Well this is a big deal then if I understand correctly.
I have heard that certain Stern node boards have boot strapper code on chips that can not be legally programmed by a 3rd party as their software is not open source. So I'm assuming this is not an issue with FAST or P3-ROC?

Sorry I don't login to Pinside often. Apparently it's on the truck with my Alien LV.

Hopefully see it soon.

I'm still moving some stuff around from a flood I had here in Australia (that was fairly public).

With all of that non hobby real life work getting the house back on track, I'm doubtful I'll be making a video!

But I'm sure I'll get some pics taken.

I think the Multimorphic and Fast board firmware are both closed? OPP is totally open, and Spooky’s Pinotaur and CobraPin are derived from that.

I meant the software libraries that are used for communicating between the computer and boards is open. I think the communication between boards is an open standard as well. In that regard, someone might be able to cold room engineer a compatible board

You'll have the only fathom mermaid in public hands and you're not going to take a video for us or even for posterity? It could be the only fathom mermaid that ever goes out. Who knows?!

He's not wrong. It would be interesting to know how many boards fast has shipped to Australia.

Putting a roof over your families head is a little bit more important. Or do you need that video to up the price of your pre-order spots?

It definitely won't be the only one. Have some faith.

I'll see how I go. I don't really have a tripod or anything that suits a phone which is what I'd use for this kind of thing, and would rather set it up without stopping and starting for video commentary.

Then again, I ran a television production company for 15 years and I'm an editor by trade, so I can probably do something.

It's largely for that reason though and the fact I'm retired now that I avoid requests to make videos at all cost.

Imagine retiring from something and then getting asked to still do that thing all the time.

I'm good at it, it's what I know. But I don't do it by request any more.

But I'll see how I feel on the day.

Like I said, I don't really frequent Pinside... But I might make something (simple and unpolished) for Aussie arcade and then cross post it here.

And if I don't... I'm not really responsible for this task just because my consumer product went on the truck before other people.

I didn't buy myself a job.

I'll share something anyway.

Pictures will be fine.

Thanks Punkin, how are you doing mate? Bill stopping at yours heading north? You might see the box.

How's your weekly get togethers going? You have such a great collection of interesting games.

Doing really well. Bills gotta bring a couple of speed testers here next time he goes through Wagga, and he has to drop off a TZ here for a mate, so I could well be the first to post a pic of a Mermaid in the wild (although still in box) so get ready for a dick grab pic

Sunday Silverball is fun, i have been experimenting with different formats for the comp, we did a Fairstrikes the other week, that was great.
Organizing a trip up to Sunshine Coast Pinball Club atm. Woopi Freeballers are going to invade them on a weekend where they are running 5 comps in the middle of next month, first trip away this year, so looking forward to it immensely.

Did you get your machines up and salvaged? I know Bill got rid of his flooded ones.

Cool, give those Sunny Coast boys hell

I think Wayne may have snapped that first pic of the Fathom in box in the truck (during Alien pickups at Mr. Pinball - I could be wrong), so you will be second. As long as it is heading this way that's the main thing.

I actually wonder if I will be first to receive - Brisbane is a bit of a mission from Melbourne, so if a couple go out the door in the next week, a local might see one before me - depends on how busy Bill and Shannon are with drop offs - I don't like to hassle them, they come when they come.

Re: the repairs - it'll be a good outcome.

I collected the 3 Stern cabs and Lebowski cab from Geoff at Pinball Perfection yesterday - the Sterns all strengthened and glued back and BKSOR and EHOH you would not know had gotten wet. Lebowski has a new base put in (it was MDF so it was swollen), and he trimmed the decals better than factory, honestly TBL cab is in BETTER condition than when it was NIB now.

GOTG has some decal damage and the wood has a tiny wave in it, so we are ordering new decals and will strip it, sand it and decal it - AMD is on to the decals.

