As far as I know, they never utilized these lights on f14. I was just the other day thinking about how to hook them up somehow.

We're in charge to do that - it's not so difficult.
You need some resistors, sockets, bulbs or LED and the connection to the power supply or to the GI wiring.
The base of the LED-Panel is the same as used in the Millionaire, but that Pin has two more displays for credit counter.

YOu are in charge .. I am just the guy sitting in the corner waiting for your success

Same question in r.g.p. ... no usefull answer so far. A guy told me that he had a look in the proto schematics and there is no space for an other 4 switched lamps in the matrix. F-14 uses them all ....

Yes, I will get it on.
Today I tested with regular bulb and LED... power consuption is 0,5 A with a bulb and only 0,15 A with LED.
Resistor gets really hot with bulb, so we need resistors with wattage up to 2 Watts.
With LED there's no problem with consumption and heat, but not everyone likes LED, so I want to design the circuit interchangeable.
My solution is a resistor with 15 Ohm and 2 Watts - that will work.

I don't see why you can't just alligator clip or solder directly to one of the gi sockets no? Why resistors?

I use a PinLED-Board and this board has four sockets for bulbs and a connector, but not equiped.
Two bulbs have their own circuit, and the other two are connected parallel and there are three placeholders for resistors and the wiring is connected via these resistors to the sockets.
I take 12 Volt from Power Supply and therefor I need the resistors to operate LED with 6 Volts.
First I have to solder the connector and the resistors.

Averell, make sure to write up a summary/how to when you're done. It would be very helpful for the rest of us.

I wrote a manual how to reinstall the prototype flashers, but it's available in German only.
So Do I with the summary for the PinLED-Board.
It's not difficult to understand and very easy to do.
My new calculation now is a 12 Ohm resistor for standalone circuit and 6,8 Ohm for parallel switched bulbs.
That will work and I have tested yesterday.
I've ordered the parts but now I have to wait for delivery.

Just started a tech thread for an F14 I got called out to look at.
Thought I would post the link here in case any of you System 11 experts can help me out.
https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/f14-burnt-coil-and-other-questions

Averell pm me the manual. I know german a bit.

Gave my F14 some TLC this evening. Tried LEDs from China with a single 5050 SMD cold white. Results are excellent! I was afraid the smd would not spread the light enough but its very good. The six controlled lights are also china made cointaker style with a white dome. These are super!

Switched to a clear bumper cap with a slow colour changer under. Spreads the colours very good. Also put in Transparent silicon slingshot rubbers, superbands and some lexan protectors. And finally I put in the two missing flashers up top but I haven't wired it up yet. And lots of electric tape underneath on every switch. Lol

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I would suggest Blue LEDs for the right column of bonus inserts, mine were completely faded like yours and some blue LEDs really brought them back. Just a suggestion.

Yup, makes a huge difference.

Agreed. Mine are faded but with comet smd's in it blue as can be.

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Yup I have a batch of leds on its way from China. Exact Same shit cointakers and comet use but a third of the price.

@aerobert: I need your Email, please send to [email protected] and I send you the manual.

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Here you can see the free area in the PinLED-Board that can be used in F-14 Tomcat also.

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I soldered high power resistors with 12 Ohm and 6,8 Ohm, remembering that two bulbs have their own circuit, and the other two are connected parallel. The angled plug is in delivery.

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I prepared the electric directly from the power supply as well.
I use unregulated 12 volts via pin 6 (Plus) and pin 14 (Ground) at plug 3J6.
The required counter plug is in delivery also.

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Hello, I'm a new member and a proud owner of a F-14 pinball. Wanted to ask you (or anyone) how did you mount your toys on the play field? Thanks!

Has anyone had this happen where all the eject solenoid keep firing like they are looking for a ball but all the balls are in the trough? mine just started doing this.
Thank you in advance for any help you could send me.

Check the Switches in the ballthrough. Cant remember if it uses opto, if so, clean them with qtip and check solder and/or board connector.

Should be a very Easy fix.

Thank you, Aerobert. I will check that out. So there's probably just a switch stuck that thinks the balls have not returned?

Yes, most likely the game miscounts the number of balls in the game. It either thinks one ball is missing (bad opto/switch), or all are missing (completely disconnected or broken switch/opto assembly).

This is the most simple, and normally the first, thing to check every time there are issues with missing balls, or the game firing away one extra or some other strange ball related things.

So the switch test will let me know if there is a stuck switch triggering those coils? I also will check the connector on the board, if a wire was broken though they wouldn't be triggering in the first place. I thank you again for steering me in the right direction.

The trough switches are sub-micro switches. If adjustment of the wire is not the problem, it's usually a bad switch will need to be replaced.

Hey guys. I may be venturing into my first pinball. I found an F-14 Tomcat advertised for $1000. Playfield in good shape, backglass almost perfect, new rubber. Cabinet is a little crispy, and the owner says it doesn't play music. (Don't know about sound effects).

I'm asking for help in what I should be looking at when I go see it later today. I am not at all familiar with Williams Sys11.

Thanks guys. I'm pretty excited about it. Is $1000 reasonable do you think?
-J

Existing post screws and made mounts out of spring steel.

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That's pretty reasonable. Hard to go wrong with any System 11 for $1000 unless it's really trashed. Just be aware that you are probably going to put a few hundred into various parts and upgrades, and possibly need to send out a board to fix the sound if you can't fix it yourself. I'd probably try for a lower price if there is battery leakage though. Just my opinion.

