One exceptional aspect of the Alien is the light composition created by all the different light sources. There are so many cool picture motifs for a photographer... I reserved a special dark place for the Alien pinball in my cellar and I added some more alienish light sources - like a (cheap) LED beamer showing Alien poster pictures and video clips.

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Dang. Just... dang. Those photos are terrific.

Wow! Last night the guys and I were talking about adding souround sound speakers to Alien, and in a dark room like that!! SO CREEPY!!

I agree. The photos' convey the feel of the game and the movies. Darkness, suspense, intrigue, terror...... amazing shots.

QSS

Man, that does look awesome! Not bad......for a human.

Why ?
I think the sound is pure Stereo ???? Or did I miss something ?? I have also a full set 5.1 speakers left over but it makes no sense to me to use them ...

Other idea: 4 orange warning lamps in the corners of the room, connected to the pin ..

Yes, it is 44.1 stereo mixed with a sub woofer in mind. I did 18 months of work before ever hearing it reproduced by the pinball sound system.

A couple of years ago I added a sub to my studio setup so that I took into account what the mix was doing down there (knowing that some owners were amending their pins with subs).

I was pleasantly surprised the first time I played Alien in my studio. The Chinese amp that Andrew branded as the 'Heighway Amp' is very good. The only downside was that the levels needed to be adjusted down quite a bit if the coin-door volume buttons were to be of any use and the bass needed to be balanced with the stereo pair. I did this and published it for Heighway and users. If you adjust the knobs to the documented values the pin has some real kick.

I've never felt the need to add a sub to Alien as the wood floor vibrates under my feet at the right times.

ddt

Thank you!

Even the I/O board looks attractive with the right light source as the PCB material distributes the light between the copper layers!

BTW, I took this picture for my I/O Board documentation, which I just published in the support topic (as it's a bit technical):
https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/heighway-pinball-support-full-throttle-and-alien/page/17#post-4792281

IO-Back2_1920 (resized).JPG

Where can I find adjustment documentation? Thx

^Would also love to know. I saw you can adjust the knobs on the amp on the bottom of the cab, don’t know if I’ve seen that in a pin before. Good to know a sub isn’t needed too.

Made it to save newt for the first time last night and wished I could’ve cranked the game even louder.

Thank ddt ! was a pleasure to meet you in Germany last year !!

A friend of mine has a very early Alien with a bigger bass in the cabinet.
My Alien is very late and came with a smaller bass in the cabinet so I added a active subwoofer which was former in the homecinema. Fantastic.
But with this informations now I will try the left over 5.1 system on the little amp !

And yes ... the little amp need very very fine tuning ... I played a little bit around with it ... very sensible ...

Nothing out there like "Loader Battle".....just putting it out there...this machine has no equal for full immersion, theme, and unique gameplay....good grief!!!

PETG installed!!! My launch is now perfect, as I could position the wireform correctly. This is a MUST have for anyone wanting to keep their games, imho.

Found about (5x) cracked acrylics during the swap, in addition to my destroyed upper launch plastic.

Not that hard to do, just time-consuming...you'll need a large rivet tool for the bottom of the launch plastic to attach to wireform.

One key thing to be aware of - many of the sleeve posts are actually attached under the playfield with a nylon nut as opposed to T nuts (uggh), making the potential for dropping the nut off huge. Almost all of my posts had gotten loose, and ended up dropping a couple of the boards on the underside to access the nuts.

Huge thanks to Wayne (via Freeplay) to make these available to owners.

game gets better and better.....

All out of spare alien computers, but have 5 replacement ssds pre-loaded with software.

Got another request for spare computers - If I can get 3 more commitments, then I have enough to purchase another batch to build.

Scott

Stolen Alien game !!

Hi all , we had a client to us who bought a Alien game LE no 146 and had a burglury this weeken and got his game stolen .

As all of you on this side have eyes please give us information if you find this game around.

The game was strolen in Sweden and i think it would be hard to sell in in our country as its a smal country and the pinball guys know about this also .

Any hints please send me information , and if you got a god price on the game you all know way !!!

Kenneth Pettersson

Whoa! Hope you find it...

That was a pretty heavy heist! Did they bring their own dolly?