Dutch is also sending a brand new bowling alley and rug.
Spooky is making me a replacement Rick and Morty cabinet and cab bits. There's a bit more in the base of that.
Paul is sourcing a GNR CE cabinet for me.

Playfields have done really well, after stripping and cleaning. Ray Scott has been working the top side, and Trav Secker from Aussie Arcade / Brisbane Pinball Repairs on the lower side and the focus across everyone is to clean and replace everything with corrosion, including springs, light sockets etc.

Travis has also taken away and completely finished MMR Royal back to fixed, so that's one done in full. The cabinet was fine on that, testament to CGC's build quality there, total submersion and it looks untouched.

All in all, 2 months later, and we have 1 pin of 7 fixed, and 4 well on the way. There will be some delays with JJP and Spooky, but we will do the playfield work while we wait.

The finished result will be 7 working pins again, that you would be hard picked knowing had been underwater thanks to some very talented people.

A lot of folks offered to help on this. Damien rang me personally from Haggis as well offering to help with whatever he could do, which was really nice of him.

Although I will always disclose the history of any pinball if it ever comes time to sell any (not considering that yet), I think overall they will look and play 'as good as new' once done.

The house is a different story. We are evacuating. Pinball playing has suffered from basically using every square inch of space for recovery. Theres a Beatles Gold NIB just sitting here still in box because there's just no room to open it in my garage.

I know there's demand around seeing Fathom, so I'll get it rerouted to the shed we are restoring the water damaged pins so I can open it in a large shed to show it off. The only issue being that it isn't my home, so it won't get more than a dozen games on it there. It's not a place to hang out.

Hopefully we get a new home ASAP so I can take new / beautiful pins like that and set up a new space to enjoy.

Cheers for asking mate.

Sounds a mission, but needful as it would be impossible to replace that collection. I know Bill disclosed his had been flooded.

It's good to hear about them being saved for sure.

Yeah could be some locals pickup from Haggis too.

What a mess. Good luck!

Still no excuse for not shooting an unboxing video, slacker. (jk)

If you knew 1% of what i know it would send you into a Spin. Rather be smart enough to realize not to use customers money like all the rest have and failed.

Seems like it might be a decent insurance policy at some point to drop $620 and order the full Fast bundle. You would basically have spares for all the boards and power supplies. Whoever owns the game 20 or 30 years from now might appreciate it too!

https://www.fastpinball.com/product/fast-starter-bundle-power/33?cp=true&sa=false&sbp=false&q=false&category_id=2

Hoping the drop targets are normal indusry standard, Celts were extremely thin. May have been a space issue idk, they do work just fine tho. Hoping Alex post some pics and feed back!!

eh... nevermind. I didn't think it would be such a big deal LOL

As the weekend is here. Waiting on all the home Fathom pictures coming soon.

Bill left wagga on his way north Yesti arvo according to eyewitness reports. Machine #30 is on his truck (as i assumed).

He has to stop at my place on his way to Brisbane, but may be in Sydney for a few days before that. I am only 4 hours from Brisbane. We have personalised delivery from a professional pinball mover here on the east coast. Does a great job.

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Looking forward to seeing more machines built and on way to their owners. It's going to be a very interesting month or so watching the progress.

I highly doubt haggis will post any more update vids this month. We're just going to have to wait and see if any pics or unboxing vids start popping up around the world.

You can bet the pitchforks will come out in June. The people who paid in full 6-7 weeks ago (with an 8 week guarantee) won't be happy come June.

Don't think there's too many here care what you think by the looks of it.

Hopefully Haggis can avoid the pitchforks by building games and shipping them out. Time will tell.

I don’t think most Americans realize how big Australia is. I know I didn’t until I did a little research some years ago. It’s just a bit smaller than the US if I remember right. So for some going to grab their Fathom or waiting for it to land is similar to driving from NYC to Vegas or Cleveland to San Diego. I do think it’s pretty cool that it seems so many of you guys down there know each other.

