Try here:
http://stevekulpa.net/pinball/bally_disp6r.htm

You can get a .pdf copy of the manual here: https://www.ipdb.org/files/761/Bally_1985_Eight_Ball_Champ_Manual.pdf

I would refer you to a place that would sell an original copy of the manual, but it seems that everyone who has one wants to keep it.

Your EBC looks really great! Mine apparently has had a little bit rougher life and we are going through some growing pains together.

I agree that it is a really fun game for what it is: single ball, single level, shooter. It makes you pretty much earn every drop. I don't get many hits from bouncing off the slingshots, but I do occasionally get double-hits from the top flipper (the old 1-ball 7-ball combo if you will).

Flipper buttons definitely spark. I never noticed the other switches spark, but they probably do. Not as big a spark as the flippers, for sure.

Ya, bending back the lamps is sometimes the best way. Several of the hex screw heads were soldered to the mounts on my machine. I figure if I break the mount, I have the same amount of solder work either way. Not the best quality workmanship, which was a real problem in most US industries back in the 80's...

I don't have much experience, but it seems to me that the 6803 board is pretty decent. It is fairly robust and supports lots of flashers and switches so that games can be fairly complex but not confusing. I had to repair my control board once from something that happened with a prior owner and once that I messed up. There are no hard to find parts on the board (although replacement control boards are pretty much not available now). There is plenty of room to make repairs on the board. There are some mods available. I highly recommend Pinitech's 6118 NVRAM to replace the battery (simple plug and play replacement and boom, no battery required), and there are several companies that offer LED displays that drive just fine from the control board without using high voltage from the power module. The wonkiness of my Eight Ball Champ is more in the flippers, saucer assembly, and cheap MDF cabinet construction than it is the 6803 system. The flippers are actually way better than many 80's era linear flippers, but parts are a little bit unique. My game plays just fine and is fun.

If Bally would have survived and evolved into ramp/multiball machines, I think the 6803 would be more common and probably a bit more revered. It seems like there is plenty of bandwidth on the board to do more stuff and add modules. I think they probably would have been able to upgrade/improve the squawk and talk (and ditch the cheap squeak system) and keep up with new display technology for quite a while. Adding alphanumeric displays to new games seemed fairly simple, for example.

I find that between my game manual and http://www.pinrepair.com/6803/ , there isn't much left to the imagination.

In my experience, rollovers definitely need caps to register reliably and I would bet other momentary switches (like the "paddle" switches behind drop targets) probably work better with good caps in place. I had a rollover switch with a bad cap and the game would set a new high score if you just left the machine alone long enough. After cutting out the cap, it registered maybe 80% of quick rollovers but resolved the ghost scoring issue (and would test out OK in the stuck switch test). With a new cap installed, it works again with higher reliability.

I have posted this elsewhere, but if you find yourself in a jam, call Clive at the Coin Op Cauldron. I do my own repairs if there are only 1 or 2 things wrong with my 6803, but he got me out of a pickle where absolutely nothing worked. 6803 control boards that are not filled with corrosion and/or non-operational are hard to find.

I assume PA has the same capacitor-on-switch setup as other 6803 games. If they are still original, it is probably time to swap them out for new. Bad caps made my 6803 machine do some pretty goofy stuff. Had to clear my high score after first ball once...

I have no help for you other than confirming that if you simply disconnect the caps on the switches that it should still test OK for a "slow" hit. The cap just seems to make the signal longer so the control board can keep pace with a quick hit.

The matrix design kinda dumbfounds me and I can't find a wiring diagram for free online, but if you haven't read this: http://www.pinrepair.com/6803/ it might help.

That braided bare wire should probably tie into the ground wire matrix that runs throughout your cabinet. I think it is more of a safety thing to keep you from getting zapped if something goes awry than it is for machine functionality, but I might be wrong.

It is good that you replaced the battery. After they die, they tend to cause all sorts of issues. I went with pinitech's NVRAM chip and ditched the battery forever. I highly recommend the switch. Easy to do and no worries that your battery will contribute to corrosion or leak acid all over your control board.

On the playfield parts list for my Eight Ball Champ, those are listed as "Playfield Support" p/n 0360-0114-00XF. A google search doesn't get me anywhere. That is usually when I call Steve at Pinball Resource. He doesn't use Bally part numbers, so just have the description ready.

