Hmmmmm, so why do cars come with spare tires?

Looking to join the club. BNIB Bond LE as partial trade. Message if you’re interested.

Wow, nice, can you help me order some parts on your interweb for my POTC? JJP doesn't seem to have them.

I’m in!

I'm in if the price is reasonable. I bought the disc mod from the mod couple and I was super disappointed. I eventually even had to put the original gear back on. The set screws would strip out inside the gear if you tried to tighten them enough so they didn't slip on the shaft.

This belt drive idea seems like a great solution!

I am in also.

Actually most new cars now , do not come with spare tires, and the small percent that do come with one, its a mini spare.Only to save money for the manufacture and the fact that most of society now does not know the difference between a lug nut and a chestnut.

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Just last week I bought your actuated chest mod....now I wish I waited just a few days so I could order this with it and save on shipping! Oh well.

Luckily.....the mod couple silencer was out of stock and I DIDNT place my order for that.....so I could get your superior silencer version!

Just don't buy a car with a turbo. They never last long. LOL

I would never buy a audi or bmw. So I should be ok….

Quick question from new owner.....I've been fiddling with the autolaunch (and reading the troubleshoot thread about autolaunch issues) but I need to know what is the appropriate behavior. Yes, obviously it needs to get past the hill, but is the autolaunch supposed to be sending balls with good speed all the way around the orbit to the upper left flipper? Or is it too common on POTC to just have autolaunch balls barely reach the pearl and I should be thankful they get to the playfield?

Mine goes strongly around the orbit.

Check the assignment of the auto launch forks and how they strike the ball. Also the setting for auto launch power. You'll want that working well for multi ball and not having each ball hit the pearl vuk.

Existing customers should watch their inboxes

Interested for sure. Nice work here.

Appreciated....I needed to know "what" I needed to be striving for.

I hate autolaunches....there is so much slop in the mechanism that its impossible to get any consistency on it.

I went ahead and added a washer to help get rid of some slop (and move the prongs right since they were too far left)

20221110_135914 (resized).jpg

Then adjusted the prongs a bit which are hard to bend anyway (right one especially), and put power up to max on the coil.

I wouldn't say it "strongly" gets the orbit, but at least 70% now at least get to the orbit...other 30% at least go to the ship (and its VUK). Before, most would just dribble out of the hill and into the pops, with 10-20% not even getting up the hill.

Autolaunch adjustments give me PTSD from adjusting IMDNs autolaunch.

Will do! Emails going out today?

While I'm talking problems....so my 3rd pearl lantern, the red LED only works about 20% of the time, if that.

In this pic....the lanterns are flickering "fire", with red/green leds on to make yellow/orange, but ...3rd lantern is only green.

20221110_154714 (resized).jpg

From this post ->
https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/jjp-pirates-of-the-caribbean-official-owners-and-fan-club/page/21#post-4693755

It looks like its 4 wires connected to a small circuit board. Does anybody know if this is an easy part to source or JJP exclusive?

5a6859a86052d9481a52507f09a32c8e54b65275 (resized).jpg

If you haven't already, try taking slow motion video of a launch to see where between the ball launch and entering the orbit the ball loses power. Could be hitting part of the wire form on launch or wire form could be a bit out of alignment.

Page C-95 of the manual has the part number for the RGB cable for the lanterns. It's 19-009038-13 "POTC Black Pearl Railing RGB LED Cable".

Page D-36 shows the board where the cable connects into J803. The part number for the board is 15-000058-08 "POTC Black Pearl Mini PF RGB LED Bd."

Not sure where either part might be available though.

https://marketing.jerseyjackpinball.com/potc/POTC_Manual%202_0%20November%202018.pdf

I'm pretty sure all of the RGB LEDs that are on pirates are, in essence, standard 5v RGB common anode variants. So if they needed to be individually replaced with either a SMD style or bulb/through hole style diode it would be possible. If you wanted to replace that single bulb it would be fairly easy to clip that one off and put in a 5mm RGB LED. If you can determine if it is a connection issue then you can either repair the wire/connection or replace the bulb instead of replacing the whole harness, which JJP may not even have at this point.

