One suggestion, since you will be remaking the head in acylic: route the power cord through the bottom of the back door instead of underneath the head.

Moving a bingo is tough, but assembling a bingo only to realize that the power cord isn't in place? Has to make you laugh (or weep).

Golden gate has a very complex stencil. I will be eagerly watching to see how you tackle the cabinet! Awesome idea!

Yes, they have a service plug inside the backdoor. Remember everything is two prong.

Detachable power cord? Now you're talking!

That switch has two functions: one to signal to the ball lift relay that it should engage to allow the lifting of the next ball, the second to trigger the close of the shutter by running the shutter motor (but only on the first shot).

That switch is tricky to adjust, but I believe it is NC and should only open right as the ball passes through the gate. Any earlier and you will have soft plungers stacking a ball in the shooter lane.

The game also portions lifting via the lane switch.

Timer step up happens based on trough switches closed and a switch on the lifter motor cam.

By the time Golden Gate rolled around, the bingo hole switches used this 'new' style. Prior to 1955(?) they used a simpler leaf switch under each hole which would move with the shutter board. Maybe retrofitting with that style would be easier?

Yes. I can pay a photo if you like.

Wow. My typos are pretty spectacular these days.

IMG_20160109_172551_(resized).jpg

As you can see, the difference is wire bundles for each row. Also may require periodic adjustment.

True!

In Golden Gate's case, opening that switch will trip the before 4th, and before 5th and after 5th lock relays. It knows to do this based on the position of the timer unit. There are also trips for the feature before 5th and after 5th which will trip when the game awards or you hit the rollovers.

The switches are indeed still normally open.

Awesome!

I've always laughed at the location of that sign. The only ones who can read it are kids!

That sight always gets my heart a-flutter.

Shawn, this looks great!!
-Nick

Amazing work - so many light years beyond me... Just amazing.

With regard to the ball track: it may just be a finesse thing or it may have to do with the larger ball size. Golden gate uses 1 1/8" vs a standard 1 1/16" ball.

Golden gate used 8 balls. Originally, there were non- magnetic brass balls installed. Those are $$$, so sometimes I cheat and get the ones that allow magnetization. Depending on placement of various units and the depth of the shutter board, the existing wiring can magnetize balls.

I'm not sure how the plastic will interact with the ball.

As to the ball size: you'd have figured it out quickly - the game requires the trough switches be activated in a certain order to time out features/keep track of the game. Weird stuff happens with regular balls installed.

Yes, it prevents several problems - the most obvious being cheating - if you can drag and drop through the glass--- why not?

If the balls are magnetized, this becomes a problem as the neighbor ball will also become magnetized. When a ball passes by a magnetized ball held in a trap hole - *zing* - it sticks to the ball and will not roll down the playfield.

Bally added a device called a 'debuncher' into the trough to prevent magentized balls from sticking to each other during the lifting/startup sequence as this would be catastrophic. So even with all 8 balls magnetized, the games will all still play... just not very well.

Showtime is nothing compared to a Golden Gate...

No words... wow!

Yes. I normally run a qtip with wax on it through the channel to make life a little easier (then a dry one a little later).

Though it is worth noting that it isn't a problem typically, unless the interior rail is really badly rusted. It is painted, and that also eases the installation of glass.

I figured. Just giving you the low-down on why it isn't normally a problem. I don't think it'll be a problem regardless, especially with a little wax.

Shawn, very sorry to hear this. Best wishes for the health and safety of you and your family.

Excellent, glad to hear the news! That stencil is going to be very pretty!

That's incredible!

Beautiful! Do the back legs have the anti-twist plate welded in? It doesn't appear that the front legs do.

Incredible work! Hope to meet you at TPF and play the game!

The cord comes out under the head - unlike on most other games, and, in truth, other manufacturers' bingos, Bally put the cord in the head, and then tucked it between the lower cabinet and the head upon assembly. Guess how often I put them together without the cord coming out? Frequently.

At a family function, but schematics and manual are available here:

http://bingo.cdyn.com/machines/bally/golden_gate/

Both the mixer and control unit motor (pictured) are 120V. They are some of the only circuits in a Bally bingo that are 120V, so luckily very easy to replace wiring on. They do run to the plug and from plug to transformer main. Second connection is to the mixer motor, most likely.

The pleasure was all mine! It was great to finally meet you. I had a lot of fun (albeit brief) conversations with you and your brother.

Thank you! I can't believe the genius of Don Hooker. These games are so much more than the sum of their parts (and that sum is large, based on the number of parts)!

