It was very fake, I messaged them and got asked if I had cash app and to send the payment right away, when I asked for more pictures and they sent pictures of a different playfield. The profile looked very suspicious as well.

Finally decided to get my TAF finished up.

Cabinet is drilled and fitted and tested for proper fit.

Top carriage bolts inset to keep the cloud topper from cracking and breaking when its bolted down:
bac view (resized).jpgfront view (resized).jpginset bolts heads (resized).jpg

Ready for prime, paint and decals.

Im going to powder coat the armor.

The CPR "gold" playfield I bought has a terrible clear coat on it.

Ill re-clear it properly.

So a bit of paint here and there, then ASSEMBLY !!

Very well done Thing! You’re really on the ball!

Ill post again when the cabinet is painted, stenciled and decaled.

I have a set of mirror blades I would like to use.

Im thinking they would be good on this TAF resto.

They didnt fit on my Funhouse resto, the cab was too narrow,

Do mirror blades fit good on TAF?

Since I have to clear coat a couple playfields, it will be 6 weeks until I can populate the TAF.

So, I have a bit of time to paint, stencil and populate the cabinet.

I like to get the game running in the cabinet before I start on the playfield.

Populating the playfield is actually much easier than the cabinet work and only takes a couple weeks for me if I have all the parts on hand.

With shipping parts that I didnt realize I needed it can take a month.

I think I can finish the game 90 days from now.

My game will be "for sale" as soon as its done.

For the coils? Not on this title. Flippers they need to be wired a certain way.

I finally had time to re-clear my "Gold" CPR playfield. It had just too many defects:

Inserts raised, inserts low, tape marks in the clear, overspray, orange peel etc.

The ball wouldn't roll in a straight line over the mansion and greed inserts.

Its nothing that cant be sanded out and re-cleared.

So, Im catching up!
taf playfield done (resized).jpg

It took 4 coats of clear, sanded down flat each coat, to get it flat.

Final coat, block sanded, flattened, polished and buffed in my temporary polishing booth !

Paint is too soft right now to put a "true" mirror sheen on it. I'll do that in 6 weeks and inspect the final die back.

Its good enough, now we wait 6 weeks for reassembly.

Time to work on the cabinet!

For now its "wall art" in Pinballgoddess music room.
wall art (resized).jpg

P2K clear always puts a slight bow as it shrinks.

A bow is ok, twists however need special care for a couple months.

Hard oak rails from Reese Rails will easily flatten it later.

You could sit at a bench with scrap parts and wire and develop your skills more and then move onto the machine. Maybe a half hour to become good at flowing solder.

Circuit breaker at wall, fuses, fire extinguisher.

LTG : )

now that's funny !

Helps to make a good mechanical connection first before you solder. Strip enough wire to wrap it through and around the coil lug first then add solder. Both joints there could use some more solder flowed.

2 things:

#1) Your soldering needs to be better.

The wire DOES NOT have to go through the hole in the coil lug. It just has to be fully soldered on about a 1/4" of wire. You can do it if you wish, but its NOT altogether necessary.

You "currently" have cold joints that will crack loose and fail due to vibration. Adding melted insulation to the joint will cause it to fail.
"Tin" the wire ends before trying to solder to the coil lug. "Tin" the coil lugs with some fresh solder.

This way, the solder will melt at the same temperature, on BOTH SIDES of the joint.

Add a little solder to the cleaned tip of the iron before making up the joint. The liquid solder will help with the heat transfer, you will make up the joint faster.

If the solder wont FLOW right, add a little flux to the cooled connection with a q-tip, try again.

The 2 freshly "tinned" connections should bond together with little or no extra solder (other than the little solder you put on the tip before you started to make up the joint). Be quick enough that you DONT melt the wire insulation.
If you continuously burn insulation or the flux burns dark or black, your temperature is TOO HIGH.

Clean off burnt flux with rubbing alcohol and a cotton ball or wad of paper towel.

Make up some practice wires:

Cut 6 pieces of scrap wire, 4" long, and strip off 3/8" of insulation from each side of your practice wires.

Twist each of the 12 bare ends of the wires with fingers to keep them from fraying out. Do NOT attach wires together yet.

Flux the bare wire end with paste flux (just dip the ends into the pot). "Tin" the wire ends with melted solder via the soldering iron and a roll of solder.

Apply the solder to the iron in a big drip and then apply it to the fluxed wire.

The end result should be shiny and well coated with NO burnt or melted insulation and no badly burnt flux.

Keep practicing until you are confident and have good results. Adjust your temperature and speed of movement as needed.

Keep the soldering iron tip CLEAN with a wet sponge or a copper scrubbing pad.

Any bad joints, just snip then off and try again.

After you have all 6 wires "tinned", solder the "tinned" ends together into a circle. This will teach you temperature control and how to solder a wire in the "real" world.