I don't know if anybody else feels this way, but I would try a squirt of electrical contact cleaner on the pot when the machine is off and adjust the pot on the sound board up and down before letting it dry (or blowing it dry with canned air). My Squawk and Talk had some "dead spots" in the volume pot that cleaned right up and life is good now. Could also be the main volume pot if both sound effects and speech are affected.

On my machine, the squawk (sound effects) and talk can be balanced by adjusting the pot on the sound board. The sound effects are only controlled by the pot on the coin door and the relative speech volume is controlled by the pot on the sound board.

In other words, if all sounds die together then it is probably the pot on the coin door. Same recommendation applies before swapping out parts. A little spray of contact cleaner has saved my bacon more than once.

Start by cleaning/adjusting the switches. I am not an expert at the 6803 board, but my experience is that the control board only scores the "hits" and the bumpers are reacting to the switch being closed. Somebody please correct me if I am wrong. I used to get phantom scores without bumpers being activated, so I am taking an educated guess...

Can you swap the leads and see if the dimming flips? If it does, then my best guess is that the displays aren't getting enough juice.

That is above my paygrade to troubleshoot 14-digit displays.

This has been a similar problem before that was fixed by basically a board re-build:
https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/bally6803-party-animals-strange-display-issue-help

It that is hard to stomach, there are a couple of options in the USA. Coin-op Cauldron might re-work the board but won't replace any of the plasma. Might be a short-term fix if the plasma is going bad. I would e-mail first to make sure the repair is plausible.

Second option is replacing both with new LED displays. There are a couple of companies that make them. I can't vouch personally for either, but I like my LED displays I got from Pinitech (which doesn't offer the alphanumeric 14 digit displays). Not a cheap option, though.

I mainly justified the LED displays when I was having problems with the HV part of my power board. I don't know for sure if the jury is still out on if they tax the control board enough to matter, but I am sure you know that the 6803 control boards have been pretty hard to find.

I imagine this has been asked, but no recent discussion could I find...

How much to you think a 6803 control board, refurbished and with battery replaced by NVRAM is worth? I see stores on-line that advertise $350US but they haven't seemed to have stock for years now.

This is most likely a trivial question because I am not looking to sell mine, but I occasionally run into an old Bally machine that is not in great shape but I can harvest it for parts and at least do a little work if needed as long as it hasn't corroded all to heck.

Nada on displays is most likely a problem on the high voltage section of your power supply. First evaluate your experience and comfort level with high voltage. If you are good, then test to see if you have about 180V from TP2 to ground. If no, move to TP3 and check that for 230V. Best case scenario is nothing on TP2 and ~230V on TP3. In that case, unplug machine and spray some contact cleaner in your HV pot and articulate the switch. Not the end of the world if neither test point has voltage, but it requires some soldering and a "cap job" that is outlined here: http://www.pinrepair.com/6803/ You might also have a bit of luck by re-flowing the solder on your power board before replacing components. Seems like the electrolytic capacitors are prone to failure after 30 years or so. Get a nice Hakko or equivalent if you don't already have one.

I suppose that it could be possible that the 43VDC is related, but since some of your flippers work, it is probably a local problem.

For your upper flipper, I think your machine has two switches on the flipper button. Could be as easy as cleaning and adjusting the switch. If your left lower flipper works, you at least have a good circuit to the switch. Not much else if you have good wiring connection and coils...

I am not willing to set my plastics free, but I could send you a high-res scan of mine if you want to make your own repro.

I should consider copyright laws. Even though I would not be looking for payment and the copyright owner isn't making reproductions, I want to steer clear. I don't want to put myself or this forum in danger if the copyright owner gets upset. When I was researching the methods to repro, the companies who amalgamated the art were asked to cease.

The voltage is fine (treat 50V as minimum), but almost 5x capacitance might not fare well in the integrated circuit. +/- 20% is fine, but I would try to get a smaller axial instead of trying something that holds way more juice than the original. The .047 might have unintended consequences and may not, but we are talking about a common $1.00 part.

My EBC had problems with quick hits on the paddles behind drop downs and rollovers until I replaced the caps. Drop downs stay down, so they always scored. I also had a cap that would cause a rollover to randomly score 30 times, so I can see why someone might decide to just cut them out. No score on occasion is better than a million unearned points.

Like most of us here, you will have a game where you absolutely play out of your mind, get the machine's high score, and curse that ball that went RDTM. For me, it is a close contest between plumbing projects and pinball games for the number of 4-letter words (but for far different reasons).

The manual for D&D said it periodically resets the high score. I don't know if that is just the "free games" high score or all-time.