The other reason you need the slot above those targets is if you lift the playfiled, you see the ball bounce from one target to the next and drop them all. If you then mess underneath and pop the targets up while the ball is still at the back (apply power or do it manually), then when you lower the playfield the ball would be stuck at the top. Lucky for you there is a slot so you can easily knock the targets down and get the captive ball back to where it was...

I've done this several times on my centaur when diagnosing coils, switches etc.

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

Congrats! My restore is on hold (waiting on chrome parts) and I'm getting anxious to have it finished up so I can start playing it again.

The caps can also fail, so it wouldn't hurt to try replacing them too. They're cheap and easily found online.

Alright. So chrome is on its way and the build is starting up in earnest again. My Centaur will have a bit more punch thanks to a custom designed speaker enclosure, crossover and a decent amp.

Some pics:

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I'll try. Current plan is I will be taking it to TPF 2018 to show it off, so if you can make it you can play it and hear it. It'll be in Keith Holbrook's booth (he's doing all the major lifting and building). I'm a bit nervous about taking it, but it should be fine in his booth.

Base paint is on now and graphics should be going on this week. It's not going to be exactly stock...

Metallic black paint, chomish silver paint, candy apple red and then all of it is going to be clearcoated. We're trying to make something truly unique and a little over the top.

Paints done. I'll get higher res photos when it's all done.

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I can probably get them, but Keith painted it. It's automotive paints and not exactly stock.

When we're done I should have all the details

Those are just his shop legs. I have a full set of black chrome bally legs, chrome side rails, chrome coin door etc that will be going on it. We had Ron plate it all for us.

Keith got most of the wiring in today. The big box in the back is the speaker system.

Made me start thinking. Has anyone out mirror blades on their centaur? I'll have to see if they make them.

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Yeah that's what I realized. I was playing Flash Gordon when I was thinking about it and there's more room there because of the upper playfield.

I haven't personally tested it yet, but it's designed to fit right. A few risks doing something like this, but that's part of the fun.

I don't have a part number but it definitely looks the same.

Getting closer to being complete. Keith (Holbrook) had to scratch build a new light board and create the harness for it. Essentially this is about as close to new as you can get for a Centaur and he's doing a great job pulling it together.

It has a CPR mirrored Backglass in the photo, but I've found a NOS original Backglass that I'll put in it later. The CPR ones just aren't as sharp as the originals.

It'll have white XPIN led displays, chrome coin door and black chrome legs before it's done.

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Ok. I need some help. I need to know what the round thing with the wires going to is on the bottom of Centaur. I'd also kind of like to know what it does and most importantly where to get one.

I'm going to go look through the manual and schematics but thought I'd reach out here too.

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Thanks guys. Appreciate it. May be playing mine this weekend. If not it's close.

Some more pics. We are getting closer. Still waiting on some chrome but Keith will be starting to fire it up today.

As an FYI. The speaker box did have to get notched to clear a drop assembly but it was close.

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This apron came off another Centaur I had and is original. It's been cleaned and some minor touch up paint. When they remake the Centaur aprons, I'll buy one and switch it out, but it looks pretty darn nice already.

So it's essentially done. A little more play testing and I'll pick it up this weekend. Once I get it back to my place I'll probably put the NOS Backglass in. It currently has the cpr
Mirrored Backglass in it.

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My Centaur, will rattle windows on the other side of my house. We used a drop down signal adapter like that, into one of the small dedicated amps (like Spooky uses in their games), a custom speaker box with a 8" woofer and silk dome tweeter, and crossover. It's ported out the bottom of the cabinet so the glass doesn't even rattle. The say it again on Centaur just shines at higher volumes with more bass. It's so much fun that I'm going to do the same thing to my Flash Gordon and possibly my Nitro I've been restoring.

I'm also trying to figure out how to make speaker boxes and port them out of the cabinet on some of my other new pins to stop the damn rattling of the glass, but I'm not sure if there is enough room in the cabinet to do it.

Just a quick PSA, I'll have my fully restored/modded Centaur at TPF this year. It'll be in Keith Holbrook's booth since he did the final paint, playfield swap and assembly. I think any of you that have a Centaur will enjoy seeing and playing it and it may give you a few ideas.

On the sound issue. I'm thinking it is possibly normal and more likely a buffer overrun in the original code. I own the restored Centaur at TPF (got 1st place for best 80s BTW) and haven't noticed the sound enough to comment for sure how often it happens or when. That game ran all weekend (tried to wear out the flippers) and had close to 800 plays on it so any intermittent sound issue due to bad code was bound to show up, but I didn't hear it specifically (was off playing other games).

Just for reference my game has an Altek MPU, Altek power, Altek light boards, an original sound card and new Say It Again board and new under playfield boards. I essentially went with a ground up build more so than a normal restore.

So if the sound issue was heard it's due to the original sound board or the original ROM code on the MPU (which Altek uses). My guess is to fix it (I'm a software engineer) you will have to rewrite the ROM code in the sound board, not the MPU. The MPU simply sends signals over to the sound board, but the sound board would be keeping track of which sounds are playing (it tries to play multiples), the speech etc. The sound problem may even be out in the say it again, but that's more of a reverb board so I don't think that would be the source.

If you haven't repinned the connectors going into the sound board, I'd make sure those are done and that may limit the problem. It's possible a bad connection on the input line to the sound board could make it worse which may be why some report it more than others.

Again if it was heard at TPF, then I don't think it would be anything to do with wiring to the original speakers, because we did a custom speaker enclosure and custom amplifier. I have not changed all the caps and diodes on the entire playfield so can't rule that out though.

That looks awesome! Good job and looking forward to seeing it all put back together.

Either way, I bet it looks way better than a CPR glass... I finally found a NOS one about 18 months ago (similar story an elderly man that was an operator/repairman) and the difference was dramatic from the CPR mirrored and regular I had. I still kept the regular CPR glass in case something ever happens to my NOS one, but I was amazed at how much higher definition the original was.