Thats perfect for you! If I come across any troubles along the way with the new pf, i will post them. Theres a thread allready about the new playfield but i have not read it that much. I think there are some tips in there anyway.

This project has been ongoing for 2 and a half year now.. thats, i dont know.. long time! But, ive not worked on the game for like a year because of the playfield. The old one will get refurbished still, and even though the game will get done without it ive promised myself to not be a slacker so I will paint it and clear coat it.

I'm back in business! Sorry for the long down times.. Anyway, tomorrow I'll post quite a few updates on the progress. It's really getting somewhere now. =)

Thanks =)
The update will have to wait til tomorrow though hehe.. flu, too much work, kid and girl friend.. but.. still pinball!

Allright, gonna try to recap the project =)

Late december I got this in the mail (allready took off some of the wrapping when I took the pics):
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And I must say I am very happy with the new playfield, thanks peter!
I thought that if I was ever going to buy a new playfield for a game it had to be this one since ive allready made huge efforts restoring it. Or maybe its rebuilding it..

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More pictures of the shiny playfield will come later. Did not take any at the time since I was really eager to get going!

I dont have a good place to work on the game which is super frustrating. But after a while you just accept the situation and kinda forget about it... the bed will do as a workbench. Very good height and all to save my knees and my back...
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Looks pretty nice though!

Heres a picture of the first part I added to the underside.
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I had a plan before I started, otherwise it would be even more complicated than it really is.

First I put all the coil assemblies, lamp boards and other assemblies back. Next I added the switch harness, next the lamp harness and last the coil harness. The wire harness under this game is actually three different ones which lay on top of each other. That made it a whole lot easier to reassemble. Now after ive done it, I think maybe i shouldve started with the coil harness since it would have made it a bit easier to reach all the assemblies when soldering the coils back.

Parts cleaned and ready for assembly, all put in bags with specific numbers. I made a list of each bag and folders with pictures of how it goes back on when I disassembled the game. If i had not done it i wouldve been f***ed.. maybe I couldve managed to get the assemblies back but the lamps wouldve been hard. Not to mention the topside of the playfield..
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Flipper assemblies that look almost like brand new!
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And some lamp boards re mounted:
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All shiny dissapearing post assembly:
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More playfield underside porn:
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And the "small wheel/jackpot kicker" assembly:
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More to come!

Why not play some pinball arcade during the breaks, dreaming of my other huge project =)
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Thanks Paul! =) Its getting closer and closer to the first ball in play!

Next thing was to clean up the head unit. Believe me, it was a pain in the ass to do! The basic idea behind the way its constructed is good but it aint easy to tinker with.

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While I was at it i took the whole thing apart, replaced the coil sleeves, rubber grommets and tumbled the metal parts.
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Some of the plastic ball guides on the faces had yellowed over the years so I tried to soak them in 35% hydrogen peroxide and bombard them with uv light. It works on some other plastic parts, like the plastic clips for the wire harnesses but these guys took forever to get any noticable difference. Had them in there for like 48 hours but then I gave up. They are not super yellow and when I reassembled it I put the clearest ones on the first face (originally they were the most yellowed ones since theyd been exposed to.. uv light), and the worst ones on the 4th human face. There theyll blend in better with the brides skin tone.
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Id like to say "dont try this at home" but I know some crazy fellas like me will try it anyway. So, word of warning: the hydrogen peroxide is dangerous. You dont wanna get it on your skin (will hurt a lot and you will get bleached to pure white and stuff) not to mention in the eyes. So, dont blame me if you fuck up trying this! Read up on it before even concider it, its a dangerous chemical.

"Hi there!"
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Next up was the gear box for the head turning motor. This is over the top like most of this project but I figured why not continue in the same manner =)

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I disassembled it, took out the gears and scraped (yes it had dried up quite good) off the old grease. Let them soak for a while in some grease remover and then rinsed it and dried it. Last i put on some new bearing grease on the gears. Not too much but a bit of it to try and make it running more smooth.
To disassemble the gear box you need to drill out two of the rivets holding it together. Its possible to tighten it up with two new screws and nylon lock nuts. If you put them in the right way, aint much clearence around the gear box when its reattached to the head unit.