That must hurt for the owner.

Start a new topic on it so more people can see it.

Woah that's terrible. Hope it shows up sooner or later.
Did they take a lot of other things or specifically the alien pinball machine?

I may have identified the getaway vehicle.

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Is it green/blue/black version?

EDIT: These are sold

A couple weeks ago I received a tracking email from Cointaker. Hmmmm, I don't remember buying anything recently. Another drunk purchase perhaps?? I just got Iron Maiden so ....maybe I bought a mod I don't remember??

I was really surprised when the package arrived, and it was filled with spare parts for Alien. Well, I *had* been pestering Heighway and Cointaker for spare parts since I purchased an Alien prototype off the floor of TPF back in 2017. But since then Cointaker replaced my proto with a true production machine, and I eventually sold that and moved on. I'm guessing they were cleaning house and found the parts with my name on them.

So anyway, I have two original Heighway Pinball I/O boards (ver 1.4b), a complete Xeno head assembly with motors, some spare induction switches, and various LEDs. Since the I/O boards alone are going for over $200 - I think it's fair to ask $500 (obo) for the lot. PM me if you're interested.
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I mean.. theoretically you should pass these on to the owner of your original machine..

Just read this post of guess who, karma always bites you in the azz

Andrew Heighway
5 hrs ·
I know a lot of people internationally. Maybe some think that the UK would be a nice place to live - but I doubt it.

I have been married for nearly 4 years to my wife - Irina. She is Russian and has been living in the UK with a residency visa for 3.5 years. Today, her visa renewal was rejected. She can appeal, but can now be deported in as little as 4 weeks.

The Home Office has offered me advice though. As I have visited Russia before, they feel I should move there, learn Russian and get a job there.

So, as a British citizen since birth, I apparently have no right to a family life in this country.

Meanwhile, the country is at civil war over Brexit. Quite how people think this country can survive on its own when it can’t run trains with leaves on the lines, can’t fly aircraft when there is snow, can’t keep its roads in good repair, can’t keep food on supermarket shelves when there are a few days of snow ... the list goes on.

I am really sick of the country I once loved and soon it will be time to leave.

http://prntscr.com/mdz2mf

hey guys I recently turned on my Alien after several weeks, and the left sling just keeps triggering like crazy. The test mode, shows that the lower left sling is "active" where do u think the problem is? Anyone had this issue before?
do you think it is all related to my two top pop bumpers which lights go intermittently go in and out or is that a separate issue?

Thanks

Not only the pinball , they got a multi arcade , and some expensive apple computers with big screens .

its the grren verison

I would start by checking the blade switches on that slingshot.

Hey man thanks for the reply, yes that seems to be the problem, if I don't move the rubber band it says "active" if I move the rubber band free up that leaf switch it goes "inactive". maybe that leaf switch needs to be replaced?? Where do I even find one? I have never worked on a sling before
THanks!

They usually just need to be adjusted, not replaced. A pliers or blade adjusting tool is needed to separate them.

https://www.pinballlife.com/ultimate-leaf-adjuster-tool.html

Lift the playfield and adjust from underneath. Turn the power off to be safe.

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/machine-gunning-slingshot#post-3814989

While you are waiting for the Leaf adjuster just do it with your fingers. My left switch had the same firing issue. Open it up a bit so its not making constant contact

I know there is a lot of bad history with this game, I haven't had it long , but I gotta say there is something special about this game...talk about pulling you into the theme WOW...having a blast!

glad you're enjoying the game @bladefury! Its totally an A list pin.

Mine did the same thing sometimes. You can adjust the leaf switch with just your finger and be good.

I have a lot of great games, and then there is Alien....Is what it is...an incredible, unique Pinball experience...congrats on getting one!!!

Thanks again man!

