I’m glad you captured all this. Love watching Mata Hari’s get rejuvenated!
(Topic ID: 268801)
Linked Games
Mata Hari
Bally, 1978
Topic Gallery
You're currently viewing posts by Pinsider mrm_4.
Click here to go back to viewing the entire thread.
Quoted from Arcane:Mathazar,
For having entirely renovated a Mata Hari, a couple of years ago (documented on Pinside), let me express my disappointment for you not trying to rescue the original playfield. The few defects you had on the playfield, were easily correctable (I and others have indicated the matching colors) and you could have instead practice at clear coating your repaired artwork.
You did a very nice job at installing the hardtop, but it will remains a hardtop (plasticky) and will never provide the smoothness and crispness of the original artwork.
I understand that a few destroyed playfield have to be salvaged with a hardtop, but in your specific case, I consider it a crime to not try restoring the original playfield. I am thinking about future generations (my kids love pinballs) and cringe at the prospect that a lot of decent machines will have been turned into a pale copy of what they used to be, due to the abuse of hardtops.
I know it is your machine and you are free to do what you want with it and even though Mata Hari has been produced extensively, these relics of the 1970's deserve to be restored like Museum pieces, whenever possible.
Yves
Yves, next time you are in the North East Ohio area I need to have you over to play my MH with the hardtop and turn you into a believer! 
1 year later
Quoted from Mathazar:There are lots of nooks and crannies in the interior toward the coin door that are difficult to cover with a spray can (without flooding areas you don't need to cover). I came up with the idea, tho I'm sure I'm not the first one, to spray out the Marigold color on a small piece of wood and have Home Depot make me a matching can of touch-up paint. I'll brush on the interior areas I couldn't cover nicely with the spray can, and be able to do game-room touch-ups in the future if the cabinet exterior ever gets bumped when moving pins around.[quoted image][quoted image]
Looking good.
I do this with the insides of my cabs too! I hate spray painting with a passion.
4 weeks later
1 week later
Quoted from Mathazar:I'm still painting the apron - had a setback. After two layers of primer and two layers of paint and all the drying and curing time in-between, I applied the first light coat of rattle can clear. Within 10 minutes, several 2"-3" square areas of the clear coat turned to crackled alligator skin. Arrgggh.
Not entirely sure what happened. Contaminant in the apron despite sanding down to bare metal? Did I spray on more clear than I thought, flooding some areas? Or (perhaps most likely) was the 1.5 year-old Krylon rattle can of clear I had in my garage incompatible with the Rustoleum primer/paint combo I laid down?
So, I totally stripped the apron back down to bare metal and am on layer two of primer again. Will get a couple of layers of paint over the weekend, and I have a brand new rattle can of Rustoleum, not an old Krylon can hanging around, to try again Monday-ish. Fingers crossed.
Meanwhile, I couldn't help myself. I put the playfield back in the cabinet, fired it up, and no smoke! Everything worked except for one bulb and the saucer ejector arm sticking on solenoid activation. Will take apart and clean the plunger and replace the sleeve.
It’s just the solvents in the clear eating the paint. Thinner coats when you clear and longer cure time for the paint before clearing is the fix.
This same thing gets me almost every time. I pretty much do this to myself every project, and every new project I think I have patience but I always end up in the same boat somewhere in the time line, spraying too heavy at first or not letting the previous color cure long enough. So frustrating.
I like the felt 
Quoted from Mathazar:Indeed. I'm going to finish the paint this weekend and then wait a week and finish with the rattle can clear next weekend. That'll be about 6 days for the paint to cure (I waited 2 days before, following the recommendations on the can).
Think that would be enough? How much time to you allot for the paint to cure before putting on your clear coat?
If you are clearing the apron after one color just do the clear about 20 minutes after your last coat of color.
Doing a single color is the best because you can knock it all out in an hour:
https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/dumpster-firepower/page/3#post-5552787
You see here how I tried to clear again after a certain amount of time and it wasn’t cured. Got the wrinkle:
https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/dumpster-firepower/page/4#post-5584476
Technically it’s because I used too much in one spot because of a bug but, if it was cured it wouldn’t have mattered
1 week later
Quoted from Mathazar:I went ahead and waited the week for it to cure....sure enough, after a few light coats of rattle can clear, no orange peel! Pretty happy with the results so far...will probably do another couple light coats and call it done. Next step - putting on the new Bally logo stickers.
mrm_4 - how long did you wait after clearing before putting on the apron and shooter stickers? Did you clear again after putting them on to get rid of the ridges of the sticker edges on the apron?
I'm kind of afraid if I tried that the stickers could react badly causing me yet again to go back to square one.....I'll probably live with the ridges and be happy (it'll be under glass, after all). I'm ready to be done with Mata Hari as I'm excited to have a new project to work on. I'm picking up a project Meteor next week, my first "new" pin in the house in about 2 years. I was going to hardtop and Pinball Pimp my Black Knight next but I'm thinking I want to get Meteor at least flipping first.[quoted image]
With my apron I didn’t clear it so you’re a step over me on that one. I just sprayed it with the yellow and laid the stickers down the next day. I’d say just let it cure the time it says on the can and you’d be fine. Looking good man, excited to see this finish up and on to the next.
Promoted items from Pinside Marketplace and Pinside Shops!
Pittsburgh, PA
You're currently viewing posts by Pinsider mrm_4.
Click here to go back to viewing the entire thread.
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+!
