The machine I recently picked up was like this. It turned out on mine the gearbox had grease that had somehow turned into pine tar. After a thorough cleaning and re-lube it functions as it should.

That post in my game is cylindrical, not hexagonal. EDIT...nope I was wrong, it's a hex post afterall...

Not a wire guide on mine...
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Ok, looking at the July '95 version of the manual, it does confirm that there is supposed to be a 1 1/4" ball guide wire there (12-4250-48). Looks like mine fell out sometime during its life. As I have my playfield torn down at the moment, I will look for a replacement. Thanks for bringing this up

I am working on restoring an I500 and would like to find a better quality left ramp. I have a NOS stock right ramp I could include in a trade for the right part. Anybody have a spare floating around?

I am finishing up my restoration and wanted to do something for the back board. I am not a fan of the checkered decal that is available, so I opted for carbon fiber vinyl wrap. I am really happy with how it turned out. I would consider using the same material for side blades. It is subtle, has a nice texture and does a good job of reflecting light.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00L9J4JRG/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o04_s00

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When a ball is locked in the turbo and it spins slowly waiting for the second lock, it it normal for the ball to slide along the inside of turbo housing and make a scraping sound? I didn't play mine too much before I did a full tear down, but I don't remember hearing the light scraping sound it makes now. I had thought that it was the motor (and thus the impeller) was mounted slightly off center from the main housing. I spent some time adjusting it back to center, but the noise still persists. I am pretty sure the ball is rubbing on the inside lip of the housing as it goes around, but when I spin it by hand it doesn't rub. It almost seems like the centripetal force of it spinning is causing the ball to move out of it's resting hole. If this is true, then I would expect all games to behave the same. Except maybe because I cleaned and relubed the gearbox, the "slow" speed is now spinning faster?

I have tried to raise and lower the impeller to no avail. The turbo works perfectly otherwise.

After a little experimentation, I found that indeed this is my issue. I got glued a little magnet on the impeller to better hold the ball in place while it is spinning at the slow speed. It solved my scraping problem.

Is there a need for replacement impellers? I am thinking about 3d printing an improved design to help keep the ball in place instead of adding the magnets.
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Indeed, the right ramp is not as hard to find for some reason. Which is weird as it is the largest of the two. I still have 2 NOS and 1 good used one I need to get rid of. The left ramp on the other hand are nowhere to be found. I took a left one up to Freeplay40 to evaluate and it's slightly too big for the current setup.