And what is your definition of "defective" people

Freaking out? Get a Golden Tee right Curley! LOL

Pooling is a defect.

That reminds me... the GB fiasco

Errbody had ghosted inserts. You said F it and bought a GB saying all would be well. I said several times you were crazy & should wait.

Then IIRC your GB started ghosting.

So as much as I like you Ice, I’m not going to ask you for advice on QC issues. I value your opinion of a game & such but you’re irrational AF my brother.

What happened with you GB? It ghosted right? Was it resolved?

And I think y’all should buy a Golden Tee regardless of Stern QC. Especially you Ice. Let’s GT it up mang!

LMAO!!!

I have two very "minor ghosting inserts" on my GB. Two of the tiny ones.

I haven't played it in quite a while because i keep waiting on the F ing code update!!!! That's my biggest problem with GB.

But I'm kind of rationally "irrational" which makes the most sense

I'd have to practice about a year or so at least on Golden Tee to jump into your level . LOL

Do you remember KPG? He had a F ed up chipped PF beyond belief. Not "pooling". Not something i stress about.

I have a Big Buck World and it gets a lot of play by my friends. But be warned crazy heavy cab.

Any chipping or ghosting on the cab?

Well I certainly agree swapping isn’t fun or cheap, but I don’t blame JJ for all of it. It was Micro that screwed up. JJ should have figured it out sooner, but they are making a big step to fix it. If they replaced every machine they would go out of business. I don’t have to swap out POTC yet. I can save it for if the playfield has to be replaced. But no matter what, I absolutely love that machine, my favorite pin ever. So I’m willing to invest some to keep it working great. I think there aren’t any great choices here, but he was serious that they won’t be using bad playfields going forward and there will be new runs without the issue. I am satisfied that they are making a serious effort. I got the clear impression he knew they needed to do something big on this to keep customers happy and coming back.

Unresolved ghosted inserts & incomplete code on a game you never play?

Yeah you should have waited.

As for my Golden Tee skills... I’m not very good. My HC is +6 right now. The hardcore bangers are like +28 me thinks. FFS just buy one dude. The 2020 update looks purdy cool. I preordered yesterday to ensure I get mine on day one.

KPG posted pics of some half naked chick in front of his exotic car IIRC so I don’t feel much sympathy for him (JK)

I've replied three times to my ticket with JJP and have had NO response. Zero..nil..nada. It's like I'm talking to myself.

They should be doing hardness testing before assembly. That’s the best solution I can think of to prevent this in the future.
Once these pinball manufacturers set a spec, it’ll fall back on the tier 2 companies.

Well I had already been talking to Frank and Steve on the telephone. Have you called yet? Both Frank and Steve have always been very helpful when I spoke to them. I’ve actually had very few issues with my POTC other than the playfield. They have helped with any issue. Jack even gave me his personal cell phone number and told me to call if I needed anything! That is class any way you slice it. I’m not going to post the number though of course. He was very good to me so I could only judge JJ based on my dealings with them and to me they have always been great. I did report playfield bubbling on both machines within five hours of them getting delivered though just to make sure I documented that there were issues before I flipped a ball.

While that’s correct, I don’t blame Chevy for a truck check engine light, I blame Delco electronics for building that sensor too cheaply. But the customer blames Chevy and has to wait while we diagnose and fix the issue. Tomatoe, Tomaaatoe.

I have not heard of Stern sending blank playfields to resolve a playfield issue, only populated ones. With Ghostbusters, it took a long time for them to get the playfield swap program in place and start sending them out. Perhaps it will take some time to get this ramped up, but I am confident Stern will take care of many customers. I am sure some will still not be happy, because in the past they have swapped the bad ones (crossing some sort of threshold) and not swapped some they deem to be minor.

In the case of clear pooling / chipping I can see Stern sending out populated playfields for severe chipping but not for pooling since it seems to exist in some capacity on a large number of Stern pins over multiple titles made within the past several years.

So finally having pulled the trigger on my first machine a BNIB IMDN premium a couple of months back, I have noticed this on the orbit around the back behind the centre ramp. It appears to be some kind of blistering. I take it this isn't normal?

Sorry about picture quality. Awkward angle to get a good shot.

IMG_20190912_114154_1 (resized).jpg

Correcting my previous post, seems to just be mylar bubbling as others below said. I can see the edge of the mylar piece near the post.

Might just be mylar bubbling up. Take a look up near the white post and you can see the corner and edge of the mylar.

Ya that's mylar bubbling. The newer builds Stern put a cliffy like piece around the orbit.

I think some people were recently posting that they've contacted Stern and been sent that cliffy like piece as their mylar also took a beating in that area. I don't know if they had to pay for it or were sent it for free, you might want to check with Stern and ask them about availability.

Thank you for the quick responses! I'll email Stern about the protector.

I am glad you are happy with the outcome..

Manufacturer's are responsible for defective parts they put in their products regardless of what source they came from. Yes, they should go down the line and get restitution from their vendors, but that's not the consumer's concern.

Nobody is asking for them to replace every machine, but a new populated PF should be expected. It's not much of a loss to JJP as they can get the old one back and reuse most of the parts and whatever loss they incur is the cost of doing business. A threat of JJP going out of business is not something I would wish at all, but I would not take a hit as a consumer based on that fear. Ford is doing horribly, their bonds were just downgraded to junk status. If you have a problem with your F150, will you just accept a new part from Ford and put it in yourself to protect their business? It's not my responsibility to keep any business I buy from in business and I expect working defect free products regardless. Also, this is not an issue JJP was blinded sided by, they were well aware of the issues with POC and shipped Wonka with the same PF issues.

