Seattle, WA
The metal guides are so satisfying to hit after shooting around on cardboard! Awesome! How are those 2 balls defying gravity by the orbit gate ??
(Topic ID: 203620)
Quoted from Mbecker:The metal guides are so satisfying to hit after shooting around on cardboard! Awesome! How are those 2 balls defying gravity by the orbit gate ??
I’m moving from 22 ga sheetmetal to 18 ga stainless. The nice part I was able to adjust a couple to make the shots smoother.
Ha. Nice catch. Since my “subway tunnel” addition on the back board. It no longer fits my rotisserie. So it’s standing on end on the work bench. Adding the service rails make this easy.
Well this cold-sore throat thing is still kicking my ass. So I’m calling it for the day. I was able to install some more parts. Properly adjusted. And make cardboard templates for all my plastics. I think I’m going to go with smaller domes. No rush for an order so I figure I will hold off on a parts order.
Eventually I want to replace the flasher with 3d printed figures. A tacikoma in the back. A laughing man logo on the left and maybe ceo Jameson on the right.
Quoted from Fortytwo:I’m moving from 22 ga sheetmetal to 18 ga stainless. The nice part I was able to adjust a couple to make the shots smoother.
Ha. Nice catch. Since my “subway tunnel” addition on the back board. It no longer fits my rotisserie. So it’s standing on end on the work bench. Adding the service rails make this easy.
Ah gotcha, that’s right you’ve got that white painted 22ga metal. I’m soon facing that same issue with a back subway and the rotesserie- going to try and figure out a way to still support pf on it and get subway clearance though.. would like to leave mine on the rotesserie quite a bit longer.
Good luck with the cold - hope you’re feeling better soon. Cold season this year sucked!
Quoted from Mbecker:Ah gotcha, that’s right you’ve got that white painted 22ga metal. I’m soon facing that same issue with a back subway and the rotesserie- going to try and figure out a way to still support pf on it and get subway clearance though.. would like to leave mine on the rotesserie quite a bit longer.
Good luck with the cold - hope you’re feeling better soon. Cold season this year sucked!
This summer I plan on making a new rotisserie. This will have hookups like the professional models onto the stern style playfeild pivots.
Thanks this is the second run at this cold.
Sadly not much progress. This cold still got me. Took the day off and did catch up on a rewatch of stand alone complex second gig. Deep. Hope to start lamp and switch install tomorrow. I did get the subway opto all mounted.
I got all the switches mounted and did a triple count. I have 44 playfeild mounted switches. One I could eliminate but not two. Sadly. Before I start wiring them up I want to get the lamp sockets mounted. I ran into a issue where the new ones I have are the wrong height. So it looks like I’ll be using some ones harvested from a em wire harness. I’ll solder the bases before install. Tomorrow’s goal is to get the GI all done. Hope I have a 12v relay.
4A3D8578-7D44-4333-B3DD-02FE14CC46ED (resized).jpeg
I got all the GI bulbs mounted. Now it’s cleaning up my wiring mess and hooking everything up. The switch wiring is a mess because I started with one board and now I’m up to 4. Im going to rip it all out and begin over. I spreadsheeted my layout to make sense of where things are hooked up.
Next few steps
Rewire playfeild.
Make andninstall plastics.
Assemble top side.
Rewire cabinet for switch board by coin door.
Now I get why you wanted to mount those boards vertically, way less space taken up than if you were to mount them flat. Even though it looks a little messy, if that's truly all your wiring (coils, lights, switches), that could be neatened up if it were bundled. You have a good fanout for wires.
Quoted from Rockytop:I imagine all the wiring is the worst part of psyically assembling a machine.
I started with just hooking stuff up. I didn’t have all the boards and switches and coils. I just wanted it to work. But I like to think things through and make sense. So this next version of wiring will be pain detailed. And will get redone at least two more times. Next playfeild will have inserts. And 84 led controlls. So more of a mess.
A huge shoutout to toyotaboy for helping me design and print the board mount towers. Great idea with the cable management built in. I drilled holes in the prototypes you printed. Should allow me to make it nice and clean. There’s a ton more wiring to come. I would like to make a board extender to add a slightly longer board to the switch tower set.