Forgot to mention earlier that I put cold white leds in the eyes and a red one AND a red condom in the.. euhm.. mouth of the bride..

I struggled with the head unit for a couple of nights but after it was done it now looks decent:
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So the playfield is back in the machine. I was a little worried about it fitting or not since I built a whole new cabinet (except for the backbox). But I tried that very early in the process and now the playfield "hooks" at the bottom are aligned and it looks it will fit like a glove. Hopefully its not laying too high to touch the glass but we will see. Dont think I have to worry.

Ball feeder coil assembly
(and no more rusty/corroded old lockdown bar reciever which is pretty much standard):
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Rebuilt pop bumpers and a new rubber at the slingshot below the bumpers:
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The top side of the playfield, not much on there yet:
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And the underside:
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Before connecting all the playfield connectors to the boards in the backbox I tightened the harness up with some cable stripes. Thought I had a brand new slit hose laying around but I think it went into my ID4 project. So, need to get a new one but this will do so far:

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Double checked everything quite a bit before I dared to turn on the power but everything looks to work as intended:
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The face is lighting up in all lamps test mode:
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And the general illumination also seem to work. Only lamps present in the bumpers but they work. I put in some red pop bumper leds there and hopefully I wont need to change them in a while. Im happy I did not mess up the bumper light wires under the playfield. Its not the slickest design but now I can forget about it for this time. For the hell of it I threw in a red led behind the rightmost extra ball insert too just for a test. It flashes!
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I made a few tests from the in game menus for a start. Especially did this to make sure the fricking head was working properly. It did, sort of.. only it turned the wrong way and the mouth coil did not work. I was thinking something had gone wrong when I reassembled the head but then I remembered I had switch the wires on the motor because I mounted it the wrong way. Not sure what the heck I was thinking about when I switched them but thats what I did. So, i switched them back and the head now turns the right way.

Still the mouth coil did not fire. I measured for voltage at the connector for it under the playfield but found none. Then I remembered.. the ball feeder coil was not soldered back so the circuit was broken there and hence the power did not reach the mouth coil. This has happened to me before on other projects so if you find something does not work when you reassemble a game remember to solder everything back before you dig too deep into it.

Another thing with the head unit that was very frustrating are the eye switches. They are a mess to line up properly because if they stick up too high (to get triggered by the ball) they will get in the way and get ripped by the turning head. I tried to replace the eye switches with the same kind of blade as is in the mouth switch but that did not work. Thats why there are different switch blades in the eyes and the mouth on this game. Might be possible to find a better way to do it for better precision but for now the original setup will do.

I can also mention if someone is having troubles with the head unit that the most common issues are the position switch not working properly (or its misaligned) or the head motor relay board which is located under the playfield. It tends to have its solder joints cracked so one thing to try is to reflow the solder joints on the board. I did that on mine while I hade it out even though it was working.

I reattached the coil wires and now the mouth coil did work again. Next I went into the head cycle test mode and the head does work pretty well now. But, sometimes when it turned the lower pop bumper would fire. Easily fixed by adjusting the bumper switch to less sensitivity.

Another thing I noticed when I turned on the game was that there were vibrations coming from the transformer.
Ive never noticed that before and I checked with some other games and its more than on those. My theory is that the vibrations spread out better in the cabinet since I glued the bottom to the rest of it. The original bottom was just slid into the guides in the cabinet sides.

Still, the vibrations are not super good. I think they are coming from some loose windings in the transformer. No biggie right now but with time more will probably break loose and they may even scratch of the coating on the wires causing a short. The fix for this would be to let some electric winding company tighten it up and rebake the transformer. Not sure what it costs but I will look into it.
Ive read somewhere that a bridge rectifier on the power board being put in in the wrong direction could also cause vibrations but im not sure about that one. Never the less I turned on the transformer with nothing connected whatsoever and the vibrations were still there.