No, it will be a few days at least. We have several new products launching so they will all be grouped together with a discount for existing customers.

Thanks. Oh, while you are here....I believe in your Pearl removal video, you were talking about adding thicker star map rubbers to help STDM drains. I can't find any other post about it though. Are there special thicker rubbers that like, titan has or are you thinking one larger Outer Diameter rubber that would fit around both front star map posts?

20221110_184048 (resized).jpg

Shooter lane troubleshooter, in order:

- Is the shooter tip intact? Replace if not.
- Is the shooter tip centered on the ball in the lane? Loosen and align shooter if not.
- Does the ball hit the "escape the locker" post when autoplunged? Check wireform alignment if so.
- Roll the ball over the shooter lane wireform. Does it click when it crosses any of the horizontal bars? If so, file them down until it doesn't.

Here’s a link to a post from when I did mine.

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/jjp-pirates-of-the-caribbean-official-owners-and-fan-club/page/280#post-5448448

Most of the time now I double flip to drop the post as soon as the chapter is selected in the animation, so the ball never comes to rest on the post. But before I started doing that I put the rubber on and it made a huge difference in reducing SDTM from there. I very rarely have SDTM from the star map chapter selection anymore.

I don't recall the size I used. But I think this seems to be the fix that might be the most engineered solution. However, I can't find the listing anymore on here so maybe it's available somewhere else. Travahontas might be able to chime in..

Thank you for the responses! Yes, from that video...its here ->

www.etsy.com/shop/TrumpancheMods

looks like he makes similar gates for hobbit and wonka....but POTC is out of stock. I sent him an email for info on restock.

And thanks EaglePin ....will get a sleeve post to help protect that silicone...my corner was thrashed (I simply rotated the sling rubber for now).

And.......I fixed the red led already! The pin is new to me, and I said the light was inconsistent, but I hadn't noticed the pattern yet. I bet....it worked when I first turned on the pin, but...as soon as I did a right flipper, it stopped working. I can't test that out now though...

But here is why, and I bet lots of pearls could have potentially the same issue (with their bottom lanterns) ->

See the exposed wire?

20221110_171758 (resized).jpg

Its from a flipper rubbing at full extension.

20221110_171806 (resized).jpg

So....with the first flip, I bet it shorts the light as soon as it makes metal to metal contact.

So, I wrapped it in electrical tape, cut a some zipties, pulled some slack into the wires, and routed them to the side of the playfield. The left flipper wasn't hitting the wires yet, but I did the fix on both sides.

20221110_180745 (resized).jpg

20221110_180738 (resized).jpg

Next time you have your pearls off, check those wires!

Nice catch!

Someone had mentioned to me that there is a difference with the Pirates monitor whether it is connected DVI or HDMI from the factory, they said there was a thread about it but I couldn't seem to find it. Can anyone explain the difference? I know the diff. between DVI and HDMI but is there any truth as far as the game is concerned?

...........................................

I think this is the thread that this person was referring to, I guess they changed the monitor at some point during the run of pirates to a cheaper display but I don't see where it says that DVI or HDMI is the tell tale sign of which monitor is the better of the two.

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/jjp-can-we-talk-about-replacement-lcds

I replaced my monitor and the original was HDMI. I hate how I did this....but the original monitor looked really bad. I made the HP 27F monitor fit by making a ghetto modified bracket. I'm not too proud of it but looks a million times better.

Edit: If the pinball mod company made a new monitor kit and bracket I would buy it.

Yeah that sounds like more trouble than I am willing to go through at this point. How can I tell which monitor is the better of the two other than seeing them side by side? Is there any other tell tailed signs of when it was which during the run?

Specs. Basically an IPS (or variant E-IPS, etc) will always be better than a TN. For this, PVA>TN, too. They're not 3D hypergaming fast, but they're plenty for PotC and more color-accurate with way better off-angle viewing than a TN. The telltale giveaway for a TN if you know nothing else about it is to stand 45 degrees off center from it and see if it darkens. TN's do, sometime A LOT. IPS and PVA generally do not because of a much wider viewing angle.