Bit like North America i supposse. We have separate communities, the east coast from mid Qld down to Melbourne and round to Adelaide, then we have Far north QLD and the top end, then all them crazy Mad Max fuckers in the middle, then the West Coast guys, nobody knows what they do over there, but i think it's something to do with crayfish.

Fuck yeah! That’s exactly what I always pictured and hoped was there.

There's a Grey Nomad movement here where on retirement all the working class take their life savings and spend it on a new landcruiser and a whopping great caravan to spite their kids. They use as a slow moving road block on the highways and in the towns. They spend a couple years driving round the country before selling it all for a quarter what they paid for it and boring people with stories for the rest of their lives.

Well, those couples, when the go across the middle, travel in convoys and keep in tight communication. Plan their stops at reputable homesteads etc. They don't camp by the side of the road like they do on the coast.

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To be completely honest, some Americans think Australia is right next door to Germany

Well put it in writing then.

That's little Australia. It's a little bit bigger than our tasmania

This shot was taken in a location called the Breakaways which is about 20 miles outside of an opal mining town called Coober Pedy with desert for 500 miles in every direction.
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It should look familiar if you have seen Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome.

Yeah they sell it to me when they have finished & we fix bumps & bruises etc they put on it on their travels & we sell it for twice the price. Then I buy lovely new pinballs with the profit. The guy making the pinballs retires at some point & buys an RV.....

I was chatting to a European women recently at our business. She was talking about home & telling me how in Europe, you drive for 2 hours & your in another country. I told her that you drive for 2 hours in Australia & you get to the shops.

Great to hear the manufacturers and distributors are helping you get to everything sorted out .

Hopefully they do, when some or all of the cabinets we saw are ready with completed playfields installed, surely they'd want to show that off, why wouldn't they??

The mindset at Haggis has definitely changed and something doesn't smell right to me. Hopefully they push on and produce plenty of Fathom's in the near future.

I just randomly watched Thunderdome last night which I haven't seen in 20 years. And here you guys are talking about Mad Max this morning.. Life is a Trip

I wouldn't doubt it. They put colored LED's in the GI's, so the skys the limit on the stupidity here.

So this isn't an Austrian pinball company? What a load of bunk.

No sign of Bill yet. I'm busy with Mother's Day and my daughter's birthday for the next couple days anyway.

There's still no room to unbox here due to recent events.

A friend is helping me take 3 pins from my home to storage on Tuesday so if it arrives after that I'll have room to get it unboxed here at the house.

If it arrives before that it'll have to go to storage and get unboxed there.

See how the week unfolds.

Either way it should be soon.

Bought an MRS of Sonic for my sunset riders. It went to Austria at least twice before USPS sent it back to him explaining services to Australia had been suspended and they should not have accepted it.

Yep he was in wagga the night before last, so would be in Sydney now i'm CALCULATING. He's stopping at mine so i'll head up you when he leaves here.

Speaking of which, it’s been months since I went on rant about how amazing a Mad Max themed pin would be. Let me go grab my notes….

Theres a few already been done. Geoff Frazer who did the Sunset Riders did Max and so did Kurt Savage.

SickNate has been working on an amazing looking Fury Road homebrew.
I love the Mad Max universe and find it way more compelling a theme for pinball than most anything on the horizon.

Being a Detroiter, we’ve been tied to the theme in pop culture as well
Moe Syzlak-“If it moves you can bet on it”
Bart Simpson-“What about the Detroit Lions?”
Moe-“Nah nah now lay off Detroit… them people is living in Mad Max times”

Is it true that when Bill the delivery guy picked up your game at haggis, they wouldn't let him go inside the facility? Yet, he's been inside in the past during Celts production. If you're smart, you won't unbox that game until this all plays out.

WTF are you talking about?

I heard Bill used the Haggis toilet on both occasions. Apparently he even ducked into the kitchen and stole a Tim Tam.

If the toilet works we are all good!

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