Is there anywhere to find more information regarding these SST specific settings. For 150 page manual telling me that EXEAY, EASY, MODERATE, HARD or EXHARD determines how the Orbit Features are started and played, really doesn't tell me anything. I'd also love a way to have the Recon Levels on a tournament setting...calling a mystery programmer.

pasted_image (resized).png

Pictures don't do it justice. My wife loves it!!

Colored Bug Counter (resized).jpg

EX EASY, EASY and MODERATE all require 3 orbits to get an ORBIT LOCK. HARD and EX HARD require 4. Factory default is MODERATE.

COLOR LED BUG COUNTER BOARDS UPDATE
----------------------------------------------
Tom has said he has replied to all that contacted him, sent invoices to those ready to pay, and sent boards to those that paid. As of now he has 9 boards left on the shelf ready for sale. When that drops below 5 he will make more boards, so theoretically they should be in-stock from now on. See below quote on how to order.

01 (resized).jpg

02 (resized).jpg

I'm getting a little discouraged about my SST. It worked fine for the longest time then suddenly blew the mosfets for the magnets and brain bug.
I replaced Q5,Q6,Q7 and while I was at it replaced the leds on the two orbit octos (the would randomly start triggering constantly at times).

While it was sitting in switch test mode in diagnostics to verify the optos are working, I closed the coin door and then like 5-10 minutes later I hear a solenoid energize. I turn it off and on again to discover that the super vuk is now locked on immediately on poweron. I take the board out again (rotten dog driver board) and replace Q4 as well. I also replaced the diodes on the two magnets and super vuc while I was at it.

Put it all back together and play a couple of games. It seemed to work fine, I did notice the brain bug popped up and down at a couple of random times (I do not remember if that was normal or not) but then on probably the third game I notice the magnets stopped working again. This is where I am at. I haven't investigated further yet, but I'm going to assume Q5 and Q6, and probably Q7 are all blown again.

Any idea what might be the cause here? This is getting really frustrating as it seems to happen randomly, but permanently until I replace those chips.

Oh man, I decided to test all the voltages on the rotten dog driver board and all show correct, except the +50volt is showing 72 volts. This has got to be my issue as the ones that keep blowing are the 50 volt ones, right? Suspiciously, some of these are blown on the original driver board as well with whole traces burned out, hence the replacement rotten dog I guess (I still have the original board as well).

Now to find out why it's at 72 volts? Was it always like this? And why did it work seemingly fine for so long before this?

OK, so my right magnet had I think a 5Amp fuse in it back when I first had all these mosfets blow. I replaced that fuse with a 3A slo-blow (what's listed on the sticker next to the holder. That fuse is now blown.

Anyone know if 3A is correct? I assume it is and probably my magnet coil is bad. How do you test magnet coils? Same as solenoid coils with same resistances?

Can someone tell me what fuse they have in their game if it is different than the 3A slow-clow it labels it as?

3A slo-blo IS correct per the manual https://www.ipdb.org/machine.cgi?id=4341 and what is on "f20" in my machine. there are also 3A-S.B. fuses in the fuse holders by the magnets under the playfield. there is a diode on each fuse holder, I put a multimeter on my magnets & got 4.5 Ohms on one magnet & 4.4 Ohms on the other.

72 Volts sounds a bit scary high ( I hadn't measure the voltage on mine but plays ok )

Thanks so much for all the info. It was the 3A SB fuse next to my right magnet that was blown. I measured both my magnets with the fuse out and got 5.4 and 5.3 ohms on mine. Is that bad?

Regarding the 72 volts. I keep reading that 72 is normal when there is no load on the 50 volt circuit so I think that is fine.

But still need to find out why that fuse blows, so frustrating.

I did measure my voltage on the F20 fuse for the magnets (and F21 for the coils) and got 72V DC

When I launched a ball and the right magnet grabbed the ball it momentarily lowered to like 42V DC then went back up to 72V DC

I don't know if your troubles could be the diode under the playfield on the fuse holder is either shorted or reversed polarity

I tried to contact Tom via his email but his diskspace seems to be full. I get this message: (maildir delivery failed: "Sorry, the user's maildir has overdrawn his diskspace quota").
Is there another way to contact Tom to order the board?

I confirmed the email failure, I have not heard from him since the 1st of August, and he has not posted in his Tomb Raider pinball thread for 40 days. I did send him a PM through pinside, I hope he and family are ok with all the crazy flooding over there.

MM

I had ordered a board and had correspondance with Tom before your post here. I had just received the board today & shot another e-mail and it had seemed to go through ok (I did have an e-mail bounce back at the time of your post but didn't affect my order.

try again I am happy with the colored bug Mod although it hadn't improved the number of bugs I can kill .... KILL 'EM ALL !!!!!

Heard back from Tom, he is ok just busy with life etc and about to take a vacation, so Color SST Bug Counter Board purchase/shipping is on hold...

------------------------------
Hi Spencer,

Luckily we did not have any problems with the flooding. Though my private
and working life is pretty busy at the moment so sorry for the late reply...

I'm about to go on a (Covid-safe) holiday so for the next few weeks I will not
be able to ship any boards... When I'm back I will let you know
People can always email me on my holiday, but replies can take some time
Yes all paid orders are sent out, If I know I can't ship in time I will not accept the money
transfers

Stay safe !!
Best regards,
Tom
----------------

Tom is back home from vacation and ready for more Color Bug Counter Board purchasing and shipping, see post #704 above.

MM

I was encouraged to share a pic of mine installed, I wished I took more pics as I was installing it but didn't have camera handy

When removing the original board I was worried the stand-offs would go flying but they were fitted to the board. it was easy to remove the original stand-offs and fit them to the new board , the wire connector was re-jection pinned properly

It was a real pleasure installing and went with ease, again very happy with the purchase

IMG_2312 (resized).JPG

Just an FYI to those receiving and installing Tom's board, this old post of the original repro board made 5 years ago by someone else suggests not using the original spacers...

"I tried the new PCB with the spacers from the original board on it, but you don't actually want to use those. The digits end up being too far away from the windows (so they look too fuzzy). I ended up using 3mm thick washers on both sides of the screws (both sides because you don't want the screws going too deep). That puts the LEDs right up to the windows so they look much sharper"

I interpret that as washers on each side of the board and screws run through those to the PF for mounting. I don't know if the board/leds give off any heat that could affect the inserts or not when closer (still don't have a SST again yet), but they do look sharper in the pic/vid. Try at your own risk, but I'd do it.

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/do-you-want-to-know-more-sst-owners-club-past-present-and-future/page/9#post-3196656

Finally in the club! Lol

I should have the game in a couple weeks.

Now i want the bug counter board

Just emailed for the board!

I'm having some issues with this game and I'm really hoping it's not board issues, maybe you guys can provide some insight. The most common issue is that when the main multiball starts with the moving warrior bug it initially only shoots out 2 balls most of the time, once one of them drains while the ball saver is on it'll spit out all 4 balls. Another issue is that the first shot of the game, the bonus for getting the correct letter when you drop in works maybe 10% of the time. I figured both of these issues would be related to the switches and the "U" switch at the top may very well be that issue because I don't think it works very much even when it's not the initial shot but I replaced nearly every switch in the game last year and when I do a switch test on the trough they all work.

Check to make sure the balls aren't magnetized and sticking to each other, that will prevent them from rolling down the trough at multiball start, hence you only getting one additional ball in play. SST uses strong magnets and will quickly magnetize any "shiny" pinballs. Gotta use regular balls in this game.

Any suggestions on balls or how to demagnetize?

Buy some standard balls from Marco.

You can bake them in an oven at 350 degrees for 20 mins, it will demagnetize them.

To test for magnetized balls:

Place them in a flat surface and see if one ball can drag another, or if all the balls can be linked together via magnetism.

that sounds like a lot couldn't I just buy a degausser at that point, I don't want to bake my pinballs in the over lol.

Heating sterl is a common way to cheaply demagnetize it.

However, you should replace the balls every 400 plays or so anyway.

So, in the end it doesnt really matter.

I want to add colorDMD to my game!

Has anyone here done this?

Which is preferred, LED, or LCD?

I have a colorLED in my TFTC and it looks great, I will never buy a color LCD.
I feel that pretty much every setting in LCD that fills in the space between dots looks like mush, but I did finally see ONE setting somewhere that more or less looked like LED.
LED is pretty much plug and play, LCD on a Sega you have to cut off the bottom center display metal mounting post to fit the pc notebook-size screen.

Good to know, Im swaying towards the LED version due to the retro look and drop in ease of install.

But I would like to see a sample of the LCD version installed.

I fixed the issues. Switch needed to be adjusted and I replaced the pinballs for the magnetizing issues. Waxed the play field. I beat the game for the first time the same day! After 2 years of owning it.

Im swaying towards the LED version of the colorDMD for SST. I just bought the LCD version for my new Stargate!

My game wont be here til next week.

Ill post a couple pics when I get it.

Things Ill probably install are:

colorLED
pinsound
pinsound shaker.

And make some sense of the prior LED color flooding...

Does anyone have a link to the guys that installed a ColorDMD LCD into a Sega Showcase backbox (can't remember which game)? I know I saw this years ago, but now I can't find it.

I really like LCD better than LED, so I'd like to perform the surgery to get that display to fit.

Good News for those here in the USA still needing one of Tom's new repro Color LED Bug Counter Board.
MARCO is now stocking the board for sale!

https://www.marcospecialties.com/pinball-parts/520-5166-00-C
sst bd (resized).jpg

sst bd (resized).jpg

This is awesome news!

I ordered on from Tom 5 weeks ago and am waiting for it.

I hope its not lost in the mail !

Oh well if it gets lost I can order one from Marco!

I'm thinking about a Pinsound and speaker upgrade, but I haven't pulled the trigger yet. Is this mix on YouTube the same as what's available from the Pinsound forum?

if so that's awful.

Well, I wasn't necessarily commenting on the quality. I'm realistically not going to create my own mix, so I'm just trying to understand what is available if I choose to upgrade to Pinsound. Unlike other titles, there's only 1 Pinsound mix for SST (unless there is some other source than the Pinsound forum).

Following up on this post from over a year ago. The unevenness of the inserts/random ball movements finally got to me and I decided to do something about it. However, looking closer after not looking in a while; it seems to confirm my initial suspicions that this was not the way it came from factory and that someone replaced the inserts along the way. You can see how they overlap the edges of the cutouts in the playfield and the corners of each insert vary, with some rounded, some squared off, and some cut at an angle. Plus they are red and it seems like the pics I’m seeing of other machines look clear and “stippled”.

Would you current SST owners (or past owners if you have good pics) mind posting close up images of of the inserts for comparison? Also, I’m thinking I’m going to have to file/dremel these down to get them to sink into the playfield properly unless someone knows a source to buy new ones. My initial attempts to find them have been unsuccessful. Thanks!

1B10D25D-059B-4F7E-B05C-B7E7395D20A0 (resized).jpeg

761E5CD8-E37B-426C-AD52-5427043D65C7 (resized).jpeg

8F50D942-02F1-4DAA-BC84-19818F8F02D1 (resized).jpeg

965D5D9F-758B-4BC8-A293-887D6642BDC6 (resized).jpeg

Certainly you can block sand the insert bottom to get it to level out.

But they might be red because they couldnt get the right color.

What are the measurements?

PBR might have something?

Inserts can be a challenge to aquire.

Stern would be able to help track them down.

It's kind of frosted EDIT: the manual says I think "luminescent"
IMG_2408 (resized).JPG

The color from the LED segments underneath is what shines through (pic was taken in service mode)
IMG_2409 (resized).JPG

I had some nylon tubing I cut for spacers and used shorter screws an the digits are now sharper.

IMG_2414 (resized).JPG

Nicely done!

Im still waiting for mine, 7 weeks in the mail...

That's bizarre, never seen that on any SST. I don't suppose it could have been a prototype test game trying out the red lenses before doing the color LED board?

The inconsistency of the cuts suggest was done afterwards.

The manual doesn't list an 1-1/2" square insert

I'd probably give some of these a try for fit https://www.pinballlife.com/1-12-square-inserts-9859.html and perhaps a member of the club here could manufacture re-pro's ( I still don't know what material would be used)

Yeah, I dug through the manual trying to find a part number with no luck. The other thing is, and y’all can verify with me (please and thank you), that the inserts aren’t exactly 1 1/2” squared. They are closer to 1 1/2 x 1 3/4+. If anyone knows a source for getting these, ordered or newly made, I’d greatly appreciate it.

Yeah I only gave a quick measurement of mine horizontally

I wonder if reaching out to SkyKing2301 of Rocket City Pinball https://pinside.com/pinball/biz/directory/1843-rocket-city-pinball would result in adding these inserts to his store. I don't know what his procedure would be. I'm guessing a used one of yours to scan and field test.

if Marco bought the colored bugs for their inventory them may be interested in a source for the inserts as well

This is the only SST in 20 years I've seen with this issue, I don't think a parts dealer is going to carry an item he's only gonna sell 4 of

Call Stern with the size and see if anybody there can track down those inserts. A while back I needed an outlane wireform for an Avatar and NO PARTS DEALERS ANYWHERE carried it. I knew it was on a Metallica also, called Stern and talked to someone who'd 'look into it'. After not hearing back for a few days, I called and got a different guy who said 'Hmmm, hold on...", and came back with the B.O.M. for Met saying "We've got hundreds here. For some reason it was never made available to parts dealers!" So I called Terry and Marc and got it listed for sale.
I don't know if anyone at Stern now was there in the Sega days (aside from Gary), but somewhere in that building is the parts paperwork for SST listing that insert...

Not surprising but still disappointing.

258266AC-3C44-460C-B4D7-605045F8D8AC (resized).jpeg

I'm skeptical these would turn out well with my process (FDM) & material (PLA); translucent PLA prints tend to scatter the light very well (which is why I use it for light start & coin reject buttons) -- but you want something with better clarity so the numbers/symbols will show through cleanly. I'm also concerned to how well it would hold up with a ball rolling over it all the time.

You might want to try someone who prints with resin.

Sorry guys, I'd love to help, and I'm willing to try if you want, though chas is right: I'd either need one in my hand or someone skilled with calipers & sketching would have to get all the measurements I'd need.
-Andy