I've been trying to get a Dolly Parton working that was in pretty bad shape. The Solenoid and MPU boards were replaced with Alltek ones (they are awesome, by the way!) and the Power board was replaced with a rottendog. That has gotten it to the point where the lights and displays function but now I can't get 43V power to the playfield.

On the old power board, an orange wire was soldered right to it (in between J1 and J2) which I think could have been for 43V, but the orange wires I found on the playfield appeared to be for GI, so I didn't want to guess. The knocker works but it's the only solenoid that seems to (and it is charged with 43V) and it isn't on the playfield.

Finally, F1 on the Rottendog power board blew while I was testing something with my voltmeter (or I think anyway). I didn't have a 10A fuse to replace it, but that was for 5.4V? That wouldn't have anything to do with the solenoids would it? I'm not entirely sure what that is even for since the MPU board is definitely working with the 5V from the solenoid board.

Anyone have any thoughts given all that? I spent all day yesterday in a nasty ole bar trying to get this fixed. It's SOOO close but yet so far :/

Yep, Power board shows 43V as does the knocker on the bottom of the cabinet (which does work when testing using the Alltek CPU test add-on card). It's the playfield where I can't seem to find it. I kept testing the fuse every-time I tested a solenoid with a volt meter and it (mostly) remained unblown. I think a fast-blow was in there originally and I believe a slow-blow is required? Even with a repalcement fuse in-tact, though, I still don't get 43V.

The weird part is, when I have the MPU board in game-mode (not test-mode), I can start a game and press the flipper buttons and see the GI's dim. So that makes me think it's trying to do something, but I'm not sure where it's going if there's no 43V on the playfield.

I'm trying to repair this thing in a dark bar so anyone know which solenoid is the first in the chain for the power? I made a few guesses but it's hard to see.

All that said, I do have the schematics for the playfield and found the section I need, but it doesn't list wire colors unless I'm just not seeing something?

Correct me if I am wrong, but the solenoid board itself is really tying the power to ground right? Solenoids are otherwise charged with power directly coming off the power board?

Hmmm yeah I tried checking for power before and after the fuse and would check after each test for a blown fuse. As it was blowing before, it must have been getting power at some point and now it's not but I don't recall changing anything. Thanks for the letting me know which pins go to what though, doth! That'll make it much easier to know where to start!

As far as the GI's dimming, unless I'm testing for voltage somehow the wrong way, I'm not seeing any 43V to the flipper coils at all, which is weird for why the GIs still dim. I tested the knocker coil for 43V but doing the same test resulting in nothing on the fliipper coils. It's very strange.

Nope, flippers do not function. None of the solenoids on the playfield function - I can't see 43V on any of them. The knocker on the bottom of the cab, however, does work.

So I feel like a wire has come loose or maybe a cold solder joint on one of the solenoids towards the back of the playfield (that I'm having trouble easily getting to). I'm used to modern pins where you can flip the playfield up to the backbox but you can't really do that with these older ones can you?

As noted, there IS a disconnected wire but it's orange and tracing where it goes, it really looks to be for GI. It was soldered directly to the old power board between J1 and J2.

Haha no worries barakandl - I appreciate yours and everyone's help!

I actually do have the schematics, though not the one you just provided for the power board. I just had Rottendog for that, which tells me which pins are 43V but not what they were going to. So yours will be quite helpful.

I agree, the connector is probably wasted and I already have the connector kit from Pinball Life to fix it. I just didn't want to do that yet until I was more confident in the wiring. I'm actually worried though that the wire might be missing and some other wiring shenanigans have taken place on this poor machine over the ages.

Yes, one end is yellow I believe, though I think the other end is grey for the fuse holder, not brown. But I'll look again next time I can make the trip out. I need to buy some 1A and 10A slow blow fuses before I can make the excursion to try again.

Thanks so much for the help everyone! Gives me something to go on!

Yep, those are definitely yellow (going out tot he coils, or at least the flipper and other lower playfield ones). After thinking about it, I actually do think the wires coming in are brown. So I'll just have to find that. Worried it isn't there.

Some dude did some pretty ghetto fixes for this thing, which is, in part, why I swapped out the boards with Rottendog and Alltek boards. I didn't anticipate I might run into funky wiring issues though :/

The sheet you sent me is golden! Though I'm now nervous - I'm almost certain there is no wire currently going to J1:6. That was one of the ones that was burnt. Since this thing used to work, I have to assume that wire has been put somewhere else. I'll look, as suggested, at the transformer and trace things back from there to see what I can find.

As I recall, when I was comparing the Rottendog schems (http://rottendog.us/BPS018.pdf), the wires that were connected to 43V were thin which has me concerned. If someone somehow tied one of those to the playfield, that'd be bad juju, though since I'm not getting any power to the PF, I'd doubt that. If I just can't seem to find it, worse case is I'll just run a new wire I suppose.

Hmm you don't happen to have a link perchance? I tried pulling up the category and got a blank page mostly:

http://www.planetarypinball.com/mm5/merchant.mvc?Store_Code=PP&Screen=CTGY&Category_Code=WIR

Doh! But yes I agree, I ought to figure out what's going on with the PF. Ideally I want it wired the /right/ way so if I do figure it out, I may still end up running a new wire. Things were awfully ugly in there before I came along and it's been a bit of a nightmare to work on in places as a result.

Awesome, thanks vid1900!

Hey all! Just providing an update - I got the dern thing working! Turns out I had J1 shifted over (it's a 9 pin socket but 8 pin connector). I had it wrong initially because the original connector appeared to have been cut so I think the first pin had to be shifted over.

After that, unsurprisingly, the flippers got 48V and were able to start doing their magic. Thanks for all the help in this regard! Knowing the wire color really helped me figure out that was what was wrong!

After that, it was just some odds and ends - fixing some bad joints on the playfield and one wire in the wrong position on the header. I still have some things to fix (coin mechs are gross!) but it works at least.

Thanks again for all the helpful advice here!

Yep. Actually I thought about just redoing the whole connector and will key it then.