Has anyone has any serious electronic failures on a spike system yet? So far my Kiss and GoT pros are doing great on location with no issues below the playfield. I searched on "Spike problems" and saw some reset issues and a complaint about GI turning off with the door open plus the usual "I don't like the switch location" but other than minor ergonomic issues has anything failed yet? Anybody have any mysterious power driver or lighting/switch issues?

I'm just curious so I can study up in advance of any anticipated failure modes. If any exist.

holy crap.......

Hmmmm..... replacement boards ain't cheap for their size and parts count. Plan A was to buy a few and keep them in stock for quick repair turnarounds if one fails. Will still likely do it but it will hurt a bit.

https://ksarcade.net/stn-520-6935-00.html

https://ksarcade.net/stn-520-5329-00.html

http://www.marcospecialties.com/pinball-parts/520-5329-00

http://www.marcospecialties.com/pinball-parts/520-5319-00

That was $300 Au.

So for the record, and a slightly different perspective, I'm an operator but not a "real" operator. I used to run a 45 piece (mainly redemption) location on the side that killed it on earnings but got out (day job too important and the location owner was a douche). Now I'm back to collecting pinballs and operating them at local microbrewery taprooms mainly to expand my hobby. But...... I pride myself on maintaining my games at a totally unrealistic level of up time (I slightly freak if a bulb burns out) and I'd really like to have a spare board set for quick board swaps. I own mainly modern Sterns and I see a lot of Spike games in my future BUT I'm not thrilled about spending $200+ for a small board that shouldn't have cost more than $50 to make. A 100% mark up on production costs I'm cool with, but a 400% I'm not.

One factor is that now that they are going to smaller boards in higher quantities the prices per board real estate and parts count should be coming down. But it seems that they are going up. I'd really like to see someone generate a bill of materials for a Spike board so we can go from just guessing to speaking from an informed position. But this is Pinside so I guess that's not needed. I was really expecting these boards to roll in at about $125-$150 at worst.

Thanks, my distributor is getting pricing for me. And he's monitoring this thread.....

Anybody ever have any weird switch problems with Spike? I've got intermittent switch issues on GoT and Kiss. They work perfectly in test but in game play they occasionally don't register.

Kiss - VUK often doesn't respond in game play

GoT - Rollover lane switches sometimes don't respond, particularly the right rollover lane.

Both work perfectly in test mode.

Ideas?

With ball of course.

Nope, right rollover lane, no timing required at all.

In regards to the other person's comment about switch quality the wires seem to be a but "wobbly", i.e. they move right and left more than I'm used to seeing.

So I finally had a serious failure on a Spike system (GoT). One of my regulars reported a dead flipper so I'm like "easy, dead fuse", and when I opened it up the enormity of the difference in the spike system really hit me. No freakin fuses. But it turned out to just be a broken solder joint on the flipper coil and easily fixed. Time to start studying that system more.

And my crappy switch on the roll over lane of GoT is still crappy and upon further investigation the "ears" on the lever are out of whack and the switch lever pops loose real easily. I looked for a replacement and the part # isn't listed at any of the major vendors so I ordered the "Spike - 1" Stern rollover switch and I'll compare and install it if it matches.

And...... my scoop switch on Kiss is still crappy as well. Its sensing the ball and kicking it out immediately every time 100% but rarely ever records any award. That one has me puzzled.

"The KISS scoop switch may not stay closed without some adjustment of the switch arm." So what you're saying is that it needs a more aggressive switch closure? Some timing issues there?

Thanks, it lights up backstage pass, new track, whatever..... hit the scoop, no response. Regulars bitch, then I put it in test mode and it senses and kicks the ball out like a champ. I'll try the factory reset.

So just as a follow up to earlier posts, I finally got around to tweaking the switch lever on the scoop/VUK for a more aggressive closure and it now awards back stage passes. It was always sensing the ball and kicking it back out but not awarding points.

