Odd as the statement can apply to any piece of hardware that is over 30 years old. Caps dont care if in a system 6, 7 or 11. A lot of this hardware is way beyond expected life.

Frankly if you are not willing to get hands dirty you should not be fooling with 30 or 40 year old arcade hardware in my opinion or you need to have a good tech on call. Bulletproofing is going to happen regardless of system.

Just a follow up- I have seen distaste for early solid state hardware from people with some stratification. Some guys will not play anything without a DMD for example, hell I have seen people unwilling to play any game without a COLOR DMD minimum. The early solid states have a stigma to them perhaps unfairly that they are nothing more than solid state EM games which to some extent is true. Mostly are single level playfields with little or no multiball as a rule of thumb.

I think it is a poor choice arbitrarily ignoring them as there are some gems from this era that have great play and sound.

System 7 has many of the same exact problems System 6 has. The 40pin - cold solder joints - worn out capacitors - worn out sockets.

Other games of this era have their weak spots too - Stern and Bally with that power board that is always burned up - .100 pitch connectors that are flaky - SCRs burning out in the lamp matrix.

I don't think advanced diagnostics is the answer when the average Joe Pinball isn't going to do board work. If so, there are diagnostic ROMs that will pinpoint problems (to a certain degree) on system 3-7. Or just get a logic probe and start working through the board.

I think it has nothing to do with reliability. It has to do with the sheer volume of some of these games that were made, the depth of the rules, interest of the gameplay (lack of ramps until System 7,etc) and the quality of the light show and sounds.

Hard to beat a System 11 game (which has it's own tech weaknesses) in these areas for only a few hundred to a thousand more than a Blackout.

Compared to WPC up to today and it's no contest which explains their ~$2500 starting point these days.

I have one Bally that those .100 has been such a PITA I'm selling it.

It has been an endless issue on this pin. Like playing whack-a-mole.

I would say there are varying degrees of equity between an "entry level" pin's price point and average need of service due to age. All of the prevalent makes of early SS pins have their common issues. Bally/Stern with their burnt up rectifier pcbs and mpus with propensity for battery damage. Williams with all of the issues in this thread.

Honestly, this is very interesting.
I think that the leap from EM to solid state without chimes is a crucial moment. Games like Blackout or Firepower or Meteor are significantly faster than anything that came before.
First thing I do is make sure that the boards are solid. I do not have the skills to do this myself. SEND THEM OUT to Robotworkshop, Eugene or Chris (or whoever your experience board guy is locally).
If you bulletproof the boards, this will eliminate all kinds of fluky, weird stuff.

There's no reason to bag on early games like these.
They are spectacular.
They are pure pinball.
There are limitations to the technology BUT I think that designing a game with the parameters bought out lots of creativity and boosted pinball to the next level.

Personally, I find the vast majority of pins coming out today rather rote.
Everything is "rampy" and is basically a seven-shot-fan.
I especially hate anything with a video screen...if I want to watch the movie, I will.
If I'm playing pinball, I want to play pinball.

If you pick up one of the sought after early SS titles like Blackout or Flash Gordon, then say, something like Space Shuttle and then a system 11 title and then something like AF/TZ/CFTBL/MM/TOM/TOTAN you have a spectacular and varied lineup. Each pin will bring something else to the table and you probably won't be bored....there are some popular titles that bore me to tears: T2, Demolition Man, F-14 Tomcat...

The one slightly disappointing thing is that titles like Meteor, Blackout, Alien Poker, Flash Gordon and many other solid, fun, early SS pins is that they are single ball games. Any novice won't notice that as a weakness...they are still fun and can be very fast.

Schwaggs It looks like we were on the same path at the same time. Ha.

Side note-I'm assuming that sling shot hits are supposed to be worth something, score wise? Mine are triggering when hit but not scoring any points. All of my other switches appear to scoring as they should.

And of course one thing that makes sense is to reduce the load on the power supply by running LEDs after it has been bulletproofed....they don't need to look like clown vomit. Warm white goes a long way to helping these pins look normal and, probably, helping with longevity.

Look, I'm no great shakes when it comes to electronics. I'm good with general electrical repairs but when you get down to board level repair I'm still weak on theory but I'm good with my hands and willing to learn. There are some very good guides out on the internet and this board for how to bulletproof various platforms.

It took me a day to replace the 40 way interconnect, rebuild the power board with new caps and replace the diodes with heavy duty versions and add fuses to the bridges to protect the wiring in case of bridge failure. Not a big deal IMHO.

And yes, LED across the board. Warm White in clear and frosted domes goes a long way to reducing amp loads. More of a problem with some pins like Data East but can't hurt here either and better for the plastics and backglass too.

I'm not saying the average person will have all those skills or tools. If not they can send them out to be done. Usually costs far less than replacement boards. After that they shouldn't have to worry about it. If someone had done it already they should be good. Just commenting that the System 6 can be reliable as the others. I've had to do the same list for system 7 boards and everything I said applies to those too. Same issues.

Funny you should mention this...I was planning to try to rebuild the power supply on my next project. (A Meteor for sure, that I should get today or tomorrow..may get another classic Stern from the same guy).
If that goes well a time or two, then it makes sense to try to do the entire board set for Firepower or Alien Poker (when I find one).

As an absolute noob, with a slight bit of experience playing with some Arduinos, I rebuilt a dead Gorgar using Vid's guide. I've since rebuilt several Sys6, helped with a Sys3 and then moved on to repairing all sorts of machines, from Sys11 to Segas and WPC. This weekend, I had a Baywatch cook the launcher coil and start smoking, so any machine that isn't brand new will probably require getting your hands in the guts of the machine, regardless. I wouldn't count this against a Sys6 specifically. In fact, when I started guiding a friend into repair work, we started on my Blackout project because it is easy to work on.

