(Topic ID: 218315)

Headless Gator on the Loose! Bringing back a Nip-It

By Thrillhouse

5 years ago



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#1 5 years ago

A very kind friend shot me a txt telling me a guy in his neighborhood was cleaning out a home and was going to have everything hauled to the dump. Among the junk was a Bally Nip-It. I rushed over and grabbed it, the catch being there is no head for it. The homeowner looked everywhere but it is nowhere to be found unfortunately. The cab and playfield are in pretty good shape although it looks like it spent a season or two outdoors. The gator mech is still there and everything else looks complete. I've now got a headless gator on my hands but I'd hate to see such a fun game parted out and am looking to find a replacement head. I realize this is a long shot but I would like to give it a try.

Can anyone tell me if there would be other games from the era that had the same head design as Nip-it?
If anyone has any leads on where to start looking besides here please chime in. I'll be posting a WTB ad shortly but would like to see if there are other games that would work as a replacement first. Thanks for looking.

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#2 5 years ago

Any standard width 1968-1976 Bally EM backbox head with 4 players (5 digit scoring, note the "false" 0 digit), one stepper for credits (single step, increment/decrement), and one stepper for ball count, one stepper for match feature (rotational) will work since this game uses chimes in the lower cabinet. The scoring relay bank design is quite common for backbox installs in 5 digit games. If I remember correctly off my game, and the schematics, the bonus scoring stepper is the far left one, which would be a bit harder to find, as not all games had this feature. No other oddball steppers, or assemblies like many of Ted Zale "zipper flipper" games. I would start by conducting game research on these facts, accordingly.

However, keep in mind the new light panel would have to be potentially be recut based on positioning of the windows, and assemblies/wiring remounted. Also, this does not consider you will have pay another $275-450 for either a reproduction or NOS backglass as well which do exist.
Basically, you are looking at around $275-650, dependent on condition and parts, not counting personal time, when you find a donor.

Since, I have done quite a few of these type of Ted Zale restorations, I can share that if you do have to do a conversion, it will still require quite a bit of work, but certainly is achievable. It depends on your level of commitment. Alternatively, I buy Ted Zale parts, including full lower assemblies and cabinets such as this one.

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2 weeks later
#3 5 years ago

Thanks BK, very thorough and helpful as always. Thanks to a very kind pinsider I have procured a head (and parts body) and will be Frankensteining the two into 1 complete machine. He had a very interesting technique to palitize a game too, thanks @igo4rams!

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#4 5 years ago

I finally had enough free time to clean everything up and put the game together. Unfortunately it's a bit of a basket case. After going thru and adjusting a few out of whack switches and replacing two fried coils I switched the game on. The bonus counter wouldn't stop firing and the score motor continued to spin. I turned it off and put the backglass in to snap a quick pic and checked the time. Seeing it wasn't to late I decided to take another look and this time it actually started up normally. Half the switches and coils don't work but evidently the frankengator liked having it's glass back. Hopefully I can sneak an hour or two tomorrow and make some more progress.

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