cool dude, I'm in. So a strategy question to the group. How big a roll do the drop targets on the right hand side play for you? Usually I'm so focused on getting the elements of coolness I don't think about the drop targets much. They're kind of hard to hit too, especially the ones closest to the apron. But I think knocking them all 3 or 4 times lights extra ball and I think there may be some other goodies.

I like your Big Shot figure. It really doesn’t need to look like the original.

I recently removed all the glitter decals from my mixmaster and ordered new ones from Planetary Pinball (order worked out great, thanks!), but after cleaning up it which was a lot of work getting all the goo off and polishing (I used a special automotive chrome polish - mistake - it was too abrasive) I decided to wait on putting the new decals on, partly because I was thinking about investigating if it’s possible to get the mixmaster coated again first. So I put it back in and you know what - I think it looks better without decals, so I’m going to leave it without decals for the time being.

Back on the subject of insert LEDs for Dr. Dude I recently put LEDs in all the inserts, but took them all out a few days later. LEDs don’t seem to work in Dr. Dude. The result was the insert lights were always on, I couldn’t recognize the status of my elements of coolness or which reflex targets had been hit, etc. My impression is that Dr. Dude works more with dimming than other System 11 games. Has anybody else observed this ? Do I need special LEDs with slow response times?

thanks for the information. I’ll be very interested how that works with vacuum metalization. When I think about it it makes a lot more sense than a galvanic type chrome coating. It also explains why using chrome cleaner is a bad idea - metalization layers are a lot thinner.

Regarding the LEDs - maybe there’s some other issue with my Dr. Dude because I also tried some non ghosting LEDs and they didn’t look right. My investigations will continue.

thanks for the replies. When I said the LEDs in inserts were always on - this was a bit inaccurate - they were flickering, but with a much more intense on phase - also the ones which were supposed to be off. So here’s my thought and question - the dude lamps in the middle just above the flipper fingers - on my game they are all always on, but the ones which are supposed to be on to show your dude status are brighter. They also have this very slow pulsing effect which actually looks really cool, kind of like a smoldering fire - I always thought it was supposed to look like this, but now I’m thinking maybe not (or now that I think about it obviously not!) - also, the other lamps on column 8 do kind of the same thing. So I need to investigate column 8 - could indeed be the transistor- a misbehaving transistor in one column would of course affect all the rows.

I was eagerly watching for a theory for this question - why does this little guy break and what have people done with him when he breaks. Judging from the way he's attached to the game and the force being applied to the screw holes from the coil I would imagine over time the screw holes give out (it's kind of a weak design). When I bought my Dr. Dude the seller had two games and neither had a Big Shot (maybe he took it off his keeper because he thought I might ask! - which I did). But it doesn't explain to me why there aren't a lot of broken Big Shots for sale. Here my explanation is they were all thrown away when the games were routed. But even this doesn't completely explain the situation if they were reproduced several times since. Since then I have made my own which is fine.

I kind of agree with this - I almost never aim for Big Shot - doesn't really yield many points and is a bit dangerous.

I’ve had this problem often enough that I took a small angle bracket and bolt (around an inch) and some nuts to build a simple construction to prevent the ball from getting stuck there. I just used the existing holes in the plastic so it’s a reversible mod. You can’t really see it when you’re playing because it’s hidden by the heart plastic. It’s real simple, I recommend to experiment, but if there’s interest I can make a photo when I’m home again.

I found the schematic scans in IPDB for Dr. Dude to be rather poor. Many of the scans for other games are excellent.

Many apologies for how late this is - where did the time go ??? I think the ball must go up there after kareeming off the reflex targets,

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I like the idea of putting some rubber on, maybe heatshrinking cable sleeves. However, the ball doesn’t hit this construction very often and when it does, I don’t think it is going at high speed.

I just checked the pictures here in Pinside in the gallery and EUREKA you’re right. Thanks for pointing this out. We’ll see now if this change has an effect on balls getting stuck on top of the plastic.

I put slow changing RGBs in the pops. Since the bumper caps are uncolored it works pretty well.

hopefully an easy question - are the flasher bulbs (like in the raygun or in the backbox) supposed to get 37V dc or 25 V dc ?

I finally found the solution for this issue. Some (silly) person had put in two diodes for each lamp in the dude-o-meter and they were pointed in the opposite directions ! I cut away the diodes on the socket side of the board. All the original diodes in the board were ok. If somebody can offer a plausible explanation why someone would install two diodes going in opposite directions I would feel enlightened. Oddly, there were additional instances of double diodes on some five or so individual BA9 insert bulbs.

After removing all these diodes, LEDs work great in Dr. Dude.

One amusing (at least to me now, not then) side story was after installing all the LEDs and starting the game, none of the LEDs in the Dude-o-meter worked. I kept removing the board, reflowing the plug connections, changing diodes - until I realized that none of the bulbs are lit when you are at the bottom of the Dude-o-meter scale. After your first multiball, then the lowest lamp lights. With the double diodes in, there was always at least one Dude-o-meter light on.

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Check continuity at the coil and at the lights. You probably have a broken connection somewhere. Trace the connections back to the connectors in the backbox.

“also my heart of rock n roll and the gift of gab triple light that uses the 55 wedge lights are out.”

Same thing. Search for the broken connection. Check the solder on the pins on the board which hook up to the connector (on the board under the playfield with lights in question). It sometimes helps to reflow that solder (heat it up to liquid, then let it cool).

I always use lead solder on my games, but they're all pre 2000 like Dr. Dude. I suppose you could reflow without adding solder, but I always add a tiny bit.

Just an additional comment to insert lighting issues - check out the lamp matrix in the handbook - if you have lights not working in a row or a column it will help you localize the issue.

ok, that would be J9 in the interconnect board you’re showing. That and J7 and J6 connect to the GI. That the connector was damaged by heat is clear, but you can’t be sure the defect is there. Refer also to the pages beginning on 3-21 in the game instructions - here all the connector pins are described.

that and how to interpret the 5 inserts in a semicirccle around the drops - I’ve never really figured out.

It is a great game - it really grows on you over time.

Good luck with that. Have you read other posts in this thread on this subject?

As an aside, I have often wondered what happened to all the broken Hot Shots - why would someone throw away a broken one when he/she doesn’t have a replacement…

any indigestion ?