Medieval Madness
Williams, 1997Am installing a new Mirco playfield on MM. The wood is HARD and I am afraid to pound the new tri-nuts (T-nuts) into the new playfield for fear of cracking the clearcoat or wood. Tried a few of them and had to pound the heck out of it to get them installed. Scared to do anymore!! ha ha (but true!) Swapped MB playfields a few months ago, but bought one from Gene and the wood did not seem nearly as hard. Any suggestions?
Here's a tool you can make that works great.
http://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/tz-repro-playfield-from-mirco-reviews?ti=1
You can either use a screw in the t nut with a stackup of washers and turn the screw to draw the t-nut down. Or get an old fashioned "Molly Gun" tool to pull the screw and draw the T nut down. Here's an example, although the ones I have are older and different. I have not used them for installing T nuts, but it seems like it could work well.
I just did my Mirco MM playfield swap last month. I just used a 3/8 socket extension to help me pound the T nuts in, worked great (see picture, I placed the left side of the extension over the T nut and hammered away). Never had to worry about putting my hammer through the playfield!
IMG_2416.JPGThanks to everyone for the responses! Really cool to see the tools that you guys used. Thx for posting. My brother brainstormed and got a c-clamp from Lowe's and we pressed each t-nut in, while protecting the other press point of the clamp (and other side of the playfield) with hardwood and a towel. Worked great.
Quoted from PNBLWZD:You can either use a screw in the t nut with a stackup of washers and turn the screw to draw the t-nut down. Or get an old fashioned "Molly Gun" tool to pull the screw and draw the T nut down. Here's an example, although the ones I have are older and different. I have not used them for installing T nuts, but it seems like it could work well.
th.jpg 13 KB
I like this idea 
with a little bit of felt on the bottom of the molly tool, you don't have to worry about marring up your playfield. also, because you're drawing the t-nut into the playfield straight (and not rotating the screw/bolt holding it), it eliminates the potential for the 3 or 4 "teeth" on the t-nut not grabbing and tearing up the backside of your playfield
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South Lebanon, OH
Vancouver, BC