So Wonka looks like a lot of fun... But I am happy to be a recent Pirates purchaser! Pirates has a real wow factor to it... And it's so fun and satisfying to shoot! From what I've seen so far of Wonka, Pirates is the better game!

Yes. The power is off.

Also, after loosening and tightening the left BP flipper and turning the game back on, no joy.
The flipper would appear dead.

=(

It was working fine last night. All I did was turn it off and then turn it on today.

Does the ship have to come off now?

Yea. I don't even think it's close.

I watched the stream and was underwhelmed. I wasn't expecting it to live up to POTC, but I was expecting more...

Yes. One of my flippers started sticking up. It had loosened and had too much up and down play so was binding. Pull your flippers up and down and see if your stuck one has appreciably more play. Mine was obvious.

It met my original pre Kameda expectations but yes potc seems like a no brainer buy in hindsight.

I must be missing something..

I loosed the right BP flipper and upon loosing you can easily manually move it up to pretty much a vertical position. I thought I was suppose to put the flipper back to it's "resting" place or all the way down and then tighten.

I did just that. I promise. And after tightening, and manually moving that flipper, it has no additional upward movement and is still too low. I essentially accomplished nothing.

This is fun...

Perhaps a bit too loose ... =D

As a side ... the left flipper isn't sticking anymore! =P

I feel silly. I should be intelligent enough to put 1 + 1 together. I am learning that there is a "bit more" to it then just that nut.

Sighs... back to it!

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As for the mod, we'll have it done in a couple weeks, we'll install it on my game then create a video for you to see. It will not integrate with the game, however we're making the video to make it appear to... we want to make it seem like it was always supposed to be part of the game. This mod will be the mod to COMPLETE your Pirates game and give it what everyone wants... you want to see the clips JJP couldn't use.

As for Willy Wonka, yeah I think Pirates has more to it, but they dropped the price drastically for the standard editions. Wonka looks amazing.

Here is what I will say, just wait until THE MOD COUPLE get a hold of it!

We need MODS all JJP games are friendly to mods.

I meant "up and down" in the vertical axis compared to the playfield (i.e. not its usual flipping axis). if there is too much up and down play, the plunger can bind in the coil sleeve. Another possibility is the return spring has broken, but if there is some spring back, and it is just sticking, there is very likely some binding somewhere...

So it just wasn't tightened to the flipper shaft enough? Easy solution. When you put it back on, make sure you have about a dime's thickness of play if you pull the flipper straight up and release it. If it's too tight to the playfield, it can bind also. You want a smidge of movement up and down if you pull up on it.

Yes I forgot to mention that

Like goldilocks, you want it "just right"

Ya Wonka looks underwhelming to me as well. Has some cool features but not that WOW factor ive got when I saw WoZ or PotC for the first time. With that said looking forward to eventually playing it. First thing I thought of when they explained the Wonkinator or whatever its called was why cant our dead mans chest work like that. 2 player game player 1 locks 2 balls and drains....second player now only has to do 1 to start multiball, would add another layer to multiperson games.

I'm sure they could code that for chest lock question is will they cause that would be cool for multiplayer game like tna

Thanks for the feedback guys.

I don't know honestly...
I'm not sure what the return spring is but I'm guessing it's not the same as the thin springs for the flippers themselves.

Again, I loosened the right BP flipper to the point where I could move the flipper as freely as I wanted to. I made sure it was resting in the "downward" position or against the metal and proceeded to tighten. When completed, I had no additional height or pitch or upward movement (Whatever you wanna use there, lol)

I actually just finished watching the removal of the BP. Pretty informative.
Maybe I just have a loose wire or something as opposed to removing it and learning I have a broken wire at which point I have to both acquire and learn how to solder.

Umm... I'm at peace with it for the night. Inevitably these things were going to happen either sooner or later. Unfortunately, it looks sooner. But maybe it's not unfortunate. At least I'm learning a ton and trying to be independent outside of posting on here of course.

I JUST WANT TO PLAY!!!! =)

I can't stress enough how much I sincerely appreciate every single one of your responses as I continue to work through these growing pains initially.