Thank you for your kind words. I can't wait to see the finished game. It looks so amazing already.

So beautiful! Best of luck on the assembly!

The lifter motor takes a couple of seconds to elevate a ball to the playfield. It moves pretty quickly, but I don't know the RPMs off-hand.

So incredible! I'm speechless.

Well, except about the gameplay...

When you turn the game on initially, the motors should be off, and the game should be in 'tilt'. The tilt trip relay does not throw. The tilt lite in this instance is lit through the anti-cheat relay being open.

When a coin is dropped, several things happen: the anti-cheat relay should latch, the start relay should engage, the control unit and mixer motor should start turning, the shutter motor should open the shutter, the balls should drop, and once all 8 balls are safely nestled in the trough, the ball lift motor should engage and bring the first ball up to the playfield.

At that point, you can press red, green or blue buttons to enable certain scoring advantages. Blue button plays for -only- odds increases. If you play that on your second coin -only- you will get a guaranteed double jump in odds.

Green plays for features - in other words magic screen stuff.

Red plays for a mixture of the two.

After playing as many coins as you feel like you should (generally more than one), you start playing.

Once the first ball leaves the playfield, the ball lift motor engages and lifts a second ball. The timer unit steps almost simultaneously with the ball hitting the playfield. Once the timer steps, the shutter motor will engage and close, trapping the balls to be played.

Aside from the shutter, this pattern repeats for any additional balls (5 total).

Once you've shot your fourth ball... More stuff happens. You can press the r button to register replays if you have a winner (there are advantages and disadvantages of doing this before playing your fifth ball), and play for extra ball by pressing the yellow button. The yellow button will step once immediately upon first coin played for EB. The EB unit needs to step an additional 3 times to give you an EB, lighting 1st Extra and Ball. Up to 3 extra balls can be purchased, and for each one you need to lite "Number" "Extra" and "Ball" before the ball is actually lifted to you.

That's the basics. Next I'll talk about magic screen and features...

So, playing for features with either the red or green can give you a staggering number of advantages:

The screen itself, labeled with ABCDEFG - each of these letter corresponds to one position of the screen. On the default card, you can only score inline wins - 3/4/5 in a row. In the screen letter sections (which are shaped kinda like Tetris pieces), you can win with three in a section (without balls being in a row on the backglass). Super advantageous - if you can make the number.

To move the screen, you use the left and right buttons -after- shooting your first ball. You can move it at any time until the 'time tree' locks you out. By default, it will lock out as soon as you shoot your fourth ball. (before fourth). You can earn before fifth or after fifth one of two ways:

1) by coining and random award via red or green button

2) by lighting the rollovers on the playfield. Hit the lit one to enable the feature Indicated.

With after 5th lit and the screen enabled, you can get a hit in four different colors (or more!) In one game...

So one of the sections revealed beginning with E is blue. This stubby reverse, upside down L will earn you either 300 or 600 replays. By default three in the section will award 300. You can enable based on the blue ovals.

Next up the super sections. Red with white stripes, when lit, will allow 2 balls in the section to award as 3, 3 as if 4, and 4 as 5. There is a corresponding yellow section with black stripes. Same idea. Only one or the other can enable on any game of Golden gate.

Next, the orange section. This is a complicated and frankly confusing feature to a new player... So please tell me if you need clarification (next post).

When OK is lit on the backglass (again through red or green buttons and coins), any two balls in the orange section will win the "red letter game". The letter lit in red in the title of the game will correspond with the instruction card in the middle of the apron. For example, if G in Golden is lit, you will get magic screen up to D, red odds to 300 (from memory, forgive if incorrect, check card for details) and one of the super sections. With any red letter game, your green odds will stay the same. That is because the lit red letter is tied to the green odds.

In later games, this is tied to the red odds. But in Golden gate and most of the 'classic' bingos, it is tied to green odds. Remember that when you are cursing the machine for not incrementing green.

Anyway, to earn the award, once you've shot your fourth ball at least, if you have at least two in the orange, hold the r button until the shutter opens and all balls drop.

At this point, the game will start going crazy, ticking up odds and features. Super cool - there's nothing like this sound or experience... Except the golden game!

So that Golden game is controlled via the Gate feature. In any given game, only one or the other of OK or Gate will light. Don't waste money if you have on lit trying to get gate to fire. It won't happen.

With gate lit, you can move the screen in the opposite direction of the normal (like for the orange section) and reveal a purple section. Any three balls on the purple section win the gate game and enable the golden game. When you have three balls in purple, hold the r button and all balls will drop. At this point, the screen will move and reveal all the golden sections.