I agree if the play field looks good and has no acid or crazy hacks on the board I would go with it.

I hope to get the counter plug this week to complete the short upgrade on the PinLED-Board.
I did a change for the plug and put it upside down on the board.
Now it's more useable for the lock pad, it's a bit different to the built in plugs.

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Well I bought it. $850. The pin plays fine except for the top left flipper flutters. From what minimal research I've done this is possibly a hold coil, the diode on the coil, or a transistor. Any thoughts on this?

The cabinet is in OK shape though it was painted all black. Needs some epoxy and bondo and a decal kit.
The translite looks pretty dirty, so I'm going to clean that up a bit.
Needs the piece of plastic that covers the ball ramp on the very top left.
Needs a blue Beacon lens unless i can glue the cracks in the one I have and make it look nice.
The playfield is in really good shape, there are only some small spots that could use a touch up. Need to read into that as I have no clue where to start.

Basically it's completely playable which I am happy about. The biggest issue with it is the sound is messed up. I hear all the effects and voices, but there is no music. I'm going to pull out the sound board and clean it up a bit, reseat the roms and see where we're at.

I'll get some pics up this evening.

No transistors in this circuit for older games like this, may guess is a broken hold winding.

Buy a new one for 30 dollars.

If this doesn't work let me know as I have an early sound board for this.

Way to go and a great price too, you will love this game.

Now PinLED-Board is finished and it works.
I only have to swap the current LED against LED with a wider angle, then it's perfect.

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The wiring for the LED is easily triple bridged.

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On the right there's the additional plug for LED.

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Bombcat back in action... under supervision of the Master himself.

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So how many of you have issues with the ball sticking between the two center targets? Ive tried to adjust and tighten the reed switches, but they keep moving just enough to catch a well placed ball.

Just bite the bullet and buy 2 new targets. Those ones are pretty easy to replace. It's the rear 6 that are the real pain and take the most beating.

Have you guys been following this thread at all? I think F-14 would make a great candidate for this product. Hopefully it will be available at some point.

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/hardtop-playfield-new-product-announcement-poll-included

Flight suit on. Just joined the club. I was unsure about it. Cabinet has some rough spots. Topper motor and lights don't work. Everything else works well as I played it. Mylar has bubbled but not enough to effect ball and inserts are mostly level, just a couple minor up and downs. Got it from an older couple that said they've had it 15-20 years. Didn't know what to expect when he said batteries needed charging since it has been unplugged for 6 months. Backbox was locked and they didn't know you could get in there. Fortunately key was on the hook in the coin door and boards are clean. No damage. Went ahead and bought it. Don't know if I overpaid but it seems like pins out here are either overpriced for me or snatched up right away so I went for it. Be prepared for some questions for the flight crew as I get into it. Did some research before going to see it but had never played one before today and I like it. Happy to join you.

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I'd get in there and carefully inspect and clean *everything*. Sounds like the previous owners really didn't know much about how to care for the game. Hopefully their neglect will prove to have been benign! Congrats!

Congrats ! Looks nice. Hopefully the batteries didnt leak onto the boards.

No leakage at all. Once I saw the key was there I showed the owner how to get into the back box and checked the boards and they are clean. Put some new batts in this morning and the adjust failure is cleared now. Novus'd it clean and did a waxing on the main areas to at least mentally feel like there's some extra protection until I tear it down and do a real cleaning once I get some new rubbers, flippers and leds. Payed a few games with no issues.

Good news ! If i were you i would now remove the battery holder off the board and put in a remote holder. And also fuse the bridge rectifier.

I've searched some and can't find a definite answer. I was in settings and found some adjustment locations don't match the manual. U26 has a proto 5 sticker and U22 Sound Rom 2 has a P-1 and menu info shows L-5. So I understand I'm running prototype rom 5 but what I can't find is what the differences are to L-1 other than the dual lock on first Tomcat spelling. Are there other gameplay differences and sound differences I have? Anything worth a new rom? Is there a reference for comparisons somewhere? Are the prototype roms considered beta and have known issues? Sorry if all this is clear somewhere and I missed it.

Oh ok thanks for the advise, that's awesome!

I fixed my music issues. Turns out one of the pins on a sound rom was bent.. im still going to recap the whole pin and lower the 100v outputs.

Hello everyone! I am in the process of shopping my F-14 tomcat pinball and I noticed that the slingshots no longer working, I've checked one of the fuses and realized that it was hosed. I replaced it with a 2 amp fuse (the original had 2.5 because Home Depot didn't have em) The fuse worked but the slingshots is still not working. Can anyone point me to the right direction on how I can resolve this issue please?

Thanks for your time!

Start with solenoid test and see if the slings work then. If they work in test then you need to test the switches to see if they are working.

Thanks for the reply! I've checked it in test mode and no reaction from them at all. The leaf switches on both slingshots is not responding. I do say the right kicker works if I do it by hand, it makes a sound but the leaf switches is dead.

What exactly have you done so far with the shopping out? Maybe it will shed some light. Did you test the fuse that you put in ? Possibly a bad fuse ?

In attract mode use a jumper wire connected to the ground braid and briefly touch the metal tab of Q-75. Does the sling fire now?

When I was in test mode and was changing the flash bulbs, I've noticed the right slingshot was repeatedly reacting on its on and when I lift the playfield up to exam it, it stopped working all together and smelled slight smoke. I've replaced the fuse but it still not reacting.

Hmmm I got to try that as soon as I can locate the q-75...LOL Sorry I'm pretty much a noob when it comes to pinball machines