Problem: optos on mini playfield fail due to heavy vibration from a overly powered VUK.
Solve: lower VUK to 18-20 and lock-tite the 4 small screws that hold the optos in place. My right opto missed both screws. I was unable to find them but had some replacement screws in my ‘magic’ toolbox. Sometimes almost never getting rid of any pinball related stuff pays of.

I'm having issues with the black pearl. It was moving fine and then it stopped. Now it does not move at all.

When the game starts the ship goes down on the left side and stays there.

The ship moves freely when not connected to the motor.

I think this is an opto calibration issue. The disk that runs through the optos had a good bit of play left and right.

The Boat test menu has the motor green.

First thing I'd check is the flat metal bar that hooks the motor to the black pearl behind the playfield. There is two screws on it, you might loosen them and adjust if the metal piece is too tight.

LTG : )

Thanks Lloyd,

Everything seems to be good on the bar. What concerns me is the motor staying engaged. In the test menu, the ship will not go left or right. The force calibration does not work either.

So the test menu is moving the ship now.

The picture below is where the disc sits when it is in the “home” position.
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Before I get into the tech stuff just want to say I'm having a great time playing this one, loving all the variety of the modes and the interesting shots, well done to Keefer, Eric, David and team!

Got my LE (#1018 built 4/29) setup this weekend, definitely my most problematic NIB unboxing, I guess I've gotten lucky in the past. Thanks to everyone who posts the fixes! I was able to use several...

The stuff that had to be fixed/tweaked:
- Auto launch wasn't working consistently, about 80% of the time it failed to launch over the hump. FIX: Added the washers to remove launch bracket slop.
- Ball gets stuck on BP ramp. BP was a full half-inch below the ramp. FIX: Pulled BP forward a bit, which raised it, this helped some. Had to remove crush washer completely to get it where it now rarely get's stuck.
- No washer under the outlane/shooter lane metal rail. Rail dug into playfield and damaged the art underneath. FIX: Added a washer.
- Monitor sag/ damaged back glass, right side was hanging down about a half inch, could see lots of foam pads mounted on the monitor through the glass. Monitor scratched the back glass in shipping I assume? FIX: Reset mounting hardware. Still sags a bit but I'll live with it for now.
- Black Pearl VUK failing to put the ball on the ship about 80% of the time. FIX: Increased VUK power (to 24 from 14).
- Sling posts show severe bubbling, no supplementary washers installed from factory. FIX: None at this time, waiting on JJP fix.

The good news:
- Trunk works 100%, locks balls when it should, no bounce outs.
- Shots to Tortuga stick, and the kickout sends to the flipper
- Black Pearl rocking works fine, shots from the cannon are lined up properly w/ Dauntless
- Disk is noisy but no more so than the discs were on my X-Men, will live with this for now

Thanks! I kept upping it a point at a time until it landed consistently. At around 18 on my machine the ball would generally fire up far enough to clear the one-way gate, then land back on the main playfield. Are there any other known issues with this assembly? I looked at it under the playfield and everything seemed tightened securely in place, the coil and bracket weren't loose.

NO

Mine came 18 from the factory (late December 2018 build), and I had the same problem with it failing to launch onto the ship sometimes and instead draining out into the playfield. I didn't know about the opto damage, so I had reset my to factory default, which is quite high if I recall correctly, so I'm going to be playing with 20-22 and seeing how well that performs this week with the glass off.

It seems like it would be prudent for someone to come up with a protection for that opto. Mine is broken and I have replacements but I am going to see about fabbing up something to protect it while I replace them. I want to make something to go between the two standup targets as well (probably something that matches the top of the ship mod couple made) so maybe it's an all in one piece.

Mine could have been 18 as well from the factory, I bumped it one point at a time until at 24 it started boarding consistently. Be interested to see where yours lands as well.

Not sure if anyone has been having issues with repeatedly hitting the tortuga shot and getting it to stick.

Received the new revised snubber bracket from JJP today and the shot is now repeatable with no brick outs.

It appears the original snubber(shorter version) was causing some restriction both going in and out of the vuk hole. I say this because I was running factory power setting of 22 and it was good but with the new bracket I had to dial all the way down to 11 to get the eject to the left flipper and not be too hot. 22 was creating a slight airball issue and a rocket eject.

Thought this was quite interesting and pass it along.

Makes a huge difference in scoring to be able to consistently hit this shot now!

I wonder if there's room for a post back there, similar to the post that blocks the ball on the AFM/r VUK.

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Problem: inconsistent auto plunge shot which doesn’t make it to the left upper flipper.
I adjusted the coil strength from the shooter but that didn’t do the trick. I closely looked at the wireform and that has 3 horizontal metal “bars” at the underside (see pictures) which make the ball rattle.
Solution: use a dremel to grind some metal and let the ball pass without touching the metal bars. You need to remove the wireform to do this properly. The dremel I used had a curved shape, which I highly recommand.
Now every autoplunge makes it around to the upper left flipper. Coil strength at only 20.

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Does anyone's spinning map disc seem to spin slightly off-tilt? I'm unable to get the disc 100% level b/c when I spin the disc, it'll be level at a certain rotation, and then when I rotate it another 180* or so it dips down slightly on that one side. Rotate again, it appears level... anyone else's like this?

