Sana'a
Back in the day, Bally sold a blank playfield with the ball return stuff cut out and the shooter lane routed for $35.
(Topic ID: 112929)
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We could save Radio Shack (currently trading at .38 cents a share) .
Pinball controller kits and parts!
Templates for routing out ball returns and shooter lanes!
Templates for routing out inserts of all shapes and sizes!
Blank playfields!
Robotic parts and solenoids!
"Radio Shack - More than just a cell phone store"
"Radio Shack - You've got questions, we've got cell phones"
Quoted from GetTheJackpot:Do you have a recommendation for bit size?
I have them cut on CNC, so the bit size is drawn up and routed (meaning even a smaller bit can generate the desired final profile).
If you were to router by hand you would want the bit to slightly exceed the radius already, so 1.125" I would say.
Don't try to cut the entire profile depth in a single pass. Make a few light passes.
Post edited by vid1900: obscene mispelling
Quoted from swinks:here is a possible solution for the shooter lane, simply route out a pocket out of the playfield and install a 3D printed shooter lane insert. The insert is 1" wide x 6" long x a fraction over 1/4" thick - with a tapering scallop channel to centre the ball. You can print any colour to suit your purpose or simply replace to freshen up the shooter lane.
Make it translucent and light it with flashers when the ball launches.
Quoted from BloodyCactus:kinda disappointed at the lack of insert availability on marco.
You have to order 10,000 inserts of a single color.
Anything Marco has is likely leftovers from a Stern, CPR or Mirco run.
Marco would be lucky to sell 500 inserts in a year let alone, 10,000+ ....
Quoted from BloodyCactus:cant get lightning bolts anywhere. very very little in the way of triangles or diamonds or much anything.
Some shapes no longer have molds available.
They have been lost to the ages or damaged.
It costs $15,000 to make a new mold.
Quoted from Aurich:Speaking of metal, I need to get some thin steel (possibly aluminum I guess, steel would be best though) cut. Like 22gauge, hand bendable. Looks like laser isn't the best way to go for that, should probably water jet it.
Anyone have a recommendation for a place to use? I need to make little thin strips with holes "drilled" in them.
Grainger and Mcmaster both have 1" SS strip stock in stock.
http://www.mcmaster.com/#standard-stainless-steel-sheets/=v8mcqy
Quoted from toyotaboy:I paid $40 to have a piece of 1/2" x 2' x 4' baltic birch shipped from a guy in St louis
Menards around here stock Baltic birch in 1/4, 1/2 and 3/4" sizes.
Whole 4x8 sheet is $49
4 weeks later
Nice board!
Keep an eye on Partsexpress clearance, when they do the CAT5 cables they are .60 cents each.
http://www.parts-express.com/belkin-cat-5e-3-ft-black-patch-cable-snagless--109-349
http://www.parts-express.com/belkin-cat-5e-6-ft-white-patch-cable-molded--109-373
3 weeks later
2 months later
Ideally, you want the 1 1/8" size trough because the ball ejecting into the same spot wears a hole into the side of the trough.
If you wear a hole into the side of the 1" trough, the ball will deflect slightly each time it is launched.
Quoted from Purpledrilmonkey:Trickiest part (so far) is the slingshot mechs. I cut and drilled for Williams style holes and starposts, but in using a Stern sling assembly it seems to want smaller cylinder sling posts to get the switches in contact with the rubber ring. Had to do some hole 'tweaking' in a manner of speaking
Maybe make a template from a stern machine.
Looking from the bottom, the important part is the intersection point where the rubber crosses the slot vs the posts.
Quoted from ecurtz:...if you happen to have a totally blank playfield that matches what you want.
Exactly.
You will notice trends that most playfields are identical for a certain era.
You can copy the flipper and in/out lanes verbatim, but then adjust the angle of the slingshots by moving the master playfield and re-clamping.
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Back in the day, Bally used to sell a blank playfield with the ball return and shooter lane already routed for $35.
Here I did a guide on how to route all the holes in a new playfield, using an old playfield as a template and a 1/4" Pattern Bit:
1 week later
Quoted from Wolfmarsh:I want the bottom part of a playfield CNC'd with all of the "standard" holes, including lane inserts, between the flipper insert, etc....
If someone has a blown out modern Stern playfield they don't want, I can get probably 10 done every other week at work on the CNC machines.
1 week later
Quoted from DDDwingmaster:How far does the shooter tip then sit from the ball normally?
You adjust it.
Some games need a ton of energy, others much less to launch the ball into play.
Think of how much more power you need on Vector or Pinbot, than Genie....
1 week later
Quoted from toyotaboy:Getting a "rotisserie" section hashed out:
http://pinballmakers.com/wiki/index.php/Construction#Rotisserie
The section about plywood is incorrect:
The type of plywood available at a big box store will have a thin ply on both sides, generally of softer Baltic Birch, and will not have the surface area to allow a full 1/32" sanding to level the surface and inserts together.
Baltic Birch plywood has many more plys than big box store plywood.
