The game looks badass!!!!

I boughtplay station 3 joystick charging cables I sure enough it was the problem I would randomly lose board connections. Haven’t had issues since

Thank you. I've been fiddeling with the servo like crazy but I can’t get to work better than it is right now. The problem is that I dont even know what the original angle of the arm is supposed to be. Any advice for a replacement servo?

Hey guys, I wanted to post here in this thread about a project I was helping out with that is Alien related. I recently met Brian Allen, one of the artists that did some work on Alien during the fiasco at Heighway. Like Aurich, Brian is a super nice guy and had some really cool looking art that never really made it to production or not in the form that was intended from what I understand. I had reached out to Brian because I liked one of the pieces that he had drawn for the game that was at some point an option for the back-glass on games without monitors. At first I just wanted to create some art for my wall that might be able to go into a light box, but now that I have it, Brian is fine with me helping him offer it to the community. Instead of just creating a translite, I have had the art reverse printed on acrylic for a much higher end look than a translite. (think of how Cirqus Voltaire back-glass is made...its acrylic or some type of plastic) These are available for order through Brian's website (https://www.flylanddesigns.com) as well as directly through me. I am planning on bringing a set amount of these to the Texas Pinball Festival for those that would like to cash and carry and save on shipping, but I am trying to get a rough idea on those that would like one. These are about 26" x26" and look amazing in a light box. I am going to attach a few pics as well as a sample video I did for Brian of mine in a light box I built. Feel free to reach out via pm if you would like one to pick up or would like one shipped. The price point on these is $200.00 picked up or 235.00 shipped due to size and packing costs. Let me know what ya'll think!

Here is a link to a video on Brian's site as I can't get my video to link due to size I guess...

https://www.flylanddesigns.com/product/alien-backglass/

Is this the recommended cable to buy to replace all 4 of the original cables? And should I also purchase those plastic wire mounts for the cables (I’m not sure what these are called, you attach them to the underside of the playfield to keep the cables in a secure position away from the rest of the guys under the playfield) ?

Okay, so I got hold of a replacement servo, replaced the broken one and now everything is working as it should.

Here is one source for the "plastic mounts": https://www.marcospecialties.com/pinball-parts/545-5253-01
They help avoid / limit force effects on the board connectors and you can keep the cables away from electromagnetic disturbances (EMC) caused by the main wiring harness on the right side in the picture.

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I was thinking about doing a small light mod, I have a strip of addressable leds I had for min pinduino, I was thinking about tying it in with a portion of the GI.
Anyone have a tip on how to do that? I am so nervous tinkering with this pin due to the fact of getting new spare parts is hardly an easy task.

Any help would be awesome!

Perfect, thank you!

The Alien WS2812 color LEDs recieve their color data as serial data packages sent over a single wire (serial bus). You can connect additional WS2812 LEDs in parallel, they will show the same color (as TimeBandit did with the sling shot update). But you can neither connect other LED types nor LED strips in this way.
But you can use a microcontroller like the Arduino to determine the color of a selected Alien LED and to trigger your LED strip to show some related color(s). To know the Alien LED color you can either analyse the color data on the serial bus or use a color sensor. As the first option is more complex and implies connections to the Alien hardware I would start with the second option. Color sensors are inexpensive, can be placed anywhere in the pin and there are many tutorials fitting to your use-case. Here is an example: https://learn.adafruit.com/adafruit-color-sensors.

Great info! Thank you!

I am trying to hook up an WS2812B LED strip, anyone know if I can use any of the connectors pictured below?
LED CHAIN OUT 2B

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Am I the only one who is not a big fan of the "scream again" ball save sound?
I think it sounds like a wookie from star wars and thats the completely wrong franchise.
I wish there was either a human or a xeno screaming instead, the rest of the sounds are great but the "wookie" scream takes me out of the immersion a bit.

The video media and sound files are all on the PC filesystem, you can easily change them.

Okay. I might just do that.

So I am now having trouble with a bunch of lights.
Som times som are stuck on in one color, others can be off at the same time.
See images from the test mode below to see witch lights are affected.

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http://pinwiki.com/wiki/index.php?title=Heighway_Pinball_Repair#Alien

The Lamp ID is based on the following sequence [IO Board #-Chain, Lamp ID]. Translated, 1-A1 would be IO Board #1, Chain A, Lamp 1. One thing to note is that these lamps are serially addressed, which means that if one LED fails or is missing, all following LED's in that chain will not work correctly (locked on, off, flashing, etc.)

