Recently picked up a Gottlieb Gladiators! Fun pin, and I have another System 3, so I'm used to some of the quirks. That being said... I ran into an issue I'm hoping someone with knowledge of the game can assist with perhaps. From what I gather reading, the game has several optical sensors for registering the ball passing thru various spots. Most of them seem fine, but I've run into an odd issue and I'm not sure if it's opto related, or something else I'm missing.

To spell M-U-L-T-I, you have to hit various shots (or spot them other ways). All of mine seem to register except for the "U". From what I gather, there's a loop in the upper left/mid area of the game where the "U" and "L" are shown. You're supposed go around the loop one way to get the "U", then back the other way to get the "L" (I think).

On my machine, when I go in the left and out the right of the loop, I DON'T get awarded the "U". But when I go the other way, in right, out left, the "L" registers just fine.

So I guess my question is: Are there two sensors in there? What would cause it to read one direction, but not the other?

I haven't completely taken the area apart yet, as I wanted to check with everyone on the forum before tearing the whole thing down to be sure.

See this pic on ipdb for reference of the area in question: http://www.ipdb.org/showpic.pl?id=1011&picno=49349&zoom=1

Thanks for the responses, I appreciate it. Maybe they read sequentially? So if "U" is lit then it has to read the left Opto before the right one is triggered, and vice versa for "L"? Not sure if it's that smart, but I would think it would have to be otherwise the directionally wouldn't matter.

I guess I could test that by triggering the "U" elsewhere with an "advance multi" award, then when it's on "L", I can go the wrong way and see if it registers L even though it shouldn't. Worth a shot.

Wires/plugs being reversed seems odd, but I can check that I guess. Sounds like no matter what I do, I'm going to have to take apart that whole area to check things out. Looks like a pain. Any advice there?

Yea it's a pain to get to, so it looks like I'll be doing some dismantling and removal work to really get a good look and sort it all out. I'll start with the top of the playfield, the actual sensors and such, by taking apart that back area. Maybe I'll get lucky and something is just misaligned, dirty, or just needs a re-flow up there.