That is white rust caused by oxidation of the zinc coating. You can clean with vinegar and a magic eraser, or just buy new sockets, as the galvanized coating is compromised.

PBR has socket cleaning sticks for the inside. I put one in a drill to clean them. As long as the inside is clean, you have good electrical contact.

Dremel and a wire brush tip make quick work of cleaning sockets.

Those are trash. Replace them with new ones. Yes vinegar will get the oxidation off and make them look *nice*, but say good bye to any remaining zinc; your then left with raw steel.

However, if you need to clean sockets that are not too bad (or the game is not worth the investment in new sockets) start with a *Light Socket Cleaning Stick* from PBR.

By itself the stick is not much to write home mom about. But combine it with a *drafting electric eraser* and you can do a respectable job of cleaning the working inside parts of the socket damn fast. I'd say about 10 seconds per socket, in situ.

I'm not a fan of *Dremel and a wire brush tip*...the wire brushes don't last long especially on full blast, and they tend to fling the broken wires all over $%@#'s creation. Yes, eye protection has to be worn, but damn, if you forget and catch one in the eye.
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Best way to clean them is to replace them. I recommend yoppsicles.

One of my customers gave me a box of stuff 10 years ago to throw out whatever I couldn’t use, inside the box was one of these drafting erasers. I looked it up and discovered that these things go for about $150 on eBay. I discovered on my own that this is the perfect tool for cleaning light sockets with a PBR stick. Thought I was the only one.

Unless the particular lamp socket is completely unobtainable for some reason (in this case, I'm pretty sure they're readily available), I just replace them when they start getting gnarly. The same problem is only going to resurface later.

Since that isn't a socket, you lose the ability to choose your bulbs with that solution.

Socket cleaning is never worth the effort, replace them and be done with it forever.

John

Replacing them is a lot of work but once you do so you can forget about it. Otherwise the lights will be intermittent until well after you pass on....

I've only replaced all the lamp sockets on a playfield just once. It was an early solid state game, and it didn't really take too long.

Most other times, it's just been one, two, or a small handful that were faulty or in poor condition.

Yoppsicles won't work on williams feature lamps as they require a diode.