Yes, I'll add my voice as well. The Centaur II is hideous.

Side note, I was able to grab a silver Centaur CPR playfield, thank you!

Only bronze grade Centaur pfs left as of 5am eastern.

I just posted an explanation of how I retrofit a Williams 20-9247 magnet in my Centaur.

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/centaur-20-9247-magnet-retrofit#post-3563730

This is great work. By the way, why do people end up needing to replace their magnets in the first place? Do they get locked on and burn up like on Addams Family?

That's what must have happened to mine. The magnet was already MIA when I bought the machine, Q18 was shot, and I have some discoloration of the playfield right above the magnet.

The newer magnets have built-in thermistors now, so I would guess this was probably an issue with some of the earlier ones.

Do you think it would be wise for Centaur owners to install a fuse in series with the Magnet power wires? - like the fuse kit commonly sold for TAF. What rating would you suggest?

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I really don't have enough experience to say whether or not magnet issues are common in this machine. Given the general lack of discussion of the topic, I would think magnet issues are unusual. Somebody please correct me if I'm wrong.

I have yet to play a Centaur pinball with a bad magnet.
Reading stored ball switches, on the other hand, all the time.
As for the Addams Family pinball, the left magnet goes out,
all the time, this problem started after the game was out
and about for a proximity three to four years.

I got my first pinball machine today and it just had to be a Centaur.

Work to be done first is to try and get some sound working... I've read up every day for the past 3 weeks on possible causes and repairs to carry out on the S&T board etc which I am looking forward to starting tomorrow.

I also picked up a decent replacement playfield from someone who had upgrade to a CPR pf so a full swapover is on the cards soon... lots more reading to do first... love this place and I'm learning so much

So I'm a pinball owner now... a Centaur Club Member which is a proud moment woohoo

I was thinking of installing a thermal fuse on my Centaur magnet (& on my Fireball zipper flipper magnet) The fuse could in installed & physically mounted to the magnet with a dob of silicone, the idea is that if the transistor shorts & the magnet stays on & heats up it will trip the thermal fuse before the magnet shorts out & which can also damage the playfield. You can get pretty low temp thermal fuses.

I was thinking that with a regular inline fuse set up the magnet will stay energised if the transistor fails & get quite hot before it blows the fuse?

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Welcome. If you have questions on the swap, let me know. Did one in December. Also I'm getting repair work done in 2 weeks on a non-working S&T board right now, so what I learn about that might be helpful.

That's good to know, thanks. spent much of today doing some solder reflow work and changed all the caps on the S&T along with the trimmer pots. I also popped out all the chips and cleaned the legs up before carefully refitting... Not a peep yet out of it. I need to do some more thorough checks... I've got this strange nagging feeling that I'm an LED flash down, I get a single flash with a pause then 3 more... I think... it's too late now to boot it up. I know I won't get a fifth flash as I've no AY chip in and all EE's linked... ah well, tomorrow is another day

So I needed a Centaur Apron, and couldn't find one. So I took scans from a pinside member and converted them to vector art in Illustrator. I'll probably have this either printed on vinyl for my apron or have a set of stencils made, since I have all channels separated. I'm officially putting my shingle out here at Pinside for anyone needing some vector art created. Call it a way to earn a little pinball money. Here's a medium resolution jpeg image of the Centaur result:

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Just picked this up yesterday!!!!! So excited been looking for one for a while and got a great deal on it

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Nice acquisition there... I got mine this week also and I've neglected all normal living while I work on the ongoing S&T sound problems

Great acquisitions! RESTORE CENTAUR CENTAUR CENTAUR

Hey guys picked up a centaur this weekend and am looking for replacement drop targets. Seems like marcos and some of the other normal sites are sold out. Anyone know who else sells these?

Yes, Pinball Resource has them in stock for $4 each under Playfield Parts > Drop Targets. I think all of the sellers get them from Pinball Resource.

Correction - Pinball Resource appears out at well. But Classic Arcades shows them in stock for $36 a complete set of 8.

