I've found other threads on bonus but would just like to tell of my exact problem in the hope that someone could help me narrow it down a little.

Just got a Target Alpha. This is my first EM and I'm capable of basic cleaning and adjustment of switches and to a lesser degree identifying them from the schematic. It's recently been restored and is in excellent condition. If your instructions could be fairly basic that would help me.

The problem is the bonus is only triggering after the ball drains for 1 of the 15 targets. This is not intermittent, it works exactly the same every game and every ball.

In other words I do not get bonus for any of the drop targets except one. That is the second one on the right side bank. All bonus lights work. Everything else is fine (except for the match and 5000 when lit not flip flopping which I'm also working through.)

Any help would be appreciated, thank you.

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Fixed! See the thread for how Pinsiders diagnosed and told me how to fix the issue.

Thanks for the help! Much appreciated.

I've made a short video of what's happening under the playfield. I start the game then drop a few targets and the one I know that works, then trigger the ball drain and then the switch showing the ball being ejected. HowardR asked if the bonus is stepping 15 times. It doesn't look like it. It just seems to go the once, then return to the start. Can you view the vid to confirm?

currieddog asks to manually step the bonus unit, sorry to sound dumb but how do I manually step it? And what is the correct alignment?

Thanks for trying HowardR but unfortunately I'm unable to identify which circuit that is in the machine since I'm too new to EM's. Looks like I need to try and get someone out here to look at it. I'm in a remote area and hard to get anyone so would really help to be able to tell the tech whats happening so they can bring what they need.

I'm not sure where that bonus unit should be starting and it would help to know that. But it seems to want to return to the far right position after counting the bonus, because it slowly creeps part way around when the playfield is up. And when I turn it to the far right (it moves easily) so it starts from there next ball, it moves around like a machine gun hitting all fifteen to stop at the far left, addng the bonus to the score, but then the unit goes slack. Its as if the spring is meant to return it to the starting position on the far right but it can't.

Should it be starting from the far right or far left? (see video)

frenchmarky Thanks for your reply. I will investigate.

Just to get this clear, in the image you posted, the stepper is at the opposite end of the zero position, is that right? It's meant to now turn back all the way to the right, which is the zero position, for the start of the next ball? I hope I am explaining the right, I just want to be clear where positon zero actually is.

FIXED! I removed two little grub screws from the bonus unit disc on the top and slipped it off. Then turned the gear and sure enough it sprung back to zero but with a bit of stickiness but nothing like it was with it on. Then I played with it a bit and discovered it was binding in a certain spot and overall just sticky. I used a tiny bit of mineral spirits where the shaft contacts then worked it around. Then applied a drop of light oil and worked it some more and then it was moving really easy and would spring all the way back to zero. I put it back together and all the target bonus is now working properly.

I think it was a combination of three things, 1 it was kind of gummed up and mineral spirits and a drop of oil helped that a lot and also number 2 was the way it was being held by the grub screws it was being jammed up against the top. When I replaced the grub screws I just made sure it was tight, but not overly jammed against the top. And three, the little snow shoes where not springing down properly, as it turned they would lose contact.

Initially my problem was that it only scored the 2nd right side target bonus, this was because it was binding at the 2nd row of contacts and when it fired it would only score the once and only return back 1 set of contacts instead of going back to zero and frenchmarky mentioned that at the start which got me to realize it might have been stuck in the wrong position. HowardR asked if it was stepping 15 times at the very first reply to this thread so was right on to it but I was unable to work out how to know that.

Then currieddog mentioned the snowshoes and on inspection of those they where actually sticking up a bit and a tiny drop of oil and working them fixed that.

Then frenchmarky and paulace smashed it out of the park by exactly diagnosing it and providing the fix. Just amazes me how you guys can fix a machine on the other side of the world with the owner basically never having opened a playfield on an EM machine before.

Sounds a bit dumb but what would have helped me was video and sounds of the machine and close up of the internal parts working as they should. I'll make a few videos of it all working and throw them up on youtube in case it's useful to others.

Thanks again, I really appreciate the effort everyone made in this thread to help me. Will donate to Pinside to show my appreciation.