If you know the model number of the panel you're wondering aboutjust google the panel model + "panel" or model + "panel specs" and that should give you a readout with viewing angle and color depth as well as whether it's 6 or 8 bit color (8 is better).

Thanks for the tips....yep, the horizontal bars were hitting the ball. I'm surprised at how much energy was lost due to that. My manual plunger also is much smoother now.

20221111_180615 (resized).jpg

I'm glad it helped! It -really- messed up skill shots for me when it was clicking, everything is a lot smoother after filing them down a little.

What is the latest Beta code for this game and where can it be downloaded?

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/jjp-open-beta-program

First message in the thread.

Thank You

Can anyone tell me what some of the main things to look for when purchasing this game? I mean I know to examine around the slings for pooling and chipping but how about beyond that? Common problems and issues? Things to test or look out for?

Information appreciated, thank you.

Lots of good information here:

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/jjpirates-of-the-caribbean-troubleshooting-tips-issues#post-4933792

I'll check it out, thank you.

I think the consensus is buy it if the number is right and sort it later lol.

Yeah I gotcha. Just not looking for any surprises, trying to do my homework before hand. The less headaches the better, ya know?

I have read a ton about the game and have a good idea of what to be looking for but it never hurts to ask about what I could be missing. I know with pinball machines in general that a lot of time one certain model can share a common issue which is what I am more or less looking for here.

The chipping around the posts that you mentioned seems to be most common issue. It's just so common with this title that finding one completely without pooling/chipping would be out of the ordinary. Nothing else stands out as a widespread issue, but replacement plastics and ramps are unobtainable at the moment, so I would check for any damage there.

Also look for chipping at the slots the forks come up through under the trunk. Very common to have chipping there and the owner may not even know. Also, ask about a spare playfield. Many owners were sent them free when they reported the pooling and chipping issues. If the one you're looking at has those issues, there should be a free spare playfield somewhere nearby.

Other than playfield issues, I don’t recall there being a lot of “most games had this issue” type of stuff. It mainly seemed to be a LOT of tweaks and adjustments needed, with a few issues being more major that weren’t necessarily widespread but weren’t uncommon either.

The bigger ones I recall off the top of my head that I’d probably check for would be
1) making sure the forks going into the chest work correctly and the chest lock operates correctly

2) making sure the target ship is aligned correctly and the cannon shot goes into the hole.

3) make sure the motor for the upper playfield is rocking the shop correctly and the spinning disc is spinning both ways correctly

4) make sure all lights, flippers, and switches on the upper playfield are working correctly

5) a fair number of people had issues with the playfield hangers/brackets that connect the playfield into the lock at area being bent or offline so it was difficult to get the playfield into and out of the resting position.

6) easy way to check all switches & optos is go into switch test to see if any are indicating a problem.

Other stuff would mostly be adjusting/tweaking/aligning things. There was a LOT of that stuff needed on this machine, but not insurmountable.

1. So as long as the ball locks the ball into the chest, this is fine?
2. I am pretty sure this has been adjusted but you are saying as long as the canyon is able to fire the ball into the hole, this is fine?
3. Are these independent problems from one and other? How will I know if they are working correctly? What does it look like if they are not working correctly?
4. Understood
5. So basically I just need to make sure I can raise and lower the pf?
6. Will do!

1) Yep check for balls locking and then also releasing when multiball starts. There's also a test for the fork mechanism in the software menu under Tests/Device Tests.
2) Yes, if the cannon shot goes into the hole then the alignment is correct.
3) Yes, these are independent things. Make sure the ship rocks its full range of motion back and forth. There's a test for the ship playfield motion in the software menu under Tests/Device Tests. The spinning disc should randomly switch the directions that it's spinning.

5) Yep, just make sure the playfield can be raised and lowered cleanly.

Excellent. I will make note of all this, thank you.

As far as the above goes, is there any deal breakers among these? Is there anything that can't be adjusted or replaced?

If something were wrong with the forks or the ship motor I'd think those could possibly be a bit difficult to replace/repair. I'm not sure how readily available spare parts would be if needed. The other things likely would be manageable.

Chipping around the Tortuga hole is also common. Look to see that a Cliffy protector has been installed. If not, be sure to get one.