I discussed this in another thread (https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/game-of-thrones-sword-lock-issues) but I thought I'd bring it up here and maybe get some fresh eyes on it. I've got a GoT Pro on location that has worked well up until recently. Then it just started doing odd stuff mainly acting like bad switches not sensing balls, doing unneeded ball searches, etc... Here's a partial list of oddities.

1) Sometimes, but not all the time, you can hit a ball up the left ramp to the sword lock to start Greyjoy mode and it just sits there and has to do a ball search to release the ball. Switch tests fine and has been tweaked for a more aggressive closure. Error still happens, but not repeatably, its pretty random.
2) Ball locks get awarded for no reason other than hitting a switch, come down a rollover lane, get a ball lock, drain in the left outlane, get a ball lock.
3) Ball launch delays into the shooter lane when starting Lannister mode. (maybe other modes, not sure)

Getting ball locks awarded for no reason SCREAMS "problem with an opto", particularly the left ramp exit opto. They test fine.

I've reseated all connectors except maybe the CAT5 stuff, updated to the latest software (1.29), and contacted my distributor to purchase a full set of Spike boards so I can do proper component swapping troubleshooting.

I'm tempted to just replace the left ramp exit optos but my experience with opto problems is they they either die, or fire on their own and ring up points when the ball is nowhere near. The fact that hitting a microswitch like a left outlane switch triggers an award from an opto in the upper right of the table is perplexing.

Anybody seen behavior like this? Some of the board issues described earlier in this thread seem suspicious.

"Did you check all the lock switches if one is not working right it may be getting confused?"

Yup, best guess from a distributor was "sounds like a node board has gone loco". A set of node boards is on the way for additional troubleshooting. Note, I paid for them as I want to have a full set available at all times for troubleshooting games. We'll see how this turns out.

Back to my wonky GoT pro........ I got the set of new spike boards and started swapping them out. First Node 10, but it still had the same problems. Then node 9, still problems. Then Node 8, no joy. I'll replace the board down by the coin door tonight just to be thorough but don't expect any solution. What....the....hell..... I've reset all connectors, reset the SD card, updated SW to 1.29, and I'm still get switch weirdness. I didn't get any phantom ball locks in playtesting last night but if swapping that node last board out doesn't help any thoughts?

Now my Kiss Pro is getting weird. In certain modes/situations the pop bumpers go dead. Drain a ball, they turn back on. Reported many times by a regular, I've seen it happen once though.

So to follow up on the Kiss Pro I noticed after the pop bumpers went dead once that the game went into firmware update mode after a power cycle. Could the node that controls the pop bumpers be losing its NVRAM memory? or however it stores onboard code? I swapped out the node that runs the pop bumpers and it was working when I left the location.

Still trying things with GoT pro, still wacko. Replaced the SD card after copying it yesterday and reloaded 1.29 SW. I didn't really expect that to help but I'm just checking off boxes. Next up, replace the CPU board. I'm still not hopeful of that helping as the game "works great" just does untraceable weird $shit on a regular basis.

One thing I'd like to try is to get a new, guaranteed non-corrupted SD card. Would I have to go to Stern for that? or could somebody image their SD card and let me download a copy?

I got a new SD card from Chas, plugged it in, and played three flawless games. Maybe that fixed it.

1.29, and I reloaded it with no improvement. So it wasn;t the code, but most likely a corrupted card. I'm not the only one to have this happen to them.

I had that happen to my Kiss, new node board fixed it.

Just as a data point, the problem that started this thread was bizarre behavior out of my GoT pro. Replaced the SD card, all good. Started doing it again a few months later. Replaced SD card again. That one lasted a few months before bizarre behavior creeper in again. Now I'm on SD card #4 on GoT and I switched to a high temperature card intended for dash cams. So far so good.

My other spike games have been fine except for a node board on Kiss that went tits up a while back. Warranty replacement, working fine since.

