I fixed up a Top Score for a friend and it's been having intermittent issues with features of the game related to the Player Unit. Before delivering and setting up the unit, I ohmed out all the switch stacks in the Player Unit and cleaned/adjusted as needed so on delivery, everything was working correctly. I also cleaned and adjusted the snowshoe wipers to make sure they were always centered on the rivets. The game played great for about two months and now he is seeing intermittent issues with the Player Unit. This is what we have seen not work consistently:

1) When Player 1 is active, the Player 1 score reel bulbs should light up. He noticed that sometimes those bulbs don't light up but Player 1 is playing and scoring with no issues. It's just the lights. Those lights are controlled by a M/B on the P2 stack (P2C). Sure enough, that M/B was no longer ohming out correctly so I had to re-adjust that switch. Even though that switch had been cleaned and adjusted before delivering the game.

2) The Player 2 hundreds reel does not always finish resetting to "0" so the machine gets stuck in a reset cycle. Again, all switches ohm out correctly every time I check them. Re-setting the scoring reel by hand clears the problem. Again, this is not consistent, only happens every now and again.

What makes it hard to debug is that both these issues only happen every now and again. It is not consistent. Could this be an issue with the switches on the Player Unit stacks actually having a problem with metal fatigue? Is it time to replace components rather than continue to clean and adjust?

One more question, the machine is in the same room as their woodburning stove. It was not running in the fall but now it is. Can this be an issue?

Thanks in advance,

Alberto

David, the coil appears to be pulsing OK. When I have seen it get stuck (once this morning in about 20 games) and once in the photo my buddy sent to me, it was in the number 3 which is random since that is not a position where the switch stack on the reel would be moving

For the Player Unit I took each stack off to clean it (easier access to the switches), then screwed back on and tightened, then checked with ohmmeter as I was manually actuating the Player Unit. Any switch that was not working right was then adjusted.

MarkG - is there a way to check the over travel?

My concern is that either I'm running into metal fatigue on the switches or the wood-burning stove is adding a temp coefficient to the operation of the Player Unit.