If all affected owners get is a new unpopulated PF - I will have to seriously think about any NIB JJP purchase - same goes for Stern if that's all they do.
I run my own business and aways take care of customer's issues quickly and on my dime. Anything it's costs me is nothing compared to the chance at a loss of future sales.

Correct, I just got that part in the mail last week at no cost.
Thanks Stern!

Email [email protected] with your serial number.
The protector to protect the orbit drop off from the center ramp is part number: 502-7087-00
It works well. Easy to install.

44ED7F9C-C943-4A3C-BECC-65C209C68DC8 (resized).jpeg

EE267347-1999-4B4F-A506-9D23BBF8D916 (resized).jpeg

I just spent my JP2 money on a new Mountain bike.

I'm sure you are reading this Stern. You need to announce guaranteed quality control or plenty of people are out for a NIB forever.
Plenty of other fun stuff to spend money on other than pinballs.

I agree with this. It will probably be for chipping or severe pooling. Minor pooling that requires a camera at full zoom where you see dust specs will probably not be swapped.

Is it just me, or are the JP2 LEs taking a LONG time to ship compared to previous Stern releases, as if they are being held up for some reason? Heck, even the code release yesterday was PRO only, which confirms that no LEs haven't shipped....

My money is going on restoring my classic Mini which is a shame as JP2 was going to be my first NIB.

JJP’s target audience is the home/collector market, so yeah this type of confidence shakeup needed fixing ASAP. Maybe Stern’s primary customer is operators who just don’t give AF. I hope they’re not making that bet.

I wonder if future issues of Pinball Magazine will have a section like this for pins from this era.

https://www.consumerreports.org/used-cars/used-cars-to-avoid-buying/

on later models of iron maiden it’s relaxed with a metal cliffy

Sent in pics of my IMDNLE blistering. Upper post to the right of the jump ramp has started chipping. It has been forwarded to engineering or whatever dept. handles this. This machine was $12000 in Canada. Our wages aren’t that different and our taxes are insane, so this would be equivalent to you US guys paying that much in usd. Not happy.

Well many pinsiders think this playfield issue stuff is overblown. Zaphx.

So let me be clear - it sucks. It really sucks. But it doesn't JUST suck for buyers. It sucks for manufacturers too.
All I've pleaded for is a spirit of compromise and empathy.

I will forgive you.

I haven't always done a good job communicating on this, and I've pissed people off which I regret.

I think pinball is fun. I think the people in the pinball community are awesome. The players, the creators, the manufacturers.

I look forward to a day that all this is behind us and we're all back to playing pinball, trading pinball, speculating what's next in pinball, and having fun together.

Well said. I agree.

So this thread got me thinking and wondering about the pooling issue. So I took a close look at my last NIB pin which is MET. Sure enough I found pooling, luckily around only one post. Build date is June of 2018. Don't know if I should be happy that it only happened to one post, or afraid that it will happen to others down the road. Lol

It is fun and should read "haven't always" but we don't want to judge.

Oops. More fail

Interestingly that comment came up at the (excellent) launch party at Sunshine. A lot of folks said it was unusual for sunshine to have the launch party and not have the LE. Although in saying that I was at the launch party black knight and that was a pro also.

Also I saw a couple of JP Pro’s with play field damage in New York; very poor.

Yep, if you have to make the playfield post look like Stonehenge to show the problem, it’s not really a problem.

I have some very minor pooling on my new JP2, fortunately none at the slings. If I can’t see it while leaning over the game, it doesn’t bother me. I do recognize that others have much more severe pooling, and they should be made whole. For my game, I’ll just roll with it and hope that I’ve already seen the worst of it. Life’s too short , and it’s a fantastic game.

So when did JJP and Stern start adding washers under posts? Stern are so cost conscious they would not have added them all of a sudden unless they served a purpose, the only reason I can see is to protect/hide suspect clear coat? I think I will avoid any titles with washers under posts until this is sorted out. Absolutely terrible for those affected.

I would be very interested to see if people's playfields with minor or major pooling hold up. My MET showed a crack so I put Mylar on it. Then it continued to grow until the paint and clear coat started chipping off.

That's exactly what it is., and their silence speaks volumes on the veracity of that claim.

Well, yeah. They're prolly going "awww fuck guys. How are we going to get over THIS hump? They're not letting this one go over at Pinside....! We might have to actually address it."

All the cancelled orders probably got their attention.

Can’t move forward without getting up, my Grandad always said. This got them off their seats. Let’s see what happens next.

I doubt Stern is going to make a public statement, that's just going to encourage a flood of owners with every PF issue under the sun to come out and complain.
What I am looking for is: posts in this thread that Stern is quietly starting to take care of those effected and that LE's are going out with pristine PF's.

I feel bad for Stern

They're a victim too (if they resolve things)

Maybe thats why the JPLE's aren't shipping?

I wholeheartedly agree. I can understand maybe not issuing something publicly....maybe. people that are on this website are the extreme, myself included. I can understand why publicly making this statement could entice others /less informed however they need to ensure even those less informed are taken care if if those folks proactively reach out for help.

Post above me summarizes it very well. Agree 100%. You see this already happening with jjp which I commend. It had to happen but also give respect when respect is due