Progress still much slower than I'd like, but progress nonetheless.

IMG_20150601_230717190.jpg

I explained it earlier in the thread, and if you look at the video you actually see it going from 12:59 to 1:00. But basically each reel has a "will roll over" state and a "roll over" function which act differently depending on the reel and in relation with the other reels' state.

Alright, looking pretty good! I think I'll go with the blue buttons...

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Alright so what's left is:
-lighting: I'll do the translite first to see where I put the lights
-translite: I'm in contact with someone who may be able to provide a scan shortly, then a friend of mine who's an illustrator will fill in the blanks for me
-back door: I had a replacement made for an EM machine by a local shop who make ducts, I'll see if they'll make one for me for this

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Sure, again not my finest work so I don't feel like putting it out there for prying eyes, but I don't mind sending it to you by e-mail.

I contacted Wade Krause after being tipped by another Pinside member that he might have a scan of the backglass and he was kind enough to provide one.
I worked on it a little tonight, and I'm sending it off to my friend who will fill in the gaps for me.

Here's a preview.

mockup.jpg

Hey Jim,
if it were just the code I think it wouldn't be a big deal. The issue is the wiring. If you look at the schematics, I had to engineer it to use what available inputs I have, so I don't know the value of each digit, I just know the significant ones.
For instance, for the first reel that's 0 and 1 only, the second I need to treat the 2 a specific way (last number at 12:59) and the 9 as well (last number at 09:59). I'm pretty sure it could be reworked for a 24:00 clock, but I'd need to test the code to make sure it works with the different wiring and all.
Not sure what deal we could work out, I have 0 interest in going back and messing with that so no reasonable amount of money would do it, sorry.
But I don't mind sharing the existing code with you though if you can live with the 12 hour clock.

Just as long as I don't see a big preorder thread for a score reel clock popping up in a few days

I've been figuring out the lighting these past few days, I just have a couple wires left to solder before I can try it out.
I should be able to do that before the end of the weekend.

I've got 5 sockets in the backboard and one for each digit. 2 per digit would have been better but I don't have enough of the right sockets and I don't feel like waiting anymore. With the right LEDs I think that should do the job.

So I spent some time the last 2 days figuring out the lighting. The panel think I did a pretty clean job with. For the reels I didn't have an EM at home with me to get the right setup, but I figures I'd wing something out with electrical tape.
I plug everything and...
Wow, 2 out of 9 LEDs are on. Great.

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I do some continuity tests, think long and hard about this using my full brain power and suddenly it dawns on me:
THE D IN LED STANDS FOR DIODE YOU GODD#MN RET#RD!

Yep, I didn't worry about which way I wired the sockets since it doesn't matter for light bulbs but this is running on DC current and LEDs are directional.

Oh well my friend hasn't begun working on the translite yet so there's time to redo it...

Here's with regular bulbs:

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Since 7 out of 9 LEDs were out I just switched the wires, and I rewired the 2 LEDs that now became backwards.
I also figured out a way to screw the reel sockets cleanly.

I put everything back in and... the horror! Nothing works anymore, the Arduino light is off and I think I even heard something frying.
It's almost midnight, I have to go to bed... the next morning the weather girl on TV is rambling about how nice a day it's gonna be so I won't be able to spend the day in the basement without looking like a crazy misfit. Dang weather. Rains when I need to paint, sunny when I want to work inside.
I go bike riding with the family, go to the park, mow the lawn, put the baby for her nap, and finally, back to the basement.

I spent a whole lot of time trying to find the short, and I noticed that when I pulled out the reel metal support from the backboard the short was gone. I realized I had a short between the lights and that metal support.
Upon closer inspection, I saw the leg of a staple protruding from the side and touching the support.
I removed the staple and everything seemed ok again.

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I rescrewed everything in place, testing after each step, and now I have a fully LED'd clock.

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For those who didn't follow the whole thing, the reason I want to go with LEDs is that it's not that easy to pull everything out to access the lights so I don't want them burning out, and it's awfully crammed in there so I want to limit the heat, both from the lights and from the power supply, as incandescents draw more current, unless I'm mistaken.

Still on the list:
-assemble the two backbox parts and drill a hole for the power cord to exit from under box
-have the translite drawn and printed
-get a back door made

Back door's done.
Maybe I'll polish it just a tad.

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My buddy's done with the translite, I just need to tweak the holes for the numbers, then get prints on different materials to see what looks best.

Oh and I let it run with the plexiglas in front and no backdoor and my girlfriend got up to shut the door to the basement because it bugged her during the night... I don't think that metal door's gonna do much to deaden the noise so I might have to look into adding more plexiglas sheets in the front and maybe putting some insulation inside the door.

Again, not a very practical project as nobody likes a noisy clock besides crazy pinheads like us who enjoy the soothing sound of score reel coils in the night.

Thank you for the tip. If I were just starting I'd do this, or if I were planning to do more of these things. I'll keep that in mind if I need timing for my future projects.

Did a tad of polishing.

IMG_20150615_195554609.jpg

Alright,
finished tweaking the translite. Next update will be the completed project.
It might be a while, I have a pretty busy schedule the next few days.

Here's the translite art, thanks to my buddy "Bean" Carrier for filling in the gaps for me.

Alright,
I'm calling this one done. Not perfect, some rough edges, but I spent a lot more time than I'd planned and I'm pretty happy with the results.

Go back to the first post for the presentation.

Thank you.
Yes, it doesn't make much sense any way you look at it. Just in materials I must be in over 300$, if I count my time it's probably worth a nice B-lister.
I wanted to put it on my desk at the office but it's way too noisy. I'll see if insulating the back makes a difference, but I'll be surprised if it does. Anyway the whole point was building it, not using it...

Go back to the first post...

Thanks.
I'm going to see my dad this weekend, who has the Surf Champ machine at his place. I'll see if I can do another little photo shoot there with its big sister

It would have to be re-engineered for sure. WAY too noisy. I'm guessing those Whoa Nellie! reels must be much more quiet, not sure if they can be acquired.
All wiring would need to be redone.
Code would need to be redone.
Power supply would need to be changed since I'm guessing they don't run on 24V DC.
New theme would have to be found as I don't own the rights to Gottlieb stuff.

This is a simple project and I can definitely see how complex it would be to take it to production so a full fledged pinball machine...

Yeah... that kinda kills it right there:
http://www.marcospecialties.com/pinball-parts/511-7648-00

PPS?

To milk it one last time... I added the photoshoot with the actual Surf Champ machine on the first post.
Over and out!

I have been talking with someone who's trying to implement this project, and he pointed out a mistake I made on the schematics.
The 100 Ohm resistors are in fact 10 kOhm.
Very sorry if anyone has been trying to replicate, I must have misread the values on the resistors when I drew the schematics.

I have thought about it, but the main hurdle is the score reels. Unavailable and too noisy even if they were. The Whoa Nellie ones are way too expensive so I'd have to look into designing and producing my own.
I'm not sure that could be made cost effective.

I'm on other projects right now, but I may look into it again in a few months.