Greetings everyone! This is my first post on Pinside, so I'm hoping to learn from all you experts and maybe contribute some of the little bits I've been learning.

I recently bought a Gottlieb Cue Ball Wizard that supposedly needed nothing but in reality had a number of issues. So far I've fixed everything except one problem that I think is beyond my skill set. The Wizard has a oscillating upper level that uses a solenoid to fire a full size pool ball at different targets. The problem is the ball kicker solenoid stays activated. When I got the pin, the solenoid was fried and the fuse was blown so I replaced them both. That was when I found out the solenoid remains locked down so I've now disconnected it.

This solenoid is fired from an optical switch that the ball passes through. I'm sure this switch is working because it still triggers specific voice responses.

So, any ideas where I should start? What causes an optically switched solenoid to stay locked down? By the way, I do have a manual for this machine but I'm not much good at understanding a schematic. Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks for the info... I kind'a figured the driver transistor might be the culprit. I also know I'm not particularly good at soldering. I've done a number of fixes on the play board, including replacing this solenoid, (the new solenoid had a new diode) but generally my soldering is pure ugly. I think I might take your advice and practice on some old boards.

Thanks too for the tip on the super jackpot! We've been really enjoying this game, but I figured I was missing out on some of it's features because of this ball shooter not working.

This is just a follow up to my original question...

The problem was indeed the 010 transistor on the driver board. I ended up getting a friend of mine who works on copy machines to run through the diagnostic procedure before he soldered the new transistor in for me. It was very educational. He went through and tested all the components to make sure there wasn't more than one problem and then checked to make sure a signal was coming into the transistor but not going out. When he did the soldering, he gave me some tips such as making sure the iron is not too hot and being careful not to overheat the board by keeping the heat on too long and to suck the solder out (without damaging the circuit strips), until the component is easily removed. I probably would have burned a hole through it.

The repair wasn't nearly as pretty as the original but it was a good moment when that solenoid fired right up at the right time! The next time I'm going to do the job myself!

Thanks for the tip ForceFlow, about the transistor. And rkhar, I didn't get the super jackpot but a few games after fixing it, I did get the 1/2 billion sweet spot shot. Scored about 9 billion that game. The machine gets crazy when all that is going on!