Hello all,
I purchased a Gottlieb Hearts and spades EM pin and I am learning how to work on EM Machines. What a great challenge !
Looking at the Hearts and spades I noticed the plum bob tilt switch was disconnected and laying in the bottom of the cabinet. After I repaired it and hooked it back up the machine works as follows:
With a ball in play and then the tilt switch activated the tilt light comes on the back box the playfield lights go out and all the targets are dead. After the ball drains the machine starts decrementing the number of balls left down to zero and the game over light comes on. Being new to pinball I am not sure if this operation is correct. There is a adjustable jumper that says tilt in/out and I’m not sure what that does but I tried both positions with the same results. Any information on this would be appreciated
thanks in advance
Mully

Hello based on your reply the operation I described above is not correct? Do you know what the proper operation should be? Do you know what the tilt in/out jumper is used for?

Hi thanks for the troubleshooting information do you know what the proper tilt operation should be on this game? It’s hard to troubleshoot something you do not understand how it is supposed to function.

Thanks Howard
Looks like you lose the ball in play and one extra ball on a tilt. Mine currently tells Annie decreases the amount of balls to zero then goes to game over.

Ok so The ball is in play and then the game is tilted.. looking at your highlighted schematic and a motor contact timing diagram that may or may not go to my machine( I was not able to find one for my Hearts and spades).
Can you check my reasoning on how this operates.
1 The O out whole switch is closed by the ball entering
2 The out hole relay O is triggered
3 score motor starts to spin closing contacts 1A
4 O’s contacts are closed
5 Motor contact 2C gets closed
6 T Contacts are closed because of the tilt relay being energized
7 zero position ball count switch is closed
8 subtract ball count unit coil energizes
I’m guessing all this happens to subtract one ball?

9 If the Tilt reset adjust is in the IN position and SB2 contact is closed
10 score motor contacts 3B will be closed by the motor and energize the TILT RESET.. TR coil
What do you think?

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Hi guys,
This game is set to 5 balls pet game and I think jrpinball is correct. Tilt penalty 1 ball plus ball in play.

I have been working on this issue for days to no success. Now I think I have created another issue in doing so. I cleaned and adjusted the contacts on
SB2 relay (start relay) and some on the score motor 3B. The wire color markings on the wire have faded and or the schematic colors are different, it is rare to find a wire on a switch that matches the color on the schematic. This makes it difficult to identify the correct switch for a Newbie.

TILT sequence issue:
Troubleshooting steps so far:

1 I used a DVM on continuity check placed at Node 0 and moved the other end to Node 1, then Node 2, 3,4,5,6,7. I positioned the score wheel so contact 1A was closed. Manually closed the O relay contacts and when I got to node 7 I rotated the score wheel so MOTOR 3B contacts were closed. I have continuity from Node 0 all the way to Node 7 with the MOTOR 1A , O and 3B closed. The TILT reset coil still does not energize until after all the remaining balls have been subtracted.

Reset issue:
2 I created this issue --When I reset the game by pressing the free play button the game will sometimes count up 5 balls then subtracts 5 balls turn on Game Over light, add 5 balls and then kick the ball out..see the reset video please.

Any advice would be appreciated!

Tilt (resized).jpg

Hi Mopar,

Good to hear from you again! thanks for the info. I mentioned above I did clean and gap contacts on the SB2 start switch in the control bank. Maybe I messed something up. The relays in the switch bank all seem to do a full reset.

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Hey Mopar
Wahooo!
It looks like you were right I must have adjusted SB2 contacts too close after I cleaned them trying to fix my tilt issue. I opened up the contact gap a little more and this seems to have fixed the reset issue. Thanks!!
No how about that darn tilt issue

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Hi Mopar,
Thanks for the suggestion. I noticed on tilt the game will operate as intended losing the ball in play and 1 ball, sometimes. Other times it will subtract 2 or 3 balls. I will check the 3B contacts tonight and keep you posted, thanks again for the other reset fix info!! Your Awesome man!

Hi Mopar,
I inspected cleaned and adjusted the Score Motor 3B switch but I'm getting the same operation on Tilt. It looks like the Tilt reset may be happening at different times in the sequence causing more balls being subtracted than at other times. Please see videos and notice when the play field lights come back on in the sequence compared to how many balls are subtracted. What do you think? Vid1 is it working correctly, Vid2 is the second ball working correctly and vid3 is it malfunctioning. What do you think?

