I recently installed a Buthamburg repro - would be happy to send pics & discuss experience with it.

I also have 2 used playfields that I'd be willing to sell if you're interested in going that route.

I would definitely hardtop mine if it was available. My bride has the worst playfield of any of my games. It’s probably very average overall but compared to the other ones I have looks pretty bad. Here’s pics of my Williams games. You can definitely tell a difference between the bride and others.

01E2076B-53F9-4586-B115-150C28B02813 (resized).jpeg

0688931B-007C-4372-A89F-81CF5B0148A6 (resized).jpeg

1DE5D040-84C0-4B80-8E76-76CC8C0D84DC (resized).jpeg

9D3A159D-25EE-4A83-AE6B-EF2E5A085DCA (resized).jpeg

The NVRAM isn't too bad if you take your time and make sure not to pull up any traces. If you haven't done work like this before I would recommend sending it to a pro. The first one I did manually with a solder sucker which is tedious but doable. Now I have a Hakko Fr300 desoldering gun which makes it much quicker.

I would love a new playfield too but I sort of just want the "shortcut" hardtop method to restore this one

Well if you've had some practice I say go for it! A bit more practice is always a good idea, but if you aren't damaging your practice boards I say just dive right in! My 2 biggest tips are 1. Do not heat the solder pad any longer than you have to and 2. Do not try to force the old chip out. Odds are you will not completely clear every hole on the first attempt, and you may have to go back and add solder again and remove it to those stubborn holes. Once that's done the chip will easily remove and you won't pull up any traces or pads. Good luck, you can do it!

I am by no stretch of the imagination an expert, but i am unaware of any pins from that era that used decals.
I suspect you body was in worse condition than the head, and somebody applied decals during a rebuild.

Here is a pic of my beat up BB.
I think your machine may have been outdoors at one time.

20201204_145548 (resized).jpg

The sticker issue raises it's ugly head again...

Supposedly, during cabinet manufacture, they applied a white adhesive backed vinyl to the cabinets, then screen printed the artwork on top of it while on the cabinet. So when it gets damaged, people assume it was a sticker to begin with, or so I have been told. Mine had damage under the legs where the legs had basically caused the vinyl to peel away from the cabinet which made me think they were stickers from the get go, but that was supposedly not the case. Besides I bought my Bride when she was only 2-3 years old for $950, so it is not been restored or reworked, it's all original, just a little route weary with bumps and bangs on the cabinet corners and edges.

LOL this has come up before yep and i argued at the time that although the originals were not a decal like the new repro type..technically speaking they are virtually the same thing. All modern decals are a vinyl base (usually white but can be clear) that's printed on digitally. The originals as far as i know used a very similar white vinyl base and were screen printed as you mention. Horses for courses as they say When i stripped my BOP for the restore it had the same vinyl undercoating and removed in the same way you would remove a modern decal that's stuck on well, heat gun and scraper. Seems also that a LOT of original BOP's had that colour discrepancy between the headbox and cab sides. Mine was like that and from what i can recall all the original machines i've seen over the pond here have been the same.
Edit* I must also mention that my backbox was not only a blueish colour but was also a screen printed vinyl base like the cab sides.

This is why i love Pinside.
Learn something new almost everyday.

Thanks guys.

Side note, I purchased a decal set to redo my BoP, just have not picked a time of when to begin said task....

From all the info i've gathered over the years i've been in pinball collecting (about 12) and here on Pinside there was variations with a lot of things in production of machines. This includes various manufacturers of cabinets, playfields and most likely, in the finishing of the cabinets. A mate of mine has a BOP and his backbox was screen printed directly onto wood and the cab had the vinyl substrate screen printed whereas mine had the screen printed vinyl cab and backbox. You won't regret the repro PF's from Peter, they are top notch quality!!! I've got to disagree on the black decals though They do look cool i gotta agree BUT i LOVE my purple!!

Biglouie

The buthamburg playfields are beautiful but extremely soft- clamping mine to a rotisserie with microfiber cloth padding under the clamps left microfiber pattern in the clear. It’s in a hidden location under the apron and at the back, but be very careful when populating yours. A tiny slip will leave a dent. I even left 8 weeks cure time before clamping mine. For contrast, I recently repainted and re-cleared the Target alpha next to my BoP (see pic) with Spraymax in a can. I didn’t have the same issues with the clear- spraymax was hard as a rock the day after I sprayed. None of that would stop me from buying the buthamburg. The quality is still top notch compared to other repros.

Also- if you haven’t already, check out Rad Cals for the BoP. They’re very easy to apply and I think they add some nice shine to this game. I believe they come in black or purple.

I have tons of pics from my restore if you need them when repopulating yours. Just send a DM.