Find the earliest Trouble LED in the chain and try and reseat it slightly. You may need to reflow the solder underneath as early PCB traces are weak. Do this as a last resort.

Thank you!

It turned out to be the usb cable going to I/O bord 2, the reason I didn't test the usb cable before posting is because this was one of the cables I replaced.

Scratch, that, not sure it's the cable, the same problem is back with the (new) replacement cable.

In your case I would slightly tweak/reseat" 2-C8 Left Orbit Lower", and "2-C1 GI Right Orbit Lower" you can sometimes do it without loosening the screws for the large PCB board, but in most cases you have to take a few out to slightly lift the board away from the playfield.

Thank you, I'll give it a go.

I have another problem.
During normal ball play the through just starts kicking out new balls, it continues to do so for a while, everything else (flippers/lights) looks like it's working as it should during this (except the light that are out due to a different problem..

Any clue on what could be causing this?

Also worth mentioning is that all the lights I'm having trouble with are working correctly right after a reboot. They blink a change color for about 20 seconds then they freeze up or stop working.

To fix the lights I have tried the following.
1. reseated some of the lights including 2-c8 & 2-c1.
2. Replaced the I/O board usb cable.
3. Tried a new usb port on the CPU.
4. Swapped I/O board.

Nothing have helped.

Is the ball save on so it just keeps kicking out balls?

The picture you posted before. Did you plug something into that LED_Chain_Out-2A socket? That could be the source of your issue.

If you take out the lights that are causing an issue and plug it into one of the little green free standing boards in the GI, does the bulb work as expected? I would keep testing individual potentially problem bulbs like this until you find the culprit. You may need to reflow solder on the LED or find a replacement. You can move problem bulbs to the end of the chain for the time being to minimize the impact.

Nope, it's not the ballsave.

No, I did not plug in any extra LEDs.
I have two extra LEDs I can use, I tried swapping out one of them (2-C8 Left Orbit Lower) with no change. The light is still stuck.

Hurray!

I finally got my LED problem sorted.
I started going through the problematic LEDs one by one testing them one by one on one of the little green free standing boards in the GI like @knockerlover suggested. Luckily I only had to test three LEDs until I found the culprit. The faulty LED was stuck at white light only, I replaced it with a spare one and BAM, everything is back to normal

BIG thanks to @knockerlover for helping me to sort it out!

At the moment all that's left to fix on my game is the random way it starts kicking out balls during normal play.
I have replaced all the USB cables with shielded cables.
I have routed the USB cables to the left side away from the larger cables.
I have rotated I/O boards.
I have checked the balls for magnetism.
I have cleaned the optos on the through.
I have reseated all the connectors on the through.

I have no also taken out the through emitter board and reflowed solder on all solder points, I am still getting the same problem.
What I did notice (maybe) is that the through kicks out balls until it has cleared all 6 balls, I am not sure about this, I need to test this some more.

Have you tested each trough switch individually in test mode? It sounds like they are reading active all the time, so the game thinks the ball ejects are not working.

Yes, I have tested each trough switch individually in test mode and they are all behaving as they should.

Usually it does this if it detects a jam.. the higher LED.

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Well after moving in and out 18 machines over the years, I've finally found that Alien is special enough that I want to keep for the long haul... so prepared I am just in case....many backup parts and playfield just arrived! This Alien community it's just awesome with all the help and thank you all!

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Very smart idea - those parts are gold if anything goes wrong.

Yes, I see, but that opto looks like it's working as it should.

One thing I was thinking was that maybe I need the angle the ball through a little using washers.

Perhaps the balls are magnetized and sticking together in the trough.

That was one of the things I was suspecting so I took a little paperclip to each ball, even though some of them was a tiny bit magnetically charged it was not enough to hold the paperclip.

Thanks for sending me a debug log. Magnetized balls is very likely what is going on, from the log data I don't see very many trough switches changing when it kicks a ball out.

Make sure you aren't using silverjet's

Just to clarify, this price does not include the light box with it. Thanks

I don't think we are going to have to worry about part availability for a LONG time on this game.

Just before the pin starts kicking out balls the shooter lane coil misfires with no ball in the shooter lane, then it starts kicking out balls.
Could this just be something simple as a shooter lane switch adjustment? Should I make the switch less sensitive by bending it down?
What I am guessing is that the shooter lane switch gets falsely triggered by maybe vibrations?