I think I'll be better for it.

And I look forward to the payoff when this game is running perfectly!

Have a good night all..

In no time you will be an expert. 2 months ago I picked up my first pinball machine not working. Took me a good couple weeks just to figure out what the switch/light matrix was. Little by little I started figuring things out to the point where I'm comfortable diagnosing problems (and when I'm not there are a ton of good people on this forum) and changing things around if/when I want to. The return spring attaches to the flipper pawl (the rod that goes into coil). When you manually push the flipper up the spring should be trying to pull the flipper back. The coil is only sucking the rod (thats what she said) in the spring is returning it to start position when not energized. Just about every coil is going to have some type of return spring on it.

Fun tip to add. After talking to ZapHX, I decided my slings won't need the starpost fix- yet. What they did need, however, was a little bit of Quixx- a clearcoat deep scratch remover- to smoothen any "suspect" circular white clearcoat artifacts around the sling holes. Seems to have come out nice.

IMG_20190413_104349 (resized).jpg

Did you take any before pics?

I should have but didn't. Sorry about that. But Quixx is good stuff and one of my favorite playfield products for scratch and/or minor imperfection buffing on clearcoat.

Just curious if anyone has had their game reboot in the middle of game. I was playing (for once having a great score) when everything went blank and it rebooted. I've played it a few more times(not so great scores) and all seems well. Is this simply a computer being a computer?

I asked before but never got a reply can anyone tell me what star posts to order for the slings please. thx.

They're just standard star posts. Pick a color and you're set:

https://www.pinballlife.com/plastic-translucent-star-posts-1-116-tall.html

Well finally tackled the map cliffy today not to bad was a little tight removing black pearl was pretty dirty under there gave it a good whip down with some novas 1 and back together . So depth cliffy anyone know that just snap on I cant get my sausage fingers in there lol

Yeah, The Depths cliffy just snaps on from the top side. I angled it so the bottom made contact first and then rotated it forward onto the lip on top, then slid it all the way on.

I used the referenced pinballlife posts. I also put down silicone washers so the star posts don't dig new chunks from the art.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B01DKKR3XI/ref=ya_aw_od_pi

Note that you will have to bend the leaf switch mounting brackets a bit after doing the star post mod to keep the slings responsive.

You got my upvote. I think I would buy one.the star map vs. your MOD, no contest. Anxious to see the final product.

On my game, I changed the BP flipper rubbers with titans. Afterwards, the right flipper didn't move right. After a while I found out, that it got blocked by the metal rail it rests on. I had to bend the metal rail just a hair so it could move freely again.

Definitely tricky (and a bit painful for the fingers)! I added some double-stick tape on the inner vertical surface to make sure it stays in place.

I totally agree with the consensus here that WW was underwhelming. After the controversy of DI's theme, and spinning-disc-gate and trunk-gate of POTC (not to mention production delays), I feel like JJP needed WW to be their next WOZ. Sadly I don't think they nailed it. I'm sure it will be a blast to flip (like all JJP pins), but not on par with WOZ or POTC.

Having played it extensively this weekend I disagree. It will rival WOZ and JJPOTC in our house for playtime for sure.

Rank them.... Curious to hear from someone that played all three in person

Oh man that's tough. It's hard because wonka is new so it gets weighted higher. But if I think about it a bit and really have to choose, it's Wonka, then JJPOTC, then WOZ.

Wonka Layout beats JJPOTC layout due to the constant smooth flow. You can feed ramp to flipper to ramp to flipper to orbit to flipper to ramp, etc. That puts a grin on your face. The geometry is awesome. JJPOTC has that amazing upper PF and wonka doesn't.

But Wonka has the gobstopper toy which we all thought was really cool, but looks meh when you're watching it online. Hitting the target is fun, and when the floor below turns to reveal the hole and you hit the same target again to go into the hole and lock the ball, the the floor turns again, it's a cool trick and fun. It reminds me of TOM spinning chest which is cool. But, JJPOTC has that canon shot which is always a crowd pleaser.