Quoted from Fortytwo:I have a need to mount both of these on the same tower set. The holes are 11/16 apart. I’m hope when I finally get my 3d printer I can print a spreader. To lengthen the shorter board.
something like this?
Basically what I was thinking. Could you add bump outs for screws on the left side. And is there a way to drop the left side back to make the boards parallel? Of not a slight angle won’t hurt. Or I could shave the bumps off the post easily.
Ed
Quoted from Fortytwo:Basically what I was thinking. Could you add bump outs for screws on the left side. And is there a way to drop the left side back to make the boards parallel? Of not a slight angle won’t hurt. Or I could shave the bumps off the post easily.
Ed
London, ON
Quoted from Fortytwo:I have a need to mount both of these on the same tower set. The holes are 11/16 apart. I’m hope when I finally get my 3d printer I can print a spreader. To lengthen the shorter board.
Why not mount them vertical?
toyotaboy
Close. If you move the board bumps to thebther side then we have a winner. That way the tails from components won’t get squished. I actually realized I could make these outnof metal tabs for now. But printed would look better for the long term.
MarkInc they are. The picture is bad since I need to deconstruct the switch wiring. I will do that tonight and finalize the board placement. I’ll post a new picture.
Wiring / Rewiring is going slow. But I’m taking my time to get a nice neat job. I am chipping off the hard stuff first. I drew about where all my insertsbwill be on the bottom. Made my opto power board and GI relay board. Mounted all the boards and started wiring opto power. I plan on layering starting with opto power. Then GI. I will run selonod and source power on the top of the towers. Led and opto power will be below. Switch will be he middle layer.
When rewiring, if possible separate your high power wires from all your other wires. I.e. wires for coils and the returns for the coils separate from switch wires and communication lines. Try not to put the high current wires in the same bundle as the low current wires and run where the wires are parallel for many inches. Ideally run the high current lines on one side of the playfield, and the communication, switch lines, etc on the other side of the playfield. Lighting (incandescent, or constant current) really doesn't matter where it runs so whatever is more convenient. If you are using Neopixels, it should be run with the low current lines.
Yeah, I didn't follow these suggestions completely on either of my machines, but the closer you can follow the above advice the better. There will always be places where the above doesn't work out, and if that is the case, don't sweat it. It's all good!
openpinballproj
Thanks for the advice. I understand the theory of a emp pulse can cause data issues. My plan is to run the serial cables and switch wires all at playfeild level. And to run the power supply to boards and selonoid wiring at the top of the towers. I’m thinking 3.5 inch separation should be plenty. Also the 18 ga wire will be stiffer. So running it higher will make it easier.
Good ol network wiring plenum rules.
bigduke6
That’s awesome. My plans are standard size 20.25 by 45. So should fit! I have been working with toyotaboy to make a digital file / model of the playfeild. This summer after MGC things will slow down. I want to get a playfeild ready to swap by the end of the summer with inserts. I also want to get the final ramps made. Sometime this summer we’ll be cutting it!
Made some more progress. Have a few layers of wiring done.
GI
Opto power
Board link serial cables.
Next is switch wiring
Selonoid / flasher wiring.
And highest layer power to everything.
I hope this harness is semiuseable in future revisions.
I’m also replacing the upper playfeild wood. The original lasted longer than I originally thought. Was real garbage wood.
Quoted from PM_Jeremy:Yea, more flashers!
I will have four controlled flashers. But 9 flasher bulbs. Five on the playfeild and four in the back box. Hope to have those all working by MGC.
Wow. Really coming along. Looks like my game. I see you have some of the recent changes too!! Let’s see How many more changes I make. Ha ha.
Actually I feel it’s pretty locked in. I have a scan of the upper playfeild if you want.
I had a good night. Made most of the plastics. They still need to be fitted with mounting holes and some final filing. I have 10 currently. The only two left are the lane dividers tops. I may just install the spare ones I have for Tommy for now.
I took a scrap bent it cold hit it with a hammer a few times and peeled the coating. I think this will hold up just fine. A friend remade the shooter gate in stainless while I worked on the plastics.
Thanks for following along.
A1E1FAFD-1EAD-4CCD-AD2C-7128B2ECB716 (resized).jpeg
I’m calling it a night.
Plastics fitted but not installed. Waiting for flasher domes and GI bulbs.
