did check the switches first, and cut the cap & diode on them just in case. But there was not continuity in the switch, so I moved on. At one point, the opposite kicker (P2) locked on. So this leads me to the 7402. Plus, using the test rom, I was not getting the strobe to occur, until the previous pin. Hopefully I'm on the right track...
Quoted from PM_Jeremy:Wow! It's great the side plastics light up. The whole game looks awesome!
Thank you! I swapped out the original bulbs in the side marquee for double headed flex led's. Doing this allows the Williams logo to be lit evenly (even though it doesn't look like it in the picture)
Quoted from Whysnow:amazing job!
Now I will send you mine to restore
Thank you.
Sure, I'll restore yours. Now that I've done one, another shouldn't be too bad. Just bring the Viking, or Frontier, along with it for payment 
Quoted from wrkey:Man, this post is awesome! I picked up a Joust about a month ago and working to get it going. I also created a Joust Pinball Owners Group on facebook. So if you use facebook and own a Joust, please join it! Trying to get as many owners of these fine machine in one place where we can discuss issue, find solutions, help drive development of parts specific to our machines, etc. https://www.facebook.com/groups/JoustPinballOwners
I have a question, one of the relays under the playfield that drives one set of the banks of drop targets appears to be dead. I can't find specs on it. Says is a 'auto-type' and is pretty simple... driven through a 100ohm resistor. Do you know the specs on it? I think it's either a 24v or a 12v SPST relay.
Thanks and keep up the good work with your machine!
Rusty
Great news! Another Joust will be coming back to life.
I don't use facebook, so the owner's club here on pinside is my way for information.
I don't know the specs on the relay. Try asking @_j_m since he's the guy that's been able to help me a lot with my Joust.
You're currently viewing posts by Pinsider djblouw.
Click here to go back to viewing the entire thread.
Wanna join the discussion? Please sign in to reply to this topic.
Great to see you're enjoying Pinside! Did you know Pinside is able to run without any 3rd-party banners or ads, thanks to the support from our visitors? Please consider a donation to Pinside and get anext to your username to show for it! Or better yet, subscribe to Pinside+!
This page was printed from https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/a-joust-restore-insert-catchy-title-here?tu=djblouw and we tried optimising it for printing. Some page elements may have been deliberately hidden.
Scan the QR code on the left to jump to the URL this document was printed from.
Sellersville, PA