Hi Mopar,
1- How does the Ball return relay take away the ball in play for tilting?
2- The Tilt/tilt reset seems to work fine after reset...so the mechanism should be ok ...right?
Here is the 3B contact open and closed.
IMG_2004 (resized).PNGIMG_2005 (resized).PNG

Hi Mopar I guess I just don’t know which contacts belong to the ball return coil

Hi Mopar sounds like a good idea do you know what switch on SB2 I’m looking for the wire colors do not match my schematic.

Thanks Mopar
Can you tell me which contacts belong to the ball return Relay You referenced above

Hi Mopar
I am sorry I meant what set of contacts on the schematic belong to the ball return relay.

Hi Mopar
I see now why it was confusing I was looking at the ball return solenoid thinking it was a relay and wondered how it had anything to do with the tilt circuit. So now I know O is the out hole switch and relay and the ball return is the solenoid. Still trying to learn all of this. I put a jumper across switch 3B and a tilt results in a one ball subtraction.. and this is repeatable. So when the machine is in tilt mode and the ball closes the O switch the tilt reset coil is fired when switch 1A closes on the score motor. The interesting thing is if I check continuity from one side of the 3B switch to the tilt reset coil I get continuity if I manually close the switch contacts. I guess it could be a contact resistance issue where high current required for the relay causes a large voltage drop across the contacts and causes the relay not to fire properly sometimes. Strange.

I filed the contacts until they are both shiny but that does not resolve the issue. Also with the jumper across 3B there is no loss of ball in play just one ball subtraction.

Here is a vid with a switch hooked up to trigger a Tilt and what happens with SW 3B shorted with a jumper. This reacts how I think it should with SW 3B shorted,Right?
As soon as 1A fires the Tilt reset is triggered subtracting only 1 ball. The contacts are clean and solder looks good on 3B???

Cool thanks I will investigate those switches. Thanks for your explanation on the ball return relay below. So the ball return relay has contacts named O.

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Hey Mopar
I spent all day trying to fix the tilt issue. No good news. I rebuilt switch 3B with new parts from PBR. I re-soldered each wire to switch connection on every switch in the tilt circuit. Tilt reset is still intermittent. I made a LED test light and placed it across the Tilt reset relay to see when it was getting powered. I noticed when the Tilt reset was not triggered properly the test light would only dimly light and when the test light lit bright the tilt reset triggers. Seems like high resistance preventing the tilt reset coil from firing. The A1 and O contacts work fine passing high current when firing the Ball subtract count relay. Next I connected a jumper from 25v to the Tilt adjust “IN” and manually close the 3B contacts. The tilt relay will reset strongly every time. I’m stumped. The ball return started taking several times to get the ball to the shooter lane as well. Can score motor bearings cause this?

View recent photos (resized).png

Thanks, that's just my bad picture angle. The solder tabs are 1/4" apart in reality.

Hi Mopar,
Allow me to clarify the videos.

The Tilt relay has been tripped and in Tilt mode in the start of both videos.

The test light is directly across the Tilt reset coil.

Video 1
The Tilt relay has been triggered and the ball is headed toward the out hole. When the ball reaches the out hole the Trip relay fails to reset due a weak current pulse cause by poor contacting switches or maybe switch timing...not sure...Arrrrg

Video 2
The Tilt relay has been triggered and the ball is headed toward the out hole. When the ball reaches the out hole the Trip relay is reset by the strong current pulse provided when 1A, and 3B close. Maybe 1A and 3B are not staying on long enough together at times??? Or out of sync???

Thanks Mopar
I have placed a jumper at all the nodes starting Node 1 to Node 7. Then worked back to node 2 but I can't tell which switch contacts on the relay O that needs jumped because the wire colors are wrong. Or I am looking for the wrong colors. Also I believe a sequence of switch closures with the correct timing is required for the Tilt reset to work properly right? When I add a jumper it throws off the timing. Maybe.

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Hi Mopar,
Sorry, I'm not following where you mean.
If I am on the side of the cabinet and facing the hair pin clips that hold all the relays on the metal mount bracket. Where are thet from this aspect?

Cool, I will have a look thanks!

This is the last set of contacts I have left to clean. I hope this does the trick.

I went into this figuring I would connect the tilt switch pendulum that was laying in the bottom of the cabinet when I bought it and all would be golden. NOT! 20 Hours later....still wrestling with it..

Looking at the O relay contacts on the schematic, they would have to be functioning properly to subtract a ball or balls, as it does at times during a tilt cycle. It never fails to subtract at least 1 ball unless you do not score any points, which in that case it returns the ball to the shooter lane without subtracting a ball.
Thanks
Mully

Hey Mopar,
Update: Cleaned and checked gap on the O relay, thanks for pointing out where these contacts are located. No luck. Still rando Tilt operation..

Hi Mopar,
Side question... do you know the length of the legs on your H&S?