All the layers of Baltic Birch are actually Birch, so it is very hard, heavy plywood.
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The junky big box store plywood will have a paper thin veneer of Birch, but the inner plys will be soft SPF (Spruce, Pine or Fir). So "Birch" plywood is very lightweight and very soft with many voids between the layers.
Big difference between Baltic Birch and Birch plywood:
Baltic_Birch.jpg
Birch Plywood.jpgI did not think you created it, but I did not know how to link it any better than quoting your post, lol.
Also, there is a product called Phenolic coated Baltic Birch that comes in Black or White.
The Phenolic resin is seriously rock hard (often used in concrete plywood forms for pouring basements).
If you make your whitewood out of this, you won't have to clearcoat it to test how the ball will play on a slick surface.
4x8' sheet is about $70, so it's not cheap.
131171.jpgQuoted from jwilson:Good catch. The awesome part of the wiki format is that anyone can edit it - the next time you find something that's wrong, please feel free to correct it!
Now you want me to learn how to do something?
I have a hard enough time just figuring out this new phone........
1 week later
Quoted from VacFink:The worry here is so much is out of stock and game specific. If I'm going to pirate parts used is cheaper, maybe. However am I depleting finite stock that could be preserving vintage games? My thinking here is to maybe ID in this forum parts that are new stock that's not robbing Peter to pay Paul.
Stick with brand new Williams stuff because it's cheap and bulletproof.
Flipper mechs, pop mechs, slingshots, ball trough......
Not only are you not killing a classic game, but you are letting people know who buy your stuff that they can get parts cheaply in the future.
Quoted from Purpledrilmonkey:The only stuff that I would say is tough to implement are drop targets.
Back in the old days if you wanted to make a drop target cage, you would need to make a set of dies and stamp them out.
Now you can just laser, plasma or waterjet and have them bent.
The patents have long ago run out, so anyone could make a bunch for experimenting, and a bunch to sell for replacement parts.
The custom bling guys would love to have their drop cages cut from mirror stainless.
Quoted from Purpledrilmonkey:Agreed, but imo it still comes down to the questions: do you want to build a pinball machine, and/or do you want to build mechanisms?
Both of course!
Quoted from Purpledrilmonkey:building a reliably working drop mechanism (or flipper mech, pop mech, etc...) will be a (probably fun) project in it's own right that will add to the unknowns and time to the end 'pinball machine' project.
Since the patents are expired, just copy the classic Bally Drop mechs.
Totally bomb proof, no U-contacts, plenty of blank targets made for them - the best there ever was.
Quoted from Aurich:Yeah, that just seems like overkill, surely there's a way to do it all with a servo. Maybe instead of a spring the target has a switch, more like a standup, and the servo modulates the up and down position.
That would be easy to do.
The blinds on Tommy are servos, and are always broken. We would have to make sure that all the gears on our servos were metal, lol.
Quoted from Mocean:Winding your own coils would certainly be cheaper than sourcing servos. Just saying, is all.
That's true.
High speed servos with metal gears are $6
ebay.com link: MG996R Metal Gear High Speed Torque Digital Servo Futaba JR RC Helicopter JHXG
2 weeks later
The thin aluminum coil used for roofing/siding is super cheap and would be easy to make temporary ramp flaps and ball guides.
$10 at home depot
Quoted from Aurich:Gerry, can you please stop trying to drive people to your forum in my thread? It's kind of rude man. Pimp your product all you like, you're a huge supporter of DIY pinball and I love it, but I'm trying to generate discussion here, on Pinside, about this stuff. And you're trying to suck it away to your own sandbox.
I don't see it as a drive, just a way to let people know there is a VERY detailed and active forum about the subject.
4 weeks later
Quoted from Purpledrilmonkey:Also I would be willing to bet there isn't a single enforceable patent of any kind on the overall layout of shots on a pinball machine, maybe on individual ideas or features, but not the layout as a whole.
There were plenty of copied playfields/shots by other companies over the years (think Playboy=SexyGirl) and you did not see any lawsuits.....
3 weeks later
Quoted from BloodyCactus:i wonder about their accuracy with more than one ball in proximity. how close does the ball get before detection? can it detect really fast ball movement? their magnetic, there is lots of metal on a pin, and lots of interference from the coils and magnets.
Every CNC mill uses Hall Effect Sensors at VERY high speeds, to protect very expensive equipment.
A common value is 1 mm although you can get them in .1mm.
1 month later
You can use an existing insert hole to make a template with the above pattern router bit.
Then move the template around to make all your new holes.
Remember that the diameter of the bit has to be smaller than the smallest radius of the hole for accurate duplication.
Quoted from rosh:Sort of tricky to go that way, since you need the upper part of the insert opening to be wider then the lower part of the opening, if you want the 'shelf' that the insert sits on.
Just swap out the bearing to make the shelf.
1 month later
Quoted from DDDwingmaster:Santa, can you please bring me a CNC machine too?
Build your own.
Cheap and rewarding:
4 months later
Stolen from rob046:
