Thanks for the kind offer! I'll keep that in mind.

I ordered a new set of boards from pindorabox.

Plus the vendor I got the gulf stream boards is sending out a new set.

I curious if the ones from pindorabox are better or have the shorter LEDs.

They are way cheaper...

Either way I'll have a few ways to figure this out, hopefully! Lol.

I resolved the ball search issue.

The ball 2 switch in the trough needed adjustment.

Although it tested out in switch test, it needed further adjustment in-game.

After adjustment I can let it sit with a ball in the shooter lane for extended periods with no ball search.

I had the same issues with mine. Ended up putting new switches in. Glad you found it.

I replaced every single switch.
Pops, trough, coin door, all of them.

It was just an adjustment evidently lol.

Curiously the adjustments I made while building the game are good for the most part.

But, still there is in-game testing,
It's very important.

Almost everything is really perfect!

The last thing on my list is nailing down the nagging time expander optos.

I'm hoping that the new pandora boards are more stable than the gulf stream ones.

So far my optos are behaving.
But I had a "m" opto error 2 days ago that mysteriously went away...

I'm looking for stability here.

I replaced every opto transmitter and reciever when i refurbished my Doctor Who. Its been great

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Noooo, not yellow!!!!

I did the same.
25 year old game, fully disassembled?

It crazy not to put in new parts, plungers, springs etc.

I might just have a bad opto board.

That yellow really pops!
Maybe add the tilt graphics game blades to blend in the rails a bit?

Yellow was on our list early on, as well as oxford blue and orangey red.

Due to my cabinet decals being too short and leaving a big black border, it seemed I had to go pearl black.

It looks pretty good imho.

Just finished waxing the game.
495 plays...

New balls, cleaned rubber with rc-88 rubber cleaner.

Waxed playfield with P21S silver.
Waxed the ramps.

It plays exactly like day one.
Really fast and bouncey.

I love this game!

The one with the Whomobile on it. Sure it can be scanned - just stick it on trasparent film, scan it and put it back. I‘ve done this with other decals, too...

The problem with decals/stickers, is that when they get removed they curl up horribly.

Hard to get them flat again.

I peeled off a couple and scanned them.

I also photographed a couple.

After editing and printing they look very similar.

Face it, a scan is also just a hi-rez photo.

So for now, I think that a good hi-rez photo is as good as a scan.

Cell phone cameras are amazing.

Just shine a flashlight on the decal when you take the picture.

I think the key is getting good hi-rez pictures with good lighting.

Then please at least a high res photo.

The easier way to do it is to install the time opto fix. ebay.com link: Bally Dr Who Pinball Machine Time Expander Opto Fix

I remade the whomobile decal. Here is my work installed on my game.

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I bought either that one or some other one.

It didn't work for me.
The holes didn't line up with the leds. It was very rough and I had to rework it a lot.

It was too tall and I had to add washers under the time expander to get it to fit.

I ended up throwing it away.

The new one swinks has designed looks perfect at shapeways.

Those are really nice!

Thanks. I can email the file to print or view.just pm me

I need the rampdecal with the whomobile, the one under the ramp

I have not tried to make this decal

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Let me see if I can get if off the old ramp.

I'll scan it and email it to you if I can get it in 1 piece.

That would be great! The dark blue decal with the whomobile. Thank you!

And if you could also scan the one on the right side (the thin long one on the ramp border) this would be even greater!

Today I installed replacement gulf steam opto boards in my time expander!

The middle opto problem is gone!

However the same curious phantom opto closure remains.

I built my game at my workshop.
I have continuous 125v in the wall voltage. 15amp circuit.

The game had no faults.

I took the finished game to my gameroom.

The power varies there a lot.
Continuous 118-120v rarely 121-122v.

Minor 3-4v brown outs are common during the summer.

There is a 1954 vendo 44 coke machine on the 20 amp circuit for games.

Currently I have 5 games on that circuit.

When the coke machine compressor fires up I get a phantom closure on opto L1.

Wall voltage usually drops 1v for about a second.

If I hit the right flipper it has no affect on the opto.

If I hit the left, double flipper, I get an opto closure every 5-8 flips.

This is not killing the game, but the game isn't playing as it should.

Hitting the left flipper 50 times counts down the time expander factors. Not to zero. But as low as 1.

The right flipper doesnt do this.

Hitting the left flipper can lower the time expander before you hit one if the dalek openings.

Hitting the right flipper doesnt do this.

So, is this an opto alignment problem?

Is this a power/ground issue?

The game lights flicker when both flippers are hit at the same time.

They also flicker if you hit just the left flipper.

I don't care about the lights.

Its possible that I can add a medium capacitor to the opto 12v power line to get better cleaner, less flakey, interrupted power.

So I think it's either power surges in the game or a ground problem.

Curiously is only on one of the 5 optos.

It possible that this particular opto is ever so slightly out of alignment.

Its possible that this opto is a little weaker than the other 4.

The boards are brand new.

Has anyone else had this problem?

I'm going to add a variac to the doctor who tonight and isolate it from the coke machine.

The other games are newer and unaffected by the coke machine compressor.

I do have pindorabox opto boards coming in the mail in a couple weeks.

I'll probably install those to see if there is a difference.

I'm also interested in swinks new opto carrier. It looks like a really good replacement for the factory one.

My concern is that a 3d printed opto carrier would have no "give".

Its possible that the opto boards would get crushed or short, if the scoop assembly presses on them too firmly.

