So, what is the feel on regular vs gold roms? I've had gold the whole life of my ownership but I'm thinking of switching to regular to balance out the scoring stratigies.

What are some drawbacks of the regular roms?

No drawback that I know of with the regular roms.
I like the Gold roms, but yes they make tournament play a bit difficult.
Especially if someone gets Cousin It's gold watch and the next player gets Cousin It's toe nails.
But I do like to hear Gomez say "Suuuper Seance"

Other than Cousin Its hideout point bonuses, what are the differences?

No super seance, the 2 million of the mansion doesnt award another room at the same time, there are a few animations and phrases missing but i cant remember what all exactly.

Cool. I think I will go back to the original roms and see how it goes.

I've played the gold roms a number of times at shows but my machine has the regular roms in it and always will. The gold roms just seem like a bunch of added fluff, and points, to me.

JMHO, YMMV.

Mine came with the original L-1 rom, and when I switched to a Gold rom I noticed a number of improvements in kickout timing. If later versions of the standard rom incorporated those changes, they would probably be a better choice.

The other rule change I noticed which wasn't mentioned, is that starting multiball from the vault starts the jackpot value at 15M instead of 10M, and in my original rom it's 10M whether you start from the chair or vault.

I haven't tried the Gold ROMs before but this rule change has piqued my interest. The vault is the tougher way to start multiball so I like the additional reward for doing so.

Color DMD designed for the Gold roms, I feel that's the best reason to have the Gold roms installed!

Does the color DMD not work with original ROMs?

Bringing home my grail pin while up in Atlanta for SFGE, and I am psyched to be joining the club.

I spent '92 living in Japan, doing a year of factory training in my companies expatriate program. (at our electron microscope factory)

In those days, arcades were everywhere. However, the only pin on location in my prefecture was a mesmerizing new TAF. (Obviously new, since that was '92.) I would visit that arcade once a week and TAF was always the first and last thing I would play each visit.

It is one my most vivid and enjoyable pinball memories, and now I can visualize mine being brighter, louder, AND FREE TO PLAY ANY TIME!!

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It works with either ROMs.

Was this the one on that was at SFGE ?

Color DMD works with both roms. However , there are more animations with the gold set installed. Only known flaw with original roms is sometimes the jackpot reward Clip blink or go to black and white, gone in a flash so hard to notice.

No, this was a modded out TAF that I picked up in Marietta from a guy that was flipping it. Now that I have it home under the bright shop lights, I can see I have some work to do, but that's half the fun and makes it my very own.

Judging by the second transformer installed, a previous owner was planning to add some more mods?

Nothing currently connected to the output, and I will need to fabricate a safety cover and ground it. I wonder what the intention was... Maybe planned to add 100 yards of 24volt LED strip???

Gonna need a new and better speaker too. Notice anything wrong with that one?

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The speaker has a see through cone.

So, what's the feel on clear vs smokey ramps? I like the clear one the Moncla Mafia put in theirs and I'm going to do that to mine, but is there any downside to doing it?

Hello guys!

May I join this club?

Thanks!

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Welcome to the club. Do you use gold or standard roms?

Thanks! You know, that is a very good question! I just bought it and I honestly don't know. The only difference I know from standard to gold roms is that instead of "now you've done it" its says something about "bermuda"??? Well mine says "now you've done it" when you get to multiball. But is that a definate way to tell? Thanks!

Cousin its hide out is the best way to tell. If you get bonuses for cousin in from the scoop its gold roms.

Oh ok! I do get cousing it hideout....so I guess I have gold roms?

What about the "bermuda" one? Is that not gold roms?

Hmm, at HAAG in Houston last year they had a TAF with different call outs and different music. It was still gold roms, I'm not sure what they changed actually.

I'm going back to standard roms on mine. I think it makes the game more competitive and opens up more balanced scoring for different stratigies to be employed.

My AF came with the old roms inside the coin door, as well as "the bear" mod, "uncle lester" mod and other goodies. How many roms do I have to change in order to go back to standarnd?

Not sure. I'm going to need to learn that shortly as well.

Uncle Lester is a wonderful mod. It was my favorite game specific mod in pinball for years and years (until the Tron Arcade mode).

The gold ROM display 'Special Edition' under the Addams Family logo on the DMD, so it appears those are standard ROMs.