Selonoids wired and wires tied up. Next I have to do the flashers and backbox light wires. I’m trying to decide if it’s worth it to put plugs on the two flashers sockets mounted on the top of the playfeild.
And then tackle the dreaded switch wiring.
Quoted from BorgDog:everything is difficult on linux
Basically yes. My buddy is a Linux server admin. Taught me Linux in tech school. I am using skeleton. He ended up changing dev permissions to get access to the p3-roc without the need for sudo. Set it to auto login via standard setup interface. Then moved my program folder added a line to code to find current dir and I missed what he did to autolaunch on login. Which is automatic.
Also made me an icon.
All of this I couldn’t do in one night without him. So may thanks hawke.
Quoted from Fortytwo:I missed what he did to autolaunch on login.
Also made me an icon.
All of this I couldn’t do in one night without him. So may thanks hawke.
Glad to help.
Here's the info on the autolaunch:
Once the desktop icon is working, you can put that desktop file in ~/.config/autostart/ and it will automatically launch on login.
Details are in the Freedesktop "Desktop Application Autostart Specification" which I can't link to yet. 
Did you add anything to re-launch if it crashes?
You should really make it a systemd service, or run something like supervisord or circusd to manage it.
Quoted from jwilson:Did you add anything to re-launch if it crashes?
You should really make it a systemd service, or run something like supervisord or circusd to manage it.
No effort was made to relaunch; systemd will be the next step (also ideally skipping the display manager, or at least making an X session consisting exclusively of launching the skeletongame.)
Been working all weekend on the game. Just finished all the underside wiring. I will revisit tomorrow and double check all hookups and final positioning of hebharness and additional cable management.
You can see my layered plan. The only wires missing are the insert layer.
I have it setup to be able to remove the drop target assembly or the through without cutting the harness or removing any wires.
Additionally I replaced the orbit guide with stainless and some of the posts with blue ones.
Next is to rewire the front cabinet area with the new sw-16 and some lights.
Then I’ll move onto power connection and back box lighting.
Started on cabinet wiring. Didn’t get much done properly mounted the back box boards. Started on front side wires. And some more cable management.
Also a reminder it will be at MGC playable. I hope to make it bullet proof enough to last he weekend. If you are in the area please stop out. Support the show. It’s a fun weekend.
The Aerosmith cab was the key to pushing me into this project. Started at MGC last year. Was one of the NIB Games sold to a collector for the show use purpose. Also where I meet TheNoTrashCougar and rekindled my idea of a home brew Pinball.
Fast forward to the end of summer and the owner had a warrenty cabinet because both front joints came unglued. Price was right but most metal parts were removed for the swap into another cabinet. Luckily I had most of the metal parts and friends helped me with the rest.
That pushed me over the edge and into this build. Combined with the current state of skeleton and quality p3-roc hardware and lastly a good Support network. I was all in. TNA having the same hardware was a bonus.
Because of some setbacks I didn’t make my goal. Have it flipping again before TPF. Tomorrow night not going to get much done.
Backbox still needs GI, flashers, and sub pot bracket.
Cabinet needs switches by coin door wired.
I missed four wires when doing the playfeild. Not super important. Knocker and shaker (future use) and start light. At least the cab is wired for these.
Installed the playfeild and performed a smoke test. All boards status lights come on as they should. So power is run correctly. I have another solid evening of wiring and then fixing my machine config for all the switch changes will take an additional night. Lastly I will install and wire the upper playfeild and switches.
So... next week I hope to achieve that and start on code.
2DAE8ABB-4272-4EF9-9051-196ED2C65DE0 (resized).jpeg
899B3BAE-0293-48AE-82AD-8D9437FB472B (resized).jpeg
Quoted from Mbecker:Oooohhh GI! Cool to see it in the cab!
Thanks. I know it’s dark in the middle but with no inserts I can be too worried yet. When I get farther along I can always add some spot lights. Or make light notches in the ball guides.
Reply
Wanna join the discussion? Please sign in to reply to this topic.
Hey there! Welcome to Pinside!
Donate to PinsideGreat to see you're enjoying Pinside! Did you know Pinside is able to run without any 3rd-party banners or ads, thanks to the support from our visitors? Please consider a donation to Pinside and get anext to your username to show for it! Or better yet, subscribe to Pinside+!
