Rochester, NY
Loosening the forward pushing tension of the back spring flaps fixed it completely on my BK
(Topic ID: 54503)
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Black Knight
Williams, 1980-
Black Knight Limited Edition
Williams, 1981
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Quoted from zacaj:Shooting the loops to light locks is a nice little difficulty increase, gives you some more strategic play. No lock memory is overly mean, imo. You earned the lock, you should keep it!
I set them both to difficult for the SFGE classics tournament and have never changed it back. League guys hate it but it really separates the men from the boys this way.
I am looking for a hardtop for Black Knight by outside edge. PM me if you have one you no longer need. Thanks.
Quoted from jeffc:I am looking for a hardtop for Black Knight by outside edge. PM me if you have one you no longer need. Thanks.
https://pinside.com/pinball/market/classifieds/ad/81990
Are they sold out? Hope they don’t stop as I’ll need another. I just finished lower and working upper now.
Learned something new today. My machine is setup on 38- no locks carry over. That's how I have always played it. All local places that have a bk are set this way too. 3 ball game I'm at a 3.1 mill. See attached pic. And yes I'm in dire need of a back glass.
Havent gave the machine much love lately though as I drug home a cocktail machine to fix. To do so I rearranged existing machines. I now got 1 hell of a slope to the right that is driving me nuts. Gotta pull glass and level machine again.
20190420_171052 (resized).jpgWhat is your tried and true method for cleaning up the red posts. I am about to repopulate my pf after a hard top install. All metal has been polished bright and looks amazing. Plastics are clean and look great. Sadly the posts are still dull after much cleaning. What are the options? Replace? If so with what model # from who? I've done some searches but have yet to find anything definitive.
Quoted from cshelden:What is your tried and true method for cleaning up the red posts. I am about to repopulate my pf after a hard top install. All metal has been polished bright and looks amazing. Plastics are clean and look great. Sadly the posts are still dull after much cleaning. What are the options? Replace? If so with what model # from who? I've done some searches but have yet to find anything definitive.
Replace. Marco has them. You could toss them in the dishwasher and see how they come out too.
https://www.marcospecialties.com/pinball-parts/C-951-7
IMG_5337 (resized).JPG
I put mine in the ultrasonic cleaner with a couple tbs of TSP. Use the heater to heat up the water. It gets so you can't really touch it so I'm guessing its 140+ degrees. A couple rounds of ultrasonic cleaning with stirring between and they come out spotless. Sometimes you need to clean rubber ring residue off a post or 2 but usually that comes off too. The heat, TSP and ultrasonic cleaning dissolve the wax and cleaner residue from posts without scrubbing.
Thanks all, I don't have an ultrasonic cleaner but seems like a good reason to get one as I've often wished i did have one. I may try marco to. I'm weird I guess, I like to try and restore first then replace if have to. Probably hails from cars and scooters.
Quoted from Xtraball:Trisodium Phosphate
Thats the one. Available at all home stores in the painting prep area:
Had a GC to Harbor Freight. Picked up their ultrasonic cleaner.
Wow! I’m now cleaning everything with this. 4 minutes and it’s done. 8 on tough stuff.
I looked at posts on Marco. They look right but seem a bit short. I’m really trying to keep as much original hardware as I can. I’m doing it on a Hard Top so yes I get the irony.
27D2B439-94A8-43F1-A338-031C56B49C28 (resized).jpeg934A17D6-B93B-4337-8362-E25D0EC48D4E (resized).jpegF8F26ADE-ADCB-46DB-8271-305A56305EF3 (resized).jpegUnsure what Spray Nine is, but I used a concentrated Simple Green with some water and TSP. My dad restores old oil lamps, uses amonia to remove soot and paraffin. This removed it all in 3 min. Where have these been all my life??
I love my ultrasonic too!
Do not put any plastic with printing in the ultrasonic. It may take all the printing off. Heat and ultrasonic can take the paint off metal parts too.
I use the ultrasonic to clean metal parts before putting them in the tumbler (to clean the dirt and grease off the parts) and after tumbling (to clean the tumbling media dust off the parts). Heat really cuts the grease!
Clean your white or neutral plastic/nylon parts first, while the water is clean. If you try and clean light colored plastic/nylon in dirty water with heat, you can end up staining some plastics.
Simple green on coloured plastics is a bad idea. Ask me know I know. It actually made everything faded looking. Spray 9 does not hurt colours. I use about 1/4 cup of it to 1.5 gallons of water in my sonic cleaner.
Also a few drops of good old regular sunlight soap works amazing.
Quoted from wolffcub:Simple green on coloured plastics is a bad idea. Ask me know I know. It actually made everything faded looking. Spray 9 does not hurt colours. I use about 1/4 cup of it to 1.5 gallons of water in my sonic cleaner.
Also a few drops of good old regular sunlight soap works amazing.
Good to know, I've not experienced that yet, have used with white and I ran all my inserts through it. It was a 60/40 or so mix. Maybe straight it might? Probably depends on the plastic too.
