It's a mix between cloth and vinyl coated wires... I'm worried about getting everything out of the cloth wires... I took the sound card out separately in order to bring it home, clean it up, and test it and I don't know how comfortable I feel with the cloth wire.

Got a couple of the big pieces home today. Just brought home the cabinet and the playfield.

Left the glass and lots of the other pieces including the backbox in the garage.

Left the glass and lots of the other pieces including the backbox in the garage.

This is the temporary setup to clean up the damaged wires and test switches, contacts, solenoids and lights.

This is the temporary setup to clean up the damaged wires and test switches, contacts, solenoids and lights.

Getting the cabinet ready for paint. We had to bring it into our tiny apartment to paint it because it's well below freezing in the garage. Sorry, no after pictures so far since the paint is still drying and needs another coat. We will include a before and after picture when we are done painting.

Getting the cabinet ready for paint. We had to bring it into our tiny apartment to paint it because it's well below freezing in the garage. Sorry, no after pictures so far since the paint is still drying and needs another coat. We will include a before and after picture when we are done painting.

Took the chance to clean up the plastics on the field. Just some dish soap and water and these look great. Used this opportunity to also size up some of the rubber for the field.

Took the chance to clean up the plastics on the field. Just some dish soap and water and these look great. Used this opportunity to also size up some of the rubber for the field.

I am going to be very busy over the next couple of weeks so I won't have any updates but McSparkle may have some.

fanuminski LOL

That would be killer to sit up on the backbox

However the little b@$t@rd made off without any consequences that we know of.

Sorry that I've been lazy with the updates ladies and gents. I was away for a couple of weeks working nights and then I was having some lady trouble after I returned. I'm also facing a possible lay off at work. So I took a day or two off of life to go visit my other love (my car). I haven't got back on a regular sleep schedule yet, due to the circumstances, and I haven't put much time into the pinball machine as a result. Finally though, I put some time into it. I didn't get a ton of work done because I was preoccupied with doing a lot of nothing.

I decided to just start small and work on something that I could do sitting in my spare car seat while just listening to some music to help me feel better.

Took these metal pieces off of the playfield and figured I would give it a whack at polishing them up.

Took these metal pieces off of the playfield and figured I would give it a whack at polishing them up.

After a quick clean up with a scouring pad and some dish soap and cleaning vinegar (left), it's clear that there is some pitting and these won't be perfect. I might be able to sand them out and repolish it but I think I'm going to wait to determine if the machine has bigger problems before I spend that much time or money on this thing.

After a quick clean up with a scouring pad and some dish soap and cleaning vinegar (left), it's clear that there is some pitting and these won't be perfect. I might be able to sand them out and repolish it but I think I'm going to wait to determine if the machine has bigger problems before I spend that much time or money on this thing.

Both of these were cleaned up with the same method. Scouring pad with dish soap and cleaning vinegar, then polished with fine steel wool and silvo. These are probably going to be the best they can get until at least the machine is turned on and tested.

Both of these were cleaned up with the same method. Scouring pad with dish soap and cleaning vinegar, then polished with fine steel wool and silvo. These are probably going to be the best they can get until at least the machine is turned on and tested.

Next up, the lanes get the same treatment.

Next up, the lanes get the same treatment.

Short lane polished (left) next to untouched (right).

Short lane polished (left) next to untouched (right).

Three all polished up. Again, it's not perfect but I don't want to sink too much time and money into the parts of the machine that don't need it until I get it working properly. They are also a far cry better than they were before.

Three all polished up. Again, it's not perfect but I don't want to sink too much time and money into the parts of the machine that don't need it until I get it working properly. They are also a far cry better than they were before.

I wasn't able to pull both of these metal pieces off of the board (Sorry, I don't know the names of all of the parts). One felt like it didn't want to budge and made some cracking sounds as I pulled up on it. I still wanted to polish it so I covered the surrounding plexi in masking tape and polished it in place.

I wasn't able to pull both of these metal pieces off of the board (Sorry, I don't know the names of all of the parts). One felt like it didn't want to budge and made some cracking sounds as I pulled up on it. I still wanted to polish it so I covered the surrounding plexi in masking tape and polished it in place.

This one isn't really related to pinball but I needed somewhere to stick my new gift for my baby until I make the drive back out to my storage facility to get some work done on it. Completely crack-free dashboard for the E30

This one isn't really related to pinball but I needed somewhere to stick my new gift for my baby until I make the drive back out to my storage facility to get some work done on it. Completely crack-free dashboard for the E30

Sorry again for the slow updates. It's just been a bit of a rough go. Hopefully it will pick up steam again soon.

I made a long drive out to a friend's place and traded him some work in his scrap yard for a design and vinyl print for the project. I know it's sacrilege to use computer aided design on a classic pinball machine as all the artwork is done by hand but I am not an artist by any means and it's the best I could do.

Compass (resized).jpg

This is just a shot from the long drive in this Canadian winter. Empty roads and all clear.

vinyl print 2 (resized).jpg

He did a great job copying the design and printing it. It's nearly perfect. He didn't have the off-white cream colour of vinyl and wasn't sure how to easily create the marble effect on the existing piece so I told him we'd try it out on the machine and if it needs to be redone it won't be that big of a deal.

vinyl print 3 (resized).jpg

The vinyl print looks a bit stark in comparison to the colours on the rest of the machine but I'm hoping that once it's cleaned up and all put back together, it won't be too bad. Otherwise we will have to get some cream vinyl and figure out how to recreate the marble effect in Adobe. My friend is sure the marble effect could be done but he didn't want to burn hours on it if he knew we could redo it later if required.

playfield extra 0 (resized).jpg

There's this extra 0 by the 30k mark on the field. IPDB notes this 0 on their website. I did a bit of digging and didn't come up with anything other than people seem to think this means it's special but no one knows why it's special. People also indicated that these fields with the extra 0 have hand written serial numbers, which is in deed the case here. Does anyone on here have real information about this "special" mark on the playfield?

serial number 1 (resized).jpg

serial number 2 (resized).jpg

The serial number is definitely hand written, and poorly at that. Sorry about the potato quality pictures, I was holding up the playfield and taking a picture with my other hand.

I did my best to polish out the scratches on the playfield using some Novus 2 and elbow grease. I felt as though I was more cleaning out the scratches than I was polishing them. I have a friend that's an auto-detailer that's convinced he can polish out all of the scratches and so I'm going to use his help with that I believe. Unfortunately, I forgot to take after pictures of the scratches after polishing with Novus 2.

Since I'm out of town again for work, the best I can do is give you the before pictures of the playfield scratches. Anyone have any advice on how to remove these scratches? Or should I just have my auto-detailer buff them up for me?

scratches 2 (resized).jpg

scratches 1 (resized).jpg