Since the disc's pitch seems to change as I spin it, I don't think it's a leveling issues with the main mounting bracket - perhaps something with the plastic sleeve or elsewhere?

Thanks vireland - I can confirm that the high spot remains the same spot on the disc as I rotate it so I don't think it's a mounting issue to the playfield itself (otherwise it would remain consistent).

There is one screw under the disc decal right in the center that holds the disc to the shaft. If that is not quite tight down the disc could be wobbly just a little.

Thanks guys - Yikes...I think you're probably right. Sounds like I'd have to destroy the map decal in the process to even check. Going to check in with my distributor and see what he thinks as well before I do anything.

You could get lucky and Hope the screw bites back down by holding the disk from spinning and tighten the shaft from below. I had a friend that the screw let loose and sadly the only option is a new disk decal to access the screw to shaft. Good luck.

Ok unless I read that wrong it Seems like you are going the wrong direction. You adjusted your game pitch from 5.9 (way to low in my opinion) Up to 6.5 (I prefer 6.8) and Then reduced the flipper power?? When you increase the incline you need to also (most times) Increase the flipper power or I suspect you will never hit that chest. Go up and continue to go up until it goes in. Make sure your not flying off ramps and you should be good to go.

I had a hard time updating to .99. the only way I got it to recognize the USB stick was to plug it directly into to box in the backbox, I followed the USB cable from the coin box to the backbox so that I used the same port and bam, it worked.

Is there a chance that I have a bad USB extender?

Yes it's possible. You can ask for another from JJP or just grab one somewhere. Its 10 feet long.

Thanks Vic
You never miss a cue

10 ft? https://www.amazon.com/Cable-Matters-Extension-Black-Feet/dp/B00C7SA21U/ref=sr_1_3

Doh, I read your links wrong. Bowning down to your greatness and my lack of reading comprehension

My hat's off to JJP and their handling of the situation with my chest bracket. They worked with me to provide an amicable solution even though I don't meet their requirements for a warranty replacement.

My flipper powers are at defaults and IIRC yes the default has one higher than the other.

On my machine the chest shot is easier to make with the right flipper than the left, and I consider it part of the game design and challenge. It takes a really perfect shot to nail it from the left flipper.

Another example: maelstrom is easier from the right flipper, but -can- be backhanded from the left flipper with difficulty for me. I like having these options and risk/reward scenarios. Part of the amazing design.

On the same note, can you make the chapter select with the right flipper?

Oh hell no. I can't do it with anything but the left.

Ok, good to know I'm not going to keep trying that!

Quoting myself: has really nobody noticed this? No confirmation or whatsoever.

“Problem: inconsistent auto plunge shot which doesn’t make it to the left upper flipper.
I adjusted the coil strength from the shooter but that didn’t do the trick. I closely looked at the wireform and that has 3 horizontal metal “bars” at the underside (see pictures) which make the ball rattle.
Solution: use a dremel to grind some metal and let the ball pass without touching the metal bars. You need to remove the wireform to do this properly. The dremel I used had a curved shape, which I highly recommand.
Now every autoplunge makes it around to the upper left flipper. Coil strength at only 20”

I had autoplunge problems but not the same. The two rails in the shooter lane were not completely flat, and the slight height difference was enough to cause the ball to hit the post off autoplunges. Straightening the rails fixed it.

My issue did not involve the bars under the rails; manually rolling the ball it was smooth without clicking over them.

After reading your post yesterday I went and tested mine by rolling a ball manually through there, it didn't hit any of those cross bars.

I did have to move the 'Escape the Locker' donut to the other post, which allowed for more consistent auto-plunges and easier escapes.

Edit: wrong thread.

Did you have to pound this post out for install? Do you remember what size washer you used?

Glad you're up and running!

Is the Tortuga vuk called "VUK"? I think i read it was somewhere. Need to adjust this myself, monster kickout speed on mine.

I just noticed an inconsistency in the plunge strength but I haven't checked as to the issue yet. I had previously adjusted the power to give a nice firm lob to the left flipper without getting caught in the BP. During multiball often the additional balls hit the BP. I assume this is only supposed to happen in BPMB but maybe I am wrong on that. Now, just last night, it started with every shot. Someone mentioned (I think an Aussie) that they felt the coil strength changed with environment or length of time in use, etc. Maybe I just need to dial it up a bit, it's just interesting that it's changed. I'll investigate the smoothness of the launch ramp.

Oh hey, did anyone need to replace the shooter rod spring yet? When I got my used game it was really weak, hard to make it around the loop. I believe I read it was a blue strength spring in the manual so I ordered one from Marco but it's HELLA strong. I know I have a red, which is even harder but I am going to dig around and see what else I might have to test. I know my WOZ springs are really weak (and rightly so) so I can't swap them to test. If nothing else I'll just order a few, but I just placed an order and forgot to add some in... another $9 in shipping.

Ok, maybe this is why only I experience this. Glad most of you don’t have grind the shooter wire form.

I think it's because no one else has reported this issue. You may have had a one-off badly-welded form for the balls.