08CAECB6-B8D0-414D-B370-FAF1D8096F32 (resized).jpeg

The clear on my Bathumberg PF was not totally dry when I got it. By advice from Ron Kruzman I let mine dry at least 6 months before I started my playfield swop. The best thing to do to test the clear first. Try to put your fingernail into it to make an impression in a hidden area. If you can you need to wait longer. That said the Bathumberg PFs are top notch and have never regretted doing the swop on my BoP.

I agree- and peter offers fantastic customer service. Just saying- heed all warnings to wait and let the playfield fully cure.

On a separate note, in case anyone else ever runs across the weird BoP head issue I was having, although all switches in the game registered correctly, there must have been some issue with the second switch after the ball rolls out of the head. I noticed that the head started working again when I pulled those wires, so I replaced the switch. All good now.

The issues I was having with the skill shot switches was resolved by adjusting the switch directly in front of the plunger. I didn’t realize that pressing and releasing that switch is what triggers the solenoid in the skill shot lane to kick.

Last issue remains my lights- all lights test fine but the first light in some light matrix columns remains lit. I tried resoldering the first light first column, checking the molex at the board, checking the diodes at each light. All appears correct. I remain stumped on this issue.

Duff? If you mean a transistor on the board in the backbox, I don’t think so. Board is new. I have another board that was recently repaired so I may try swapping just to rule it out though.

It’s not a transistor. You have a short somewhere in the lamp matrix.

This sounds crazy but several years ago I had troubke with the gi on my Judg Dredd. The fith light string kept going out. I coudnt figure it out. I tested everything in the world and after months of problem it came down to a shorted bulb. The bulb itself had an internal short. I was to th point of testing every thing in the circuit. New bulb and its still working great years later .

It’s worth trying a trying a bulb replacement

I finished my swap last month (I posted a 'thank' to Peter in his thread: https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/bop-bride-of-pinbot-playfield-repro-2018-pl-50002 ). I didn't notice any softness at all, but mine sat for several months before I installed it because I also got an Alien Poker and had them shipped together. I guess my timing is just lucky - the AP sat for months in Europe awaiting the finish of the BoP and the BoP sat for months here while I took my time with the AP swap. Net-net, by accident I followed the 'let it sit' advise. In any case, like others I'm really thrilled with the quality of what I got - for the price of an iPhone I got true master craftsmanship quality.

-Rob
-visit https://www.kahr.us to get my daughterboard that helps fix WPC pinball resets or my Pinball 2000 H+V Video Sync Combiner

Mine was perfectly fine also but it did sit in a box for over 12 months before it was used.

1. Yes, the skill shot rubbers are just loose on those spindles.
2. No replacements available that I’m aware of. Someone a few posts back created new clear ones by sandwiching 2 titan rubbers together.
3. No rubber or anything on the skill shot launcher

Put the bulb in the skill shot socket (just above the shooter rod) before you start adding ramps & stuff. A regular bulb that size won’t fit through the hole from the underside and it’s a PITA to try and replace from the top side after everything else is back together.

Only thing I'll add is that in my restoration, I cleaned and treated the original rubbers and they literally expanded and now look great. You do have to treat them every now and then with rubber restorative though.

Wow your face ball guides are awesome !
Could you sell me some for my bop that needs it...

Nko

Great job! Depending on price I may be in for set as well.

I‘d like to purchase 1 or 2 sets as well!

Mine didn’t move by hand either. It’s normal.

Those motors are well and truly pre brushless so just the bog standard type and i'm fairly sure that switching polarity will just make the motor turn the opposite direction. Great job on the face ball guides BTW!!

Quite frankly, it looks to me like that zero-ohm was originally in that lower W1 hole but was pulled out and connected to the W2 hole (I think so because the component would look centered between the W1 holes if the bottom lead was cleanly shaped like the top lead). Further, applying heat to the leg while pulling it out would likely muck up that lower hole, so that situation supports the theory too. Hope the lower pad is there for your re-jumper effort.

-Rob
-visit https://www.kahr.us to get my daughterboard that helps fix WPC pinball resets or my Pinball 2000 H+V Video Sync Combiner Kit

Oh la la.

34E95A0E-52AE-4F03-A9F4-912353F00B18 (resized).jpeg
091FA6B7-37BB-43BA-A27F-3ABDA3A4E931 (resized).jpeg
670C4587-02AB-4177-A0E8-D54539EB6512 (resized).jpeg

Was there a run of repro playfields before the Buthamberg ones? I found one for sale, looks brand new. He thought it was from Germany but it doesn't have the Diamond Plate logo.

If anyone has good, high res pics of the wiring under their playfield that they could send me I would greatly appreciate it. I'm especially looking for clear pics of the wiring to the various light boards by the outlanes, but I want to compare all of my wiring to a known working BoP to see if there's anything out of place.

Thanks!