I'm slowly getting my new TAF cleaned up and tuned up. The two back leg plates on my game both had the lower bolts stripped. What a pain it is to get to the back leg plates with the cheapo playfield hinges on TAF, that don't slide forward like every other DMD pin I own.

I figured out a trick to get to them without removing the pf. I noticed if I propped the pf up fairly high, like 45 degrees, I could get my arm down in behind. I didn't have a long board handy to prop it up, but I did have some twine which I secured to the pf and over the backbox to the hinge in the back to hold it up. Maybe that tip will help someone in the future.

I know! They are a PITA! I have a Diner as well and the PF doesn't slide forward either! I almost cried as soon As I found out TAF doesn't slide forward! Anybody out there have any tricks for this?

Any mylar experts here?

Thank you fiberdude. I was really worried we would make the switch and render the color DMD Nonfunctional.

Id like to keep the gold roms in as I love the Cousin It stuff but I agree with TigerLaw in that you only have one real strategy to follow with the gold roms installed, especially if your flipper strength is healthy enough to hit the bear ramp from the left flipper.

Ok so I just got done with a session of AF. But now I have an issue: The thing flips was working great when All of the sudden it stopped working.

Everything works on "thing flips" expect the flipper actually hitting the ball as It passes through the optos. The sound, the display, everything works great except for the flipper actually hitting the ball.

Any ideas or previous experiences on how to fix this issue or what it could be? Any help is greatly appreciated! Thanks!

Yes,there's a high score for gold roms and one for standard.I'd try the gold rom again if I colored the display,but would soon be back to the standard rom.

Well guys, problem fixed!

Turns out of of the optos for "thing flips" was not aligned with the hole! Everything works great now. Thanks!

Great!!! So, what's your high score so far?

I got gold roms and never heard anything like "bermuda"... Now you've done it!

Nah, nothing big. Barely getting the hang of it. Its about 120,000,000

How did you paint the chair? Is it regular paint?

Russ,

How did you paint yours? Just trying to compare methods. Thanks!

The Electric Chair?

I used Testor's Model Paints.

Medium Brown for the base color, then black to do the fine lines ("wood grain") and Metallic Silver to do the "metal" parts straps and such.

I'm no artist at all, but I can paint what's there.

Looks loads better than the stock part, IMO.

RussM

Yes, it looks awesome! What other mods did you do to your pin?

OMG, where to start?

Magnet fuse kit
Uncle Fester
Bear Rug to bear ramp (hand-painted Playmobil)
Target Decals (all)
Full Cliffy set
Thing box decals
Bookcase decal
LEDs throughout
Swamp light (green LED)
Bookcase Spotlight
Swamp accelerator (Lee's Parts)
Purple Rose shooter rod

Still to add:
TAF Pinblades
Thing Ramp decals
Black Pinballs
Full set of Titan Ring rubbers

I tinker on my games compulsively. I'm never done.

RM

Wow! I'll get there eventually I guess. How dis you install the Thing Box Decal? Its sooo difficult to get to it. Did you remove the PF? Remove all the plastics? Thanks

I'm so happy to see the TAF club getting some posts lately.

Take off the glass, then unscrew the playfield glass channel on the back and remove it. This is essential for the added clearance.

Remove the plastics from either side of the Thing box, and then you can get to the screws holding the box down.

Clean the sh*t out of it, and then spray the entire box inside and outside with a plastic-compatible spray paint. (like Plastikote)

Use black or a lighter color if it matches whatever decals you are using better. This totally gets rid of the red plastic look, esp when the box opens.

Put the decals on and reverse the order.

RussM

Perfect information! You rock man! Thanks!!!!

More to come! I got so many questions....like for example: how do you guys manage to remove the protective box under the PF for thing? The screws are right next to the cabinet and there is just no room for a screw driver there. Is PF removal from the cabinet the only way? Thanks!

You just unscrew the screws at the top of the cover and then it simply hinges out from there

I recently picked up a couple TAF's. One is fairly nice. The other....well....here's the bookcase.

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At least the bookcase sign is still there, and the top plastic...
Probably original rubber on the mini-posts.

Really? Wow! So I don't worry about the screws on the side?

Came with white rubber rings from the factory.
But I don't doubt they are old.