The wonkavator shot takes some work to qualify, and when you do, the shot is not easy. But when you hit it, it feels AWESOME - looping from top left flipper all the way to the right, orbit up and around, and then boom into the wonkavator. I want MORE. And the top right flipper to middle ramp shot feels great, one of my favorite shots on the PF. And that diverter to magnet to upper left flipper is a cool trick to line up more shots. The rainbow of colors during certain modes and multiballs is visually perfect, especially the tiny dots of "candy". The wonkavision is a cool trick when you hit the ramp and a bright light comes on shining at you as the camera "sucks" you in, displays you on the screens etc. I've heard that part is still getting more to it in future code as well.

Given the code was only 60% on the machines we played for Wonka, I can't see how this won't be a huge hit. While JJPOTC has a cooler toy in the ship PF and canon and has satisfying shots and lots to aim for, the overall gameplay on Wonka is even better.

I was underwhelmed by the stream too, and that made me debate getting Wonka vs AC/DC as my second pin, but your post leans me back to Wonka.

I've been getting way too many SDTM's from the chapter select. We even just got three in a row. It sucks to STDM from something you can't control. Is there a fix for this?

Ya personally I feel like there should be a ball save at chapter select...been punished way to many times from the off chance ball hits nothing on way down.

You should see the magnet yank the ball upward right before dropping the post. Are you on the latest firmware?

There is no setting in the menu for this?

I've run into the same issue. Usually giving the pin a slight nudge just about the time it's due to be released makes it easier for the magnet in the Star Map to prevent it from going SDTM, especially doing a double flipper button press at the same time which will start the mode.

Yep, I agree. It would be nice to have a quick ball save there. It's disappointing when the magnet flips the ball back and it still comes straight down the middle. Happens often enough that a quick ball save would be nice.

Is anyone else thinking of moving the I-lane post inward?

Those drains are just brutalizing me tonight.

I agree. I have never had this happen as Prior to the post dropping the magnet gives the ball a good Pop and it randomly goes up then rolls out rarely to the middle. I know on the Early code they didn't have this feature and it would do it all the time. I do thing a proper level all direction game helps though.

Wow interesting? I too played Many games on WW and I did enjoy it but in No way was any element of that game in the same league as Pirates in my opinion. Very well done but some things just seemed off by comparison. Especially the use of video animation. In Pirates the animation almost looks seamlessly integrated. On WW, a virtual projector screen would slide down and play a clip from the movie as if you were watching it on an iPad. Not a complaint just did not seem as fluid as Pirates. I am in and paid on an WWLe. Previously had a CE deposit but I could not see Any value for 3K as I did on Pirates CE unfortunately.

Already have. Much happier.

I’m in on a CE, not wanting to repeat the “CE envy” experience on POTC. I am excited about Wonka but not convinced it will displace POTC as my favorite yet.

Probably said before by others, but I'm surprised the CE didn't have the Dutchman instead of the Dauntless as the ship inside, given it's basically the Davy Jones edition.

Oh yeah? No regrets eh? I feel weak for considering it but I am so tired of draining there...and I don’t seem to be improving my skill at all.

Wonka “better” than Pirates? Yea...no.

Everyone is entitled to their opinion, but I’m sure the consensus will easily rank Pirates highest. It’s not even on the same level as Pirates.

I want to know how it stacks up against DI. Ya know, the other Lawlor game and standard body.

Cheating much?

Oh well...whatever.

Have fun!

Ya magnet does pull ball back into select before releasing but 1 out of 10 times it will hit nothing on the way down and go sdtm. Most of the time it will bump on its way out or hit the gold targets but if it doesnt sdtm. I have tried nudging upon release but that really does nothing . And yes I have been thinking of moving that post. I dont mind the drains there I mind the drains that come off the right slingshot that there is nothing you can do about. I think moving post will help with those.

None whatsoever. I still lose balls there, but not nearly as often now. I'd rather focus on other challenges in the game than trying to stop constant cheap drains.

Cheating?! Pffffft