In the golden game, you only have one set of odds. To win, you have to place either 2 or 3 balls in any one of the golden sections. Then register your replays by pressing r after shooting your fourth ball. It's the sequence of events that hooked me on the games.

Another note about odds. There are three odds discs that track independently. In any given game, you will find red, yellow or green more lucrative to shoot for.

The colored sections are pretty easy to see, but on the default card, the vertical, horizontal, and primary diagonals are each different colors.

I typically try to get my red odds up and play for 9-1-2 to start. If I get features, my strategy changes. Getting a super section is usually a safer bet than higher valued colors, so I might start out shooting for red, then transition to yellow super section...

Blue is always always a fun thing to shoot for, but you have to know when to cut your losses. Since you usually need all three numbers in blue, it can be very tricky to put that together (but OH so rewarding).

Hope that helps! If you have any other questions about mechanics, just let us know!

Good news, bad news:

Good news: it looks amazing. Really, truly incredible.
For the most part it is trying to dot he right thing.

Bad news: I've noticed quite a few bugs in these two videos:
1) lack of coin flash. For any button pressed, there is a random animation of the lights for that section. Red button flashes everything but extra ball lamps. Green button flashes lamps related to magic screen feature and time tree (upper right). Blue button flashes across all odds. None of that is happening. That's usually either fuse related or a single switch.

2) game gave you six balls by default and a problem loading ball #1 on your second game in vid #1 - points to trough switch errors.

3) game is timing out before fourth ball is shot. It shouldn't be. Gate switch may be open?

4) game seemed to award extra odds in video number two when playing for extra ball (yellow button). That's not right. The eb trip relays should prevent stepping of odds

5) 'eb mode' lamp is on while playing red button. This should not happen. Check red button relay for proper adjustment.

Haha, I've been there before... Once I spent two hours troubleshooting a problem that turned out to be that something had blown all of the bulbs in that feature. I felt nice and smart after... Hopefully that's all it is.

The game guarantees 5 shots only. After the fourth ball is shot, the game can be put into extra ball mode by pressing the yellow button. Once the yellow button is pressed, you'll see the bottom row of lamps cycle across, and it will light at least one of them. It will not award you an extra ball until each of three panels (1st, Extra, and Ball) are lit.

The same is true for 2nd and 3rd extra ball.

If it is also having trouble lifting the first ball, then I'd look at your trough switches first. Particularly, the switch under ball #1 (in the lift chamber) and ball #8 - ball #8 will drive the lift motor directly if certain other conditions are met at game start. Might just be a hair out of place. That wouldn't give you six balls, though - but other switches misadjusted in the trough could. Is the extra ball unit returning to zero on game start?

That I am - boy it must be handy to see everything, haha!

There are two trip relays in the trip bank on the back door called simply enough extra ball #1 and #2. These relays will completely change the game's logic flow to allow for coins to increment the extra ball unit instead of odds or features, as well as redirect a few other things (resetting the timer for each coin, etc). I would look to these as the odds (the big rectangles that are arranged in neat rows) are moving in the reflection of the playfield. The game should never award any more odds after the first ball is shot. The blue button or green button should start a new game, but should not award anything else after that first ball is shot, either. The yellow button is dead (or might start a new game.. but I think just dead) until the fourth ball is shot, then it will wake up and allow for eb mode.

That will only light up after the fourth ball is shot and the yellow button is pressed. It tells the game - hey, it's time to turn your money into extra balls. Otherwise, it should not be lit. The player would not be aware of when the game is on that mode, which would pose a serious problem if they had not collected their win.

Regarding wins. Can you show us 3/4/5 in a row and the r button pressed and the register incrementing?

Can you show us the magic screen awarding and moving? It will not move until at least ABCD are lit on the backglass and after the first ball is shot. You move it with the left/right buttons.

The search/credit award circuitry is far and away the most complex and therefore the most prone to failure. I would like to see if it need an adjustment (or two).

Can't wait! See you there!

Yes, we will be there! Hopefully all goes well with tire/wheel replacement...

Thank you to Shawn and Dennis for doing the hard work. I just got to fly in and tweak a few switches and enjoy the fruits of your labors.

I agree it was absolutely amazing in it's construction. Several times I would wonder, "how did he handle that?" about part of the construction, and I'd go take a look and be amazed all over again.

It was so much fun to teach a new group of people how to play. Thank you to anyone who gave it a shot, and I look forward to seeing it (and Dennis) again at York and hearing reports from any other show where this great game appears! Shawn, I can't wait to see what you do next (and if you can make it to York, it'll be great to see you again as well)!