This was how we learned in High School.

#2) How do test things one at a time:

My method is to use Molex connectors.

AFTER you have successfully soldered the wires to the coils, move back about 3" from the coil and cut both wires.
Strip off 1/4" of insulation from all 4 wire ends.

Add female pins the the HARNESS wire ends, Add MALE pins to the coil wire ends.

Slide the ends into the correct connector housings.
Keep track of the wire colors and match them as you go.

If there are 2 wires on a lug:

Again, 3 or 4" back from the coil:

Working on one pair of wires at a time:

Strip the insulation 3/8" and twist them together on the HARNESS SIDE.
The molex pin will accommodate 2 wires, crimp a Female pin on the twisted end of the pair of wires.

Do this for each pair of wires. One pair at a time so that you dont mis-wire a pair.

The coil side only needs one wire per pair now.

There is no point in twisting the wires together on the coil lug side, the connection is already made at the female harness pin.

You can just snip off the extra unnecessary wire from the coil lug.

Molex each and every coil. Plug them in individually and test them one at a time.

Most of the coils are 2 lugs.

Use 2 circuit .093 connectors and pins.

The flippers use 3 circuit connectors but the same .093 pins.

If unsure about Molexing, use your scrap wire and crimp pins onto it until you are confident.

I use this crimper and like it a lot:

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00OMM4YUY/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_image

It works on all crimped connections in a game, both .062 and .093

It will also crimp barrel connectors in a pinch.

The cheapest place to get connectors and pins is Newark Electronics.

Part numbers can be GLEANED from the old Great Plains Electronics website while its still up:

https://www.greatplainselectronics.com/categories.asp?cat=35

I molexed my entire game before I pulled it apart. It took a day and a half, taking my time.
Time well spent as now all I have to do is plug things back together....NO SOLDERING ! ! ! ! !

Practise your soldering, its an important skill thats easy to learn. I laid out some beginner exercises for you.

Another good exercise it making little men or simple sculptures by soldering shaped or formed paperclips together.
It tough because if you get it too hot it falls apart and you use flux.

Again, this was beginner exercises from High School electronics in the 70's.

It worked then, and should work now...

My teacher was a crusty old guy, retired from the navy. They really know their stuff!

You always have to start somewhere or sometime, why not now?

Actually, Molexing a game is one of the BEST things you can do.

Down the road as the game needs service or cleaning, is EXTREMELY simple to just unplug a mech from the game and work on it on your workbench.

At this point, I NEVER solder anything inside a game unless its absolutely necessary.

I molex the wires, then pull out the mech complete.

I even molex switches using mini-fit jr connectors if they are tough to access. Especially EOS switches.

I even molex lamps if there is a whole run of them, like on the GI strings and pop-bumpers.

This technique is now widely used by the better restoration guys and "new" modern games as they come out.

It dramatically speeds up assembly and troubleshooting.

Another painstaking step is to label EVERYTHING !

I use a P-Touch, the labels are solvent proof and dont fall off or wash off even in my sonic cleaner

One of my TAF harnesses:
taf harness (resized).jpg

In the old days I just marked the connections with a Sharpie.

But it washes off way too easy.

Personally hate the wire ... just replaced all the GI sockets on my Earthshaker and went with proper coated wiring .

Shouldn't if done properly...
For me it's a matter of esthetics.

What did you use to anchor the wire?

Staples always looked cheap to me, and are difficult to manage down the road.

Im thinking of using something else.

In theory you dont need to anchor the wires if they are insulated.

How about these?

https://www.pinballlife.com/cable-clamp-14-diameter.html

I did use staples.. would be way to many clamps .. although there are some options at home depot for cable -wire management.

20230730_160710.jpg

Here's mine. I duplicated what was done at the factory.

The bare wire is for the bulbs that flash. You don't need to use bare wire, you can use insulated. I did it just to duplicate what was there as I wanted my game to look like the original, and to make it easier to see which bulbs were supposed to flash.

P1010108 (Large) (resized).JPG

Nice work !

If you want a higher resolution photo, let me know. I cut the size down on the one I posted.

Beautiful clean work!

I like the use of regular "staple in" sockets in place of the NLA IDC ones, as well as them being bayonet instead of crap wedge style.

How are the regular sockets held in place?

I see staples on the GI ones, just like factory.

I'm not sure what you mean. They are all stapled bayonet sockets being held in by staples. It is hard to see at the resolution I posted and the solder covers some of them up.

Another note, to make it clear, mine that I posted is a duplicate of the factory. Only difference is it doesn't have the 555 IDC sockets that you can't get any more. The routing of the wires, the wire colors, even the zip ties are how it was done from the factory.

This is the way.

Gotcha, I just didnt see the staples.

Did you sneeze on it?

Tears of joy from being so close to completion!

or sweat ?

If you zoom in it’s not liquid but holes?

Frito fingers.