Following up on my GoT Pro issue. It continued to have ghost switch and "behavioral issues" and I refused to believe it was just eating SD cards so fast so I tried a few more things including swapping the CPU out of my GB pro with the one in GoT. While I had the backbox on GB open I noticed a large RFI filter on one of the CPU cables that was absent on GoT. Swapping CPUs didn't do anything, same repeatable problems, but just before calling it quits for the day I decided to cut that cable out of its wiring bundle and get it away from other wires.

GoT started acting almost perfectly at that point. Only one ghost switch weirdness in 8 full games vs highly repeatable and immediate problems before. Time for some clamp on RFI filters for GoT.

I did back in the early troubleshooting process. I just ordered a bag of clamp on filters from Amazon for $10. I've got some around the house but like most parts I have no clue what place I stashed them at. I'm gong to test the game some more later today and will take some pics.

Here's some pics. The CPU pic with the white clamp-on RFI filter on the red and black wire pair (I assume the display power connector) is my GB Pro. The pic with the red and black wired dangling out in space is my GoT pro that now suddenly works a helluva lot better. The red and black wires were bundled in the cable bundle going around to the right side of the CPU board.

My Kiss pro has no filter and I've never had these types of problems out of it. But after about a year on location my GoT pro started acting weird. If you look above in this thread I spent $500 for one each of the node boards and systematically swapped them out with no positive results. Replacing the SD card seemed to help for a few months at a time (??) but it would always go back to odd behavior such as mystery switch hits, i.e. starting a Blackwater multiball without hitting the ramp and when you entered a house mode it would often just keep the ball in the sword lock without releasing it and without providing a new ball if you had just locked a ball. Most of these problems were perfectly repeatable every game.

I played three full games today and I got one mystery ramp hit in a BW multiball and that was it. So its back to behaving good enough for location and hopefully the filters will completely fix it.

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>You stated you also separated the wiring out from the rest of the harness. It would be interesting to know which of the two things you did actually solved most of the problem or if both were necessary to get any results?

All I've done so far is separate the power wiring out of the harness, no filters added yet.

Back to TBK's first recent post
> Operators have to have own complete replacement costly board sets to keep games functioning on routes ($150-1000 for >EACH board via aftermarket sales when available)

Yup............

I've got the following Spike games on a relatively low volume location, GoT Pro, Kiss Pro, Aerosmith Pro, BM66 Prem, GB Pro, SW Pro, and I've got a GoT Prem in the basement (hey, I liked the art).

Overall I've had a really good experience so far with spike but totally agree with TBK's "swaptronics" comments. My GoT Pro still isn't quite right but the issues are minor so only my regulars would notice them. Its ok for general public play but I don't like the fact that it doesn't work perfectly and the problems are repeatable.. My HUO GoT Prem also seems to have ghost switch hit issues but I haven't been able to track them down and honestly haven't spent much time on it.

When I got serious about trying to fix my GoT pro step one was to buy a full set of node boards and start swapping them out. That cost me about $500 just to get the stuff to start troubleshooting. I swapped out every board one at a time and the problems were still specific and repeatable. Then I swapped out the CPU, rebuilt part of the sword lock mechanism, moved wiring, replaced SD cards, replaced network cables (only 1 so far, more coming).

Soon I'll have systematically swapped out every major component of the electronics and a lot of minor ones. And I have no clue so far what is causing the problems. I might get this game fixed some day but TBK has brought up some good points.

If Stern could provide these boards for what they should cost (maybe $75 node boards assuming a one tier markup) it might not be so bad. But 10 years from now if not sooner we will need a Spike version of Rottendog boards to make these games realistically sustainable.

"If JJP go belly up tomorrow, replacement boards could be on the market in just a few months, because everything is documented."

They definitely have the moral/ethical high ground on this issue.

Everybody seen these?

https://pinballsupernova.wordpress.com/2017/12/06/news-stern-service-bulletins-for-spike-1-and-2-games/