Thank you! Couldn't have explained it better myself

lost my airlock lcd last night. on reboot, saw it flash, but then dark (tells me I have power but no signal?)....

tried just swapping outputs on cpu, but neither of the other 2 screens got image from that dvi port. is the resolution the same for all 3?...going to swap the dvi cable tonight, but wanted to run by community first....have a spare, but figured I'd start w a question.

my main image on large and pf screen also developed a slight white image on the right side....wondering if my video feed is dumping.....any help appreciated.

going to monitor the cabinet heat in these cabinets.....curious how warm it's getting down there, and if this could have a long term role in any component failure.....game has been basically solid for around a year w some tweaks....has anyone done this yet?...thanks...mark

The resolution is not the same for all three screens, and because of this all of the screens have to be plugged into a specific display port on the computer. Assuming you have the "China PC" vs the Zotac, here are the appropriate connections.

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I would check to see if the playfield display image shows up on a regular computer monitor that can auto-detect resolutions to make sure the cable works and you have signal, then try swapping cables with that display and go from there.

It's also worth checking the connections at the display. Use an 11/32" nut driver to take the 6 nuts out from behind the screen, and then you can de-case the display through similar nuts on the back side.

With regards to the playfield display, the ribbon cable on the inside is very cheaply made and the connection can come partially loosened. It's worth dropping the playfield display out, and de-casing it to check this connection (carefully!)

Great advice..Thank you!!! I suspected resolution was different, and will try your suggestions.

Changed all plastics to PETG recently, so she's been jarred a bit...I'll report back after checking these items...mark

Alien upkeep looks like it’s more of a headache than Stern and Bally Williams. Is this the case?

B/W maybe ... I never had a game NIB.
STERN ... nope ... I have had so much trouble with new Sterns ... it was in a bad way amazing. GoT LE for around the €uro ammount of a brand new, small car was weeks open with a raised playfield waiting for spareparts ! Alien ... no (bigger) problems so far !! But many many spareparts on hand

*knock on wood* I haven't had any major issues yet. Simple upkeep shouldn't be any worse than any other machine. But, if something goes wrong it could be harder to diagnose and/or repair without schematics. Alien is a bit similar to the new Sterns in that there are "node" boards that can fail. So, having a backup would be a good thing.

Alien is just such a unique experience, I really hope that I can keep it going for many years to come!

I love my Alien, but I had 2 bad IO boards out of the box that needed to be replaced. Thankfully that happened prior to HP going under. Also bought an extra for if/when another fails.

Absolutely not...no Pinball is plug and play, just in this case we only have each other to lean on as we sort through issues.

Some areas built like a tank, some not so much. I will say that being electrically and mechanically inclined is a plus to enjoying this hobby.

Most that got in and out of the early Alien experience had damaged goods, and were overwhelmed quick.

I encourage you to read the early WOZ threads if you want to see real terror ( game turned out great in the end, but man!!!)

I enjoy working on/ modifying my games just as much as playing them....Alien is a very solid machine

Fixed!!!! Thanks knockerlover for tips.....I will expose how embarrassingly easy this was:

a) Took off the (5x) 11/32 nuts from frame, lifted airlock, and the HDMI connector was laying under the display, obviously shaken loose when I took the bracket off earlier to change the plastics. Must have taken a few games for it to finally finish wiggling out. Firmly plugged back in, and all is good.

b) Ironically, w the video card now driving all (3x) displays, my white line on the right side of the PF and main displays vanished, as synced back up.

Moral of the story - I should have checked that connection first, but with the other video issue appearing, I panicked and reached out before doing the obvious.

Thanks again, and Alien back to full scream potential again!!!!...mark

(side note) if you change out the plastics to PETG set (highly recommended) be prepared for a lengthy process and check your airlock video connection

A thought on cabinet cooling:

Alien has (2x) air vent in the bottom rear of the cabinet, with (2x) air vents directly above them on the backside of cab. This absolutely would create an air wall block as the cooler air under the cab would pass straight through to the top vents (passive convection).

I'm going to capture some temps w the game on for a bit, as I'm confident the switching P/S, mechanisms, amplifier, etc, are generating heat which is not being efficiently vented out. Just seems very warm down there.

Given the CPU and motherboard have a sheet of plexi directly over them further contains the heat.

While I'm certainly not going to cut a hole in the bottom of the front side of the cabinet (where it should have been), I can certainly add a crossflow fan, forcing the air from front to back, effectively moving the hot air to the rear, where it would then be carried out.

Will post before and after #'s to see how much the temp will drop.