Thanks for the tip ... just purchased a set. I'm not happy that my previous set is wearing the letters off the front. Will definitely cover the new set with Mylar.

Anyone know where to get a centaur overlay

I'd like to know this as well!

Me too.

My custom Centaur coming together.

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That cabinet is awesome, but I'd hate to be the one who has to handle it when moving it. OUCH!

I just noticed on my solenoid expander board, there's a line printed on the PCB where a jumper normally would be. But mine appears to be clipped off. Is that normal for this game or did someone do a hack. I hate it when people start clipping off componenets that were part of the original design. Here's the board with a pen pointing to where the wire / jumper was clipped off.

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Here's another solenoid expander board (from Medusa) where the wire-jumper is not clipped off.

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It's game-specific and you have to look at the schematics. Medusa shows the jumper, Centaur does not, so yours should be fine.

calico1997 Here is a pic of mine and it does look like the link is factory snipped out rather than just not fitted.

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calico1997
The Bally Solenoid Expander relay had two functions.
1) Expand the allotted solenoids in a game.
2) As a Snubber relay to one coil.
Bally used it as a Snubber relay to the ball kickout assembly
on Centaur. Thus, the clipped jumper.
On all other Bally pinballs from the early 80's, it is used as
a Solenoid Expander.

I have learned something new! Thanks for the explanation.

Agh I couldn't help it!IMAG2289 (resized).jpg

My boy, Beemer, approves of the new speaker system for Centaur...

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Picked up a new slot machine. I can't help but think the designers at the Bally Gaming division were influenced by the Centaur color scheme.

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New member to pinside... just bought first ever pinball machine: Centaur!

No other pin remotely close to Centaur. Great choice!

Awesome first pin, well done!

Anyone replaced the back and bottom of these Bally cabinets?

Picked up a Centaur in the last year and while I have it apart to swap the playfield I noticed the back particle board on the cab is separating from the sides. Since it is busted at the bottom I think I will replace it and the beer stained bottom while I have the back off.

Any advice or tricks to do that? I have replaced the back and bottom on a System 6 so was wondering if Bally is any different besides the crappy particle board.

Ever notice how these simple playfield swaps snowball to bigger restores. I still hope not to stencil if I do the back right.

If u change your mind on this project, I would be a buyer.

I did it on my Centaur. Relatively painless if you have done any wood working before.

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wow! one of the top 3 ss Bally's to be your first ever,Impressive.

So my dream centaur is about to get built by Keith Holbrook. I have been gathering parts for a long time and was going to do it myself. I even found another centaur that I thought would be a donor but it just turned out to nice once I got it playing. So I decided to wait a bit longer and get a pro to restore/rebuild it.

My centaur will be using one of the three special white playfields CPR did years ago, brand new cabinet, NOS backglass, chrome everything and black chrome legs. Upgraded sound and retro LEDs. It should be a heck of a game once done and dumb how much I'm putting into it , but hey it'll be worth it to have something truly special. I'll post pics when it's finished up. Should be about 4 weeks we are guessing.

Just can't wait. My current centaur is pretty nice and I probably would have never went down this path if I found it first. However I've been wanting this to get done for a long time now ever since I saw the white playfield, so I just kept at it.

I hate you.
lol
Can I buy your other one?

I feel the love. It will be for sale but I think there is a local guy who already has dibs. I'm not letting it go until this other one is done though.

Looks like we are putting s 10" sub with tweeter, enclosure and 200Watt amp in it. If anyone heard the amazingly loud centaur at TPF in 2016 that one was an 8" without an enclosure. It could blow the playfield glass so we're trying to do a step better and make sure the machine is protected.

Looks like I may be taking it to TPF in 2018 and have it in Keith's booth. He's excited about it too but that is a ways off.

So probably be about six weeks before it's done since chroming is going to take a while.

The old playfield has been stripped and the new one is coming together.

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Man I love that playfield. I asked Kevin to make me one in the latest batch, but he said no-go.

I went with all black drop targets and all black pop bumper parts.

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Looks good, but I had bought the drops about 2 years ago

Where are these sold?

order centaur2 targets to get black