Haunted House
Gottlieb, 1982We'll if you saw my "on the road again" post last weekend you might have got a peek at the Haunted House project I picked up in a trade for my Jungle Lord and Firepower (the second firepower I've owned ... For like 10 days) from a fellow pinsider.
So here is what I am working with....
Now here is where it gets fun... pin came with a fully populated main, attic and cellar playfields. It also came with semi-populated main and attic playfields that are in much better cosmetic shape...
Let's look first at the fully populated main and attic playfields...
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So the plan is to clean up the guts of the cabinets first. Then get the game up and running and finally do something about the playfields... My First playfield swap is coming...
Day 1 - drove to South Bend, Indiana to pick up HH. When I got home the plan was to unload and get playfield cabinet on legs and just laid head on it and call it a day... We'll that took awhile. There was one leg leveler that was stuck on the leg... It had been painted and coated over. Couldn't get that SOB to budge. No nut on bottom side either.. There were two different size legs in front and rear so I was not sure how readily available these smaller legs are today. Had to grind off leg leveler on both side and through the nut and then drill out the bolt. Surprisingly I did not mess it up and I was able to put a new leg leveler on the leg. Fun way to start.
Looked at attaching the head to cabinet but there was rust on bracket where you bolt down the two to each other. So... These all need to come off..
What does everybody use to clean the inside of a cabinet? Damp rag, little air to get crap out of corners? Thanks dan
Day 4 - Got all of the back box parts off to Tim at The Powder Pro to get powder coated. 5 miles north of Pinball Life. I'll post some photos when I get them back.
Took apart that fiber board that holds all the circuit boards and put a first coat of green on it. This was dirty and looked like shit even after I cleaned it up so this you be a nice upgrade. I'll add another coat and then put some triple thick on it. That green board and all the yellow powder coated brackets and other back box parts is going to look real sharp! The front vertical grills next to backglass are also going to be yellow. Can't wait to see how this turns out!
Busy weekend so my only goal is to finish up the that fiber board and hand clean the inside of the gutted back box cabinet. I want to get the back box done and put back together before I move on to anything else.
Quoted from danczaz:We'll I didn't have an ultrasonic cleaner when the day started... But I just bought myself one!!! Have a feeling this will get a lot of use in during this project ...
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wish you lived closer so i could stroll over and borrow it 
Ever notice when you really want something and you buy it it's on the other side of country.. Ground shipment from Washington. Hope it's here by Saturday but I doubt it...
know the feeling... i've been waiting on a defender pin for a few weeks. tomorrow might be the day 
still miss my haunted house pin.
Haunted House is great. The entire pin is a real work of art and also a fun pinball machine.
The music and art are great.
Here's a few tweaks i did:
a) raised back 2 legs up a little higher than normal to speed up game play on main & upper playfield.
b) had to fiddle a bit with the lower playfield -to- main playfield VUK so increase percentage of times ball would make it all the way up and onto main playfield.
c) used a large paperclip (unfolded at first) to put behind secret trap door so ball wouldn't go past hole and get stuck behind wire borders. just wrapped paperclip between them so ball hit it and would then drop into hole. couldn't ever see it as it was under the upper playfield and really too dark back there. plus, it was same silver color as wire borders.
d) mine had a real issue with wires coming loose from their solder points. don't know if it was just because of the life mine went through, or is a common aging problem. after lots of game-plays and that happening at several different spots, got them all back in place and all was good. super simple issue to resolve. just had to hunt them down.
also, MODS:
a) there's some cool little flipper topper mods that stick on top of the flippers that look really cool, if you're into that.
b) there's a multiball mod out there that wires into the PCB's in the backbox. haven't tried it.
c) think there's a mod that adds some speech. didn't look into it much, so don't know if it adds anything.
i didn't play it as much as tron, but i don't play any pin as much as tron
it's just an amazing work of art to have in the home as well.
Theme goes well next to Addam's family, Scared stiff, etc...
Hope it comes together well and you like it.
cheers,
bb
I restored a basket case Haunted House like this last year. You are in for a lot of work my friend.
My lower playfield looked just like that with the giant holes painted green. I was able to repaint it. The hardest part was painting those little blue "pebbles" back. Took hours! If you replace the playfields don't throw the old ones out, they are fixable.
I also had a lot of rust like you - I ended up sanding it all down, then primed with rustoleum, painted with a metallic paint and then a light clear coat.
Good luck. It's a great machine and well worth whatever effort it requires. I also took tons of pictures, so if you need anything let me know.
I might take you up on that!!! I opened her up yesterday and was might intimidated with the amount of work she needs... One step at a time...
Did you do anything to add speech or multiball?
Your Playfield Looks Almost Identical To What I Started With.
Pics here https://www.flickr.com/photos/67565915@N06/sets/72157635391130581/
Quoted from danczaz:Did you do anything to add speech or multiball?
I looked at the multiball mod. It was pretty involved, figured I had enough on my plate. 
Adding speech to this one just seems weird to me some how. The speech system sounds very robotic.
So here's my plan for now..
- strip attic (spare but need playfield)
- strip main playfield (spare but need playfield)
- clean up playfield cabinet
- get game up and running
- strip cellar
- swap attic and main playfield
- have a bad ass haunted house
Seems simple when I lay it out above
It looks like your playfield has a lot of the same wear spots as mine: through the Welcome! at the top, where the ball lands when ejected from the center kicker of the three holes below the Welcome!, where the ball lands on the upper playfield when kicked up from the main, and the four spots in the lower playfield where the ball lands-- those are the main ones on mine. Have you given any thought to how to protect the playfield after repairing it?
Right now my Haunted House has a CPU board that starts overheating and locking up after 4 or 5 games or so. I've bought a replacement CPU board but haven't done the swap yet. Restoring the playfield is something I haven't even started or planned since I haven't really tried doing anything of that level yet.
Started tearing down top side of main playfield.... Slow and steady is how I'm moving... ( or not enough hours in a day )...
Got a little distracted by Atlantis- the pin; not the level I will never get to on my RBION... Top side off semi-populated main playfield ( better of two mains) I torn down... (Except that flipper; that torqued bolt was snapped off...wtf)
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I love my Haunted House. It's seems like the playfields will never get reproduced, too bad really. Its a game that needs repro playfields. They are always missing paint. Good luck in the restore. I'll be keeping on eye on this for sure.
Crazy but true story I made the exact same trade last year Firepower & Jungle Lord for HH. What are the odds two people would make the exact same trade involving 3 machines? I do have to say my trade was for a much nicer HH but the two machines I traded were both very nice.
Anyway - I just thought it was kind of interesting that two of us made the exact same trade a year apart.
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Hampshire, IL
