I was looking online for lamp boards, specifically for a DMD era Bally machines. They are not made, or sale at any of the retailers of pinball parts. There are not even any used ones at places like here or ebay. Do they not go bad? When someone parts out a pinball, do they throw them away as not worth the hassle? Curious mind wants to know.
Sorry to be more specific, the boards that hold multiple bulbs under a playfield. I found some on Marcos, but were mostly out of stock on many titles.
Unless the boards are actually missing, they can usually be repaired fairly easily.
Resolder the soldier joins in the header pins, add solder to the bulb socket pads, and replace any bad diodes. That's usually about it.
There are a few boards here:
https://pinballreplacementparts.com/collections/circuit-boards
https://www.pinballspareparts.com.au/catalogsearch/result/?q=lamp+board
Is there a specific game and board(s) that you're looking for?
There's a chance it might be available from somewhere, or someone might have a used one in their parts stash.
If all else fails, you might be able to substitute it with lamp sockets, diodes, and a connector to mate with the playfield harness.
Thanks all. It is as I suspected, that they don't go bad, and even if they do, easily repaired. I did place a wanted Ad. I was almost hoping that Lamp Boards were universal and used in many games, but that does not seem the case. Must have been easy to produce custom lamp boards for each game designed. I get that for single bulbs that have individual Lamp holders, but there again seems to be so many different styles for different bases, angles and heights. Wish I could go back in time and ask why there was no standardization in some parts that could be used in multiple games. I am not talking about all the games having the same layout or shots. There does seem to be standardization in pop/jet bumpers, flippers, coils, VUKs, shooters, coin doors, coin mechs and ball troughs.
A few of the smaller PCBs that had maybe 1-4 bulbs were used in more than one game. But because each game had its own layout, they needed their own lamp boards to match the positions of the inserts.
Keep in mind that while there were a lot of common parts that were reused across multiple games, there were also a certain amount of parts that were unique to a specific game.
If every game was basically the same, it wouldn't make them very interesting.
Yeah, parts like that just aren’t worth the time and effort to reproduce. There’s just very little demand and way too much variety to be a viable product for sale.
The problem is a problem of re-use.
PCBs are expensive when they get large... and given they are almost always custom for a given game it means the market is very narrow.
Then you add the fact that people can't agree on led vs incandescent.
I just doubt you'd sell more than a unit or two a year.
I'd love to be wrong tho.
Thanks all for providing context and history. I placed an Ad and got more than a few responses. So there are treasure troves of parts sprinkled around the world for pinballs. I was hoping that someone was saving parts from salvaged games that are no longer reproduced. This hobby is awesome.
Quoted from Tophervette:Thanks all for providing context and history. I placed an Ad and got more than a few responses. So there are treasure troves of parts sprinkled around the world for pinballs. I was hoping that someone was saving parts from salvaged games that are no longer reproduced. This hobby is awesome.
If you would simple say the Name of the title you are looking for it might drastically help in your quest! Would at least provide a starting point to the question.
There's plenty of board houses that you can have board made rather cheaply, and a fair amount even have free software to layout the board. Heck, even a cheap CNC for less than $200 will route a board. Look up a CNC-3018 or a CNC-3018 Pro
Might not be as easy as just ordering a board, but you definitely have options to end up with a nice looking board in the end.
Quoted from Tophervette:Thanks all for providing context and history. I placed an Ad and got more than a few responses. So there are treasure troves of parts sprinkled around the world for pinballs. I was hoping that someone was saving parts from salvaged games that are no longer reproduced. This hobby is awesome.
If your search is still active, I can create repro lampboards. I did it for MM, Totan, White Water (full sets).
Dr. Who should not be a problem.
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