The versatile plastic have very similar qualities to the injected nylon parts but nylon particles bound together with a laser instead with the material is still nylon just not the same glossy look. The MJF material is also very similar are can be drilled and tapped etc as the parts are made in solid nylon as well. Shapeways nylon can handle ball impacts like with the goldeneye sat dish or the 80's bally ball kicker - both of which are my popular sellers with even Marco buying some of my gear for their site.

I personally don't like home 3d printed parts as they are partially hollow and the material degrades over time and the resin printing is great for detail models but not structural items - they will shatter.

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I'll get it!

I put my game on a 2000w variac.

The phantom switch errors are mostly gone.

I can flip all 3 flippers 50 times in a row with maybe 1 switch closure!

This is awesome!

Next I'm going to install the pindorabox boards and the new improved swinks opto Carrier in black.

I imagine it will bullet-proof this annoying problem.

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I'll see if I can remove those decals tomorrow.

They are very brittle.

Why would you need "give" for the opto carrier. Swinks' version now eliminates light bleeding and the warping from the original. Having any play is what caused so so many issues on this game. My original carrier was extremely warped, mushroom targets would stick, optos were intermittent and the position on the MPF was problematic.

What is the actual voltage at that outlet? Anytbing more than +/- 5% could be concern. Also, what is the actual votage with all others unplugged on that circuit and does the phantom issue appear with no other Load on the circuit. May still have an issue with your boards, even if they were " repaired". Unless all caps were replaced and transistors, the voltage swing may be on your power driver board. Just food for thought here, you seem to be doing a good job of narrowing it down.

Yep, that's what I'm going through.

Also phantom opto closures lol.
The new swinks carrier looks great!

I'll post it when it comes.

I was thinking of the power board.

Caps on that are most likely out of spec.

The 12v section could be weak.
I'm thinking about overhauling it.

My low wall power issues dont help either.

Ball search when idle came back last night with a vengeance!

Balls ejecting to the shooter lane non-stop lol!

I tracked it to ball 1 trough switch.

Its flakey as hell.

Got it working ok by bending it up pretty severely....

Hopefully it'll last the weekend.

I have some spare DB5's...

Really pissed me off. It's a brand new switch. I replaced all of them.

Ordered a new one today....

I'm beginning to agree with Chris.

The low quality of new parts, along with high prices and slow shipping is really starting to annoy me.

It sucks...

Was thinking about updating some of the original bulbs on my Dr Who with the Comet sale tomorrow. Are the 2SMD bulbs a good choice if I want to keep the price down? Mainly want to change the inserts and the backbox. Thanks for the help.

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Definitely. Get the "sunlight" color rather than cool or warm white - looks most like incandescents

Anyone use the Cointaker mirror blades on their game? Not sure if there is a preferred manufacturer for mirror blades? Thanksz

Have a Doctor Who that has some reversing going with the Doctors and the Mushroom targets. Anyone seen this before where targets light the opposite row and the Doctors when selected, except Doctor 4, are opposite. CPU Rom is L1

Are the flippers left and right correct in test?

Maybe wired reversed on the fliptronics connector board.

Something in flippers is reversed obviously.

I had my MPF locks backwards.

Mushroom targets are plugged into the CPU board j1 or j2 something like that.

See if they are on the right connector or reversed

Transmitters are on one connector recievers on the other.

I was just thinking the same thing, will check all connectors. Good starting point

It looks like the light block is reversed from the DMD.

I dont think its flippers any more.

More like the 7 doctor lights are installed upside down.

Usually something simple like that.

Yep, that was it. Ocums Razor moment. Thank you for the help.

What shots activate the Trap Door? Mine works but it is.not activating in a regular game.

Every so many loops (like 3 or 5 maybe) or if you make one ramp, then the other a couple times, the door goes down to feed to the left flipper on my game.

Or if you spell W-H-O to light the extra ball lights?

I'm happy to say that Doctor Who has gotten a pretty good workout this weekend!

Some issues:

The newly rebuilt MPF opto carrier (as of Tuesday last week), is now registering 3 hits to 3 of the optos when flippers are pressed.

So, you dont have to hit mushroom targets at all to count down the factors, multiball just automatically starts for now.

Way easier! Lol. My guests had a blast!

So the MPF opto carrier is decaying rapidly after a few days.

The optos are not aligned well any more and L1 is starting to flicker.

I ordered the new enhanced carrier from swinks as well as different opto boards from pindorabox.

I hope it solves this problem for me.

The parts should all be here in a couple weeks.

I'll rebuild it around the 15th of december.

Hopefully it will work properly for the upcoming xmas party.

FYI...

Here is an odd issue. When game is in Attract mode, the VUK under the Tardis starts to fire, first slowly, then repeats. I am wondering if I have an opto issue or loose connection? Any thoughts? Have not had it happen or heard it during gameplay, bit that's not to say it did and I just didn't hear it.

Ken

Ok, that is what I thought. I have spelled W-H-O and the ramp did not close, so I was kinda confused.

I had that happen.
Its doing a ball search.
It thinks there's a ball on the vuk.
Or the opto is blocked slightly, or bad.

Or missing ball.

Test it with a ball in switch test.

Also observe if plungers are pumping in the locks in the MPF.

If all 3 vuk's are firing, its doing a ball search. You just cant hear the MPF ones. They're pretty quiet.

A bad trough switch will cause this.

Almost always trough ball 1.

Make sure you have the right plunger in the vuk.

Mine was made out of old spare parts from assorted games and blocked the opto.

Pinball heaven had the correct plunger, end cap and nut. Marco had everything but the plunger.

Lastly, it could be a bad opto board.
But that's easy to diagnose in test.

I replaced mine as it had many hacks and repairs in it life and was ruined.

Thanks, I will test as you outlined.