I am the proud caretaker of a Gottlieb Airport (circa 1969) which I have had for about 15 years. The machine has been in the basement of two houses and I would play it occasionally but it has never worked 100% of the time.

I decided to take the time to learn and hopefully get the machine back into complete running order.

I have spent a couple of weeks Googling and joining this forum to gain information.

What I have not been able to find is what happens during a “round” of play on my Airport. I have found many articles on cleaning stepper motors or replacing light bulbs, but I am trying to get into my head the sequence of logical and physical events which occurs during a round of pinball.

Please forgive many errors of a newbie, but here goes.

- I turn on the machine and the backboard and player field lights up.

-I hit the reset button(not sure that this term is correct) and it resets the score reels, lights certain lights on the player field, and then ejects the pinball for play (This game only has a single pinball) for a single player with 1 Player lights on the back box

-What is physical and logically going on within the machine and how do the various hardware components interact during this sequence?

-I hit the reset button again and 2 Player lights on the back box

-Again, what physically and logically going on within the machine and how do the various hardware components interact during this sequence

- I play the first ball as Player 1 and the ball falls to the bottom of the machine.

What happens in a One Player game at this point?
What happens in a Two Player game at this point?
How does it determine which score reels are active and count the balls for each player?

- The game cycles thru all the players and the balls for each player

How do the scoring determine whether a free game is awarded and what occurs to make the free game show up?

- The game ends, and the Match Sequence is initiated?

What determines a match, how are the lights on the back board controlled to determine it, and how is the credit is awarded?

Sorry if this is lengthy and here are the specific questions/problems that I have for my machine?

In both a 1 and 2 player game, sometimes the play and score reels are incorrect. Either it skips to Player 2 in a 1 player game, or in a 2 Player game, it goes from Player 1, to Player 2 and then immediately skips back to Player 1 without allowing Player 2 to utilize the playfield.

The match process seems to work at the end, and I get a thump in the back box, but there are no lights and the credit wheel does not move.

Generic question on the Stepper units in the back box? There seem to be more rivets on the Ball Count stepper than balls(it's labeled Ball Count 0-9). Does a complete game cause a 360 degree rotation on the stepper unit, or a complete rotation of the stepper unit involve multiple games? What do each of the sensors/pickups on the rivets do?

Why are there 4-5 rows of rivets on the Ball Count stepper unit and what do they do, or are there generic steppers and my game only uses 2 or the 4 rows.

Thanks and would appreciate any guidance on reference material and information.

Since I am new to this journey, please forgive any errors in terminology and logic from my part.

Hopefully I have not violated any Forum Rules.

Thanks

Yes, I have a schematic diagram.

Yes, I have seen his post and it is really great. I am using it to clean and repair my steppers, light sockets, and other components.

I am lacking knowledge of the sequence of events and what parts of involved during game plan.

This video is great for startup sequence. Is there an equivalent video on Ball Count, Multi-Player Operation, and end of game sequences?

Thanks