Agreed we have to think of the leap forward this was. Even in the auto industry often new innovations have some quarks. Remember these Pins were built to have a life of 2-5 years not 30+.

Amen, well said

This is kind of where I'm at right now in my collection. I've got a Blackout (sys 6) a Comet (sys 9) and Earthshaker (sys 11b). I got comet and ES on a package deal 4 weeks ago. My collection has a lot of firsts:

Blackout - First to use a Rely to control GI.
Comet - First with a million point shot
Earthshaker - First with a shaker motor.

Interesting enough my brother-in-law got a Gorgar two weeks ago (first to speak)

SOLVED. I reinstalled the kickers incorrectly in regards to switch that they actuate. I don't want to be cheated out of my 10 points

Here is a little video showing how the Hardtop install came out.

Wow, looks great. I like the bumpers too.

Thanks! Sound calls were timed but I didn't do any pitch correction on them. Side note- I dropped a Berzerk(video game) voice call in a track once and pitch corrected it. There is something very satisfying about hearing "INTRUDER ALERT" in a major third.

Just picked up a Blackout with a suuuper faded backglass, anyone have an extra hanging around they'd sell to me? Does not have to be perfect.

This is not the cheapest route but a route. http://www.planetarypinball.com/mm5/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Product_Code=PPS-BLACKOUT-BG
I'm going to replace mine at some point.

FYI...

Jeff at Pinball Pimp just released cabinet stencils for Blackout!!!

Wow. That Man works quick. Benzik just sent him scans a few days ago.

Has anyone here run the French speech roms in Blackout?

I’ve been looking for some closeups of a Blackout Playfield. Specifically these two spots. I’ve found some images but when I zoom in, I lose all the detail. Or, there’s flash glare right where I need to see. Any help?

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Do these help?

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Little bit. Ideally, someone with a near 10 original playfield would post post up some nice top down, no glass, no camera flash shots for reference. Not just for me as I’m sure I’m not the only one who is missing significant portions of playfield image and still would like to touch up the original playfield rather than do a hardtop.

Mine is a 10. It’s also a Hardtop The rotate function doesn’t seem to work on my phone. I did my best to keep the shadow of my phone out of the picture.

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Perfect! Thanks Clytor!

http://pinballpimpstencils.com/blackout/

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In case any of you are wondering what the Blackout French speech sounds like, here you go.

Long story short, IC 5 and IC 6, are reversed in the rom packages available at IPDB and others. Two of them are also reversed on the French roms for Alien Poker. I found this on a MAACA forum post. Yes, I had to use google translate because the post was in French

Moved to a separate thread.
https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/odd-blackout-behavior#post-5790795

Its back!!!
Orbit completed!!!

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Can someone make me a huge favor and take a close-up picture of the wires on 2J9 please?

I'm replacing the connector and am unsure about position 3 and 5... wires are brown/green and brown/violet.

Couldn't find the wire colors in the manual on 2J9 (only positions 4 and 6 are mentioned in page 24...)

I'm thinking brown/green on 3 and brown/violet on 5 but I prefer to check with my pinheads

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Here you go

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Awesome, thank you so much found_fish !!

Back in the main lineup where Medusa was stationed.

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Ive tried to figure this out before but to no avail. If I get a strongly hit ball through the orbit, and the spinners keep spinning and I claim 2 orbit completes.
If its not hit well, then it will credit just one. Should I adjust the gap on the upper left spinner?

Mine does that too. I consider it a good shot

I need help with the flipper wiring. Mine is pretty jacked up. Need to see the wires at the coil and how the eos switch and secondary switch wiring.

I assume both of the secondary switches are for lane change?

Can I get a picture of each flipper’s wiring?

Thanks!

Im not a club member but perhaps this will help. Lane change is on the right only (my blue coil).

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Looks like someone hacked this so both flippers would lane change. Cheater! Haha

They tried to make it ahead of its time...
wonder what year dbl lane came out.?

Not sure on the double lane change.

Rules question. Can you only collect the left lane values once per ball? It seems to stop staying orbit completed once I’ve collected all the loops on one ball. Maybe a setting. I’ll look.

I'm sorry but reading this I'm not sure I understand what you're saying...? Which makes me think I might be wrong, but...

...if I hit a nice shot from right flipper through the left spinner, and all the way round (orbit) to feed back to the left flipper, the machine says "Orbit Completed". And that's it: there's just one orbit. If the shot is weak, it dribbles into the upper lanes so there's no callout at all. And of course you can't get an orbit from the left flipper because the ball hits the gate to feed those same lanes.

So I'm not sure how you would ever get the game to say "orbit completed" twice on one shot?

I guess his spinners are spinner long enough that it awards it twice. I never got that in testing on mine even by ripping them both hard with my finger.

Tony do you know if the orbit collects are capped per ball? I couldn’t get the game to award me an orbit after the first 20k collect.

You can get a right orbit from the left flipper if you remove the gate. hint hint

I believe on some Blackouts if you go through an orbit fast enough, you can collect 2 orbit completed (mine does). You'll probably need strong flippers, clean play field and a well oiled spinner.

Booooooooooooooooo!

Yeah my spinners are pretty slick and I've never had that happen either. But maybe my flippers aren't that strong.

I don't recall if the orbits are capped for sure, but I want to say they're not? I know I've gotten several orbits per ball, but I'm not usually paying too much attention to scoring since my blackout is typically brutal more often than not. I'll play test tonight and let you know!

Is it a software error that allows? Feel like I am cheating
Mine stops orbits after the highest insert light is lit. Not sure the value

I have WPC mechs in this one, just waxed it and the spinners probably spin at least 60 times on a good rip. I only get one orbit completed for a strong rip through.

Let me know what you find Tony!