Yeah, got some stuff done. Too eager to pause and update the thread especially when I've got limited amounts of time. But, it's fun to post too so I'll get better at it, promise.

Les73gtx, yes not worth going thru it if you skip the details =)

Luzur, thanks

The reassembly continues... nice and clean. The alu rails are decent but not perfect:
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Time for the ramps... i started to assemble them a few months back but discovered this when i dug them out:

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So.. I had to consult my teardown pictures to make it =) But, the new ramps looks great and hopefully they will stay like that for quite some time! I should get some protectors for them but they seem a bit hard to find. Will look into it a bit more later on.

Some steps back, before the ramps and things I tried out some leds. I put one chipped ones under all the inserts. Everyone is color matched to the insert. Even the yellow and orange ones. Ive heard the yellow and orange ones are better off with a white led under them but I think it looks very good so I wont bother. Same with the skill shot ramp lights, all color matched to the decal on the egg crate plastic, and to mask the nasty bare led bulb look I threw some bulb condoms in there too. Looks great!

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There are a tiny bit of ghosting with the leds but not much at all so I can live with it.
In the big picture, I did not put blue leds under the plastic to the left. Its a camera white balance issue since they are cold whites.

I tried cold whites at first since I thought the space theme would be nice with cold white GI. Now ive changed my mind and changed them to warm white frosted ones instead. In my opinion cold whites look like the game is some sort of refrigerator or something. Its ugly and looks like you just threw them in there without feeling. If there was some led variant with just a hint of blue in it, and not like super blue, it would be nice to put under the left long plastic. As well as purple ones under the right one. It looks a bit purple or pinkish in this picture also because of the camera acting out. Still gives ideas for improvement/a different setup...

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As for the brides eyes and mouth I put in cold whites in the eyes and a red one in the mouth. It still has the red condom on it since I dont fancy the look of the bare led bulb that much. The cold ones in the eyes look good color wise but to be honest I think they are a bit too bright when youre on the second face with the eye sockets. Might try to do something about it later. Same goes for the ball locked when lit lamp, that is also a tad too bright.

Yes the ramp protectors would be very nice to have. Need to look for them, must exist somewhere..

Never heard of the ice blue leds, will have a look!

I agree to the idea of the sparkling inserts. I might try and see what looks better. Great idea! =)

Hehe no the "clean inserts" thing is not an issue.. =)

Will post more in a while..

Here is a question about a post at the mini playfield slings (circled in red).. It sat there originally and ive seen it on others pictures as well.
Its holding one of the cylindrical plastic posts but I wonder why it has a threaded top... its not used for anything as far as i can tell. The two other posts to the left are for attaching a plastic but this one doesnt have any use. Would be better with just a wood screw with a phillips head like on other posts on the playfield.

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Anyone knows of a purpose ive missed or is it just a design mistake?

Im also wondering about this hex post in the far right back of the mini playfield... doesnt seem to fill any purpose either... only thing I can think of is its there to prevent the ball from bouncing up on and behind the rubber and get stuck. Still it looks a bit weird imo. Mine had a screw in the top of it too but I have not seen that on pictures of other games...

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Thanks for the info on the posts guys =)

I think the one on the mini pf is some sort of last minute correction. Like the ball can get stuck there if it's abscent. Wonder if it's possible but it's the only explanation I can think of.

I have another one for you too; at the base of the heart beat ramp there is a screw holding it to the black wood rail (shooter lane inner wood). I wonder if the ramp is supposed to get bent by this screw, mine do get bent a little and it feels it puts a bit too much stress on the ramp to be comfortable.. Am I missing like a spacer there or should the ramp lean to the right to make it easier for the ball to reach the shooter lane again if it takes the right lane from the mini pf?

Well.. Will update more as soon as I can. I'm in the middle of another work project right now so the hours are crazy.