Pickering, ON
Quoted from wolffcub:Just a little worn.[quoted image]
Naw, I think they have a few more years left in them! 
I got my BK about a year ago. When I got it, all that was needed were some leaf switch adjustments, some new bulbs (I wound up going with color matched LEDs), and flipper rebuilds to turn it into a nice player. It's been working fine since.
I finally decided to take care of one thing that's been bugging me since I got it - no coin slot lights to illuminate the red "Quarters" plate. One of the previous owners cut it out...literally. No lamp socket on the coin door, and I found two cut wires in the harness (solid yellow and yellow striped with white) that I assumed was for the coin slot lamp.
So, I spliced in some new wire, ran them to a spare lamp socket and mounted it, and sure enough the slot is now lit. Nice! My question:
When the lights on the pin go out during attract mode, and when they flash during the launching of multiball, the coin slight lamp does the same. Is that correct, or should the coin slot light remain illuminated solid during these times? I'm thinking that it's supposed to flash/go out like the other GI lights, but I honestly don't remember the coin slight light behaving like that when I was younger and playing BK in the arcades.
Quoted from Mathazar:I got my BK about a year ago. When I got it, all that was needed were some leaf switch adjustments, some new bulbs (I wound up going with color matched LEDs), and flipper rebuilds to turn it into a nice player. It's been working fine since.
I finally decided to take care of one thing that's been bugging me since I got it - no coin slot lights to illuminate the red "Quarters" plate. One of the previous owners cut it out...literally. No lamp socket on the coin door, and I found two cut wires in the harness (solid yellow and yellow striped with white) that I assumed was for the coin slot lamp.
So, I spliced in some new wire, ran them to a spare lamp socket and mounted it, and sure enough the slot is now lit. Nice! My question:
When the lights on the pin go out during attract mode, and when they flash during the launching of multiball, the coin slight lamp does the same. Is that correct, or should the coin slot light remain illuminated solid during these times? I'm thinking that it's supposed to flash/go out like the other GI lights, but I honestly don't remember the coin slight light behaving like that when I was younger and playing BK in the arcades.
I just played several games on mine just to be sure, but my coin slot bulbs stay on all the time. Attract mode as well as multiball.
Quoted from epeabs:I just played several games on mine just to be sure, but my coin slot bulbs stay on all the time. Attract mode as well as multiball.
Hmm...interesting. I'll trace those wires back later this evening and see where they originate from. My schematics don't show the coin door, either...need to search around the internet for them.
Quoted from epeabs:I just played several games on mine just to be sure, but my coin slot bulbs stay on all the time. Attract mode as well as multiball.
epeabs - I don't suppose you could look at the lamp socket on your coin door for me? I'm wondering if there's supposed to be a capacitor across it - I looked on ipdb.com but still can't find a schematic or wiring diagram for the coin door. I checked a few different ~1980 Williams games on there including BK but none had the coin door.
Speaking of the coin door, does anyone know what goes in the center slot on this one? Is there a particular insert or decal or something for that space? There's a spot for a gi lamp behind it, so i figured it might have had some sort of insert like the "Quarters" signs that go in the adjacent ones.
IMG_20190730_160706.jpgCenter coin slot was, at the time of Black Knight, usually a Susan B. Anthony dollar. The back side of it have a coin mechanism bracket and switch?
Most games though with that coin door had a flat plate with a Williams logo on it. Usually if this is how it was originally, there's not even a bracket and switch for a coin mech.
-Hans
Quoted from Mathazar:epeabs - I don't suppose you could look at the lamp socket on your coin door for me? I'm wondering if there's supposed to be a capacitor across it - I looked on ipdb.com but still can't find a schematic or wiring diagram for the coin door. I checked a few different ~1980 Williams games on there including BK but none had the coin door.
Kris, no capacitors on mine. Some pix and the schematic with the coin door.
Quoted from frunch:Speaking of the coin door, does anyone know what goes in the center slot on this one? Is there a particular insert or decal or something for that space? There's a spot for a gi lamp behind it, so i figured it might have had some sort of insert like the "Quarters" signs that go in the adjacent ones.[quoted image]
Mine had a quarters slot. But I also realized when I disassembled it and cleaned my coin door and reassembled it, I didn't put things back in the proper position. My left coin slot which says quarters has the dollar size slot, and the other two have quarter-size slots even though one of them is marked dollars. Oops. Another small project to tackle.
20190730_195714 (resized).jpg20190730_195659 (resized).jpg20190730_195914 (resized).jpgThanx for the info, @epeabs. It's going to take a bit more sleuthing on my part.
I do have that cabinet wiring diagram in my stack of paperwork...I had dismissed it earlier because at first glance, it looked to be all switches and no lamps. It wasn't until I looked at it closer after you posted it that there's a GI lamp circuit toward the bottom with three lamps - that must be the coin door slots. No indication of any caps there, either.
I'm wondering if there is something special with the lamp socket itself. Thanx to your picture of the inside of the coin door, I can see that your lamp sockets look different than the lamp sockets on the playfield (at least on my playfield). The lamp socket I'm using on my BK coin door is a spare I had from one of my older Bally games (my BK had no lamp sockets in the coin door when I bought it last year). Maybe the Williams coin door lamp sockets have some sort of capacitance built into the base? I'll do some more digging, and I may still try putting a cap on the suspect lamp socket leads just to see what it does, if anything.
Thanx again....
Mathazar
No the sockets are regular sockets. I got new ones from marco when I redid mine.
Frunch
Did you find your filler plate? I don't have any "W" ones but I got a couple "M" ones. 
The one above the "dollar" plate is brand new and the exact same size as the dollar plate and screen printed. The other is just a tad smaller? And the logo is actually cut into the plate just a little and paint filled. Click on the picture and I think you can see. The finish is the same the flash just got it.
Quoted from Travish:Mathazar
No the sockets are regular sockets. I got new ones from marco when I redid mine.
Frunch
Did you find your filler plate? I don't have any "W" ones but I got a couple "M" ones.
The one above the "dollar" plate is brand new and the exact same size as the dollar plate and screen printed. The other is just a tad smaller? And the logo is actually cut into the plate just a little and paint filled. Click on the picture and I think you can see. The finish is the same the flash just got it.
[quoted image][quoted image]
I'll take an "M" one!!
I opted to go with Williams center plate instead of the Dollars yellow. was lucky to find one! My BK is also wired for a lamp socket in the middle but I came across some post on flippers.com about a recently found BK that was NIB! loved the pics and am restoring mine off what i can see there.
www.flippers.com/nib_bk.html
Quoted from PinballConspiracy:I opted to go with Williams center plate instead of the Dollars yellow. was lucky to find one! My BK is also wired for a lamp socket in the middle but I came across some post on flippers.com about a recently found BK that was NIB! loved the pics and am restoring mine off what i can see there.
www.flippers.com/nib_bk.html
Thanks for posting... What a great ref. for a OEM Black Knight.
Thanks to flippers.com for documenting the game.
Quoted from lowbeau67:Make custom floor mats for all my games. Just finished this for new acquisition. Cameo is an awesome tool.[quoted image]
That is awesome!
So I had the driver board and MPU rebuilt. Put it back together and it burned up again within about 60 seconds. Prior to doing so, I realized the bottom left drop targets were not working properly. I've confirmed the transistor that burned up is for that set of targets. I then discovered the coil for the targets was melted badly, so I replaced it, repaired the board again, and again, the same transistor started smoking within 60 seconds. I turned it off in time not to burn it up as bad. I'm not sure where to go from here since I have replaced the coil on the target that I know is related to the transistor on the board that keeps melting. Any thoughts?
I had the driver board and MPU rebuilt. Put it back together and it burned up again within about 60 seconds. Prior to doing so, I realized the bottom left drop targets were not working properly. I've confirmed the transistor that burned up is for that set of targets. I then discovered the coil for the targets was melted badly, so I replaced it, repaired the board again, and again, the same transistor started smoking within 60 seconds. I turned it off in time not to burn it up as bad. I'm not sure where to go from here since I have replaced the coil on the target that I know is related to the transistor on the board that keeps melting. Any thoughts?
Played around with some different lighting options for the back box tonight. Most of the LEDs I was trying seem to cause hot spots in most areas. I'd seen a version somewhere where someone used LED strip lighting. So I had some on hand in Warm White and redid the whole back box lighting with it. I really like it because it's very even. Picture makes it darker looking than it really is in person.
20190811_151605 (resized).jpg20190811_151632 (resized).jpgQuoted from MultiBallMike:I had the driver board and MPU rebuilt. Put it back together and it burned up again within about 60 seconds. Prior to doing so, I realized the bottom left drop targets were not working properly. I've confirmed the transistor that burned up is for that set of targets. I then discovered the coil for the targets was melted badly, so I replaced it, repaired the board again, and again, the same transistor started smoking within 60 seconds. I turned it off in time not to burn it up as bad. I'm not sure where to go from here since I have replaced the coil on the target that I know is related to the transistor on the board that keeps melting. Any thoughts?
Coil diode soldered in backwards? Power (often thicker, often double wire) on the banded side of the coil.
2 weeks later
Just joined the club. Anyone have a hardtop sitting around? I bet someone bought a hardtop at Expo last year and didn't get around to installing it.
Any hoarders out there want to part with a nice repro playfield (preferred) or a Hardtop (close second) for a Black Knight. If you have one, think about when you got it, and why it's still not in the machine.
Like many of you out there, I am restoring my BK which I got nearly two years ago. Thank you to all of you that contributed instructions, pictures and videos!
My restoration of the cabinet went OK, but not great. I have decided to go with vinyl, but I have not been able to find any vinyl kits for the BK, so I created my own, in two flavors: the original set, and a modified one. I still need to complete the coin door, but here is a preview. Hopefully going to my local printer on Wednesday.
Original - BK Right Cabinet Vector Art (resized).pngModified - BK Right Cabinet Vector Art (resized).pngOriginal - BK L&R Head Vector Art (resized).pngModified - BK L&R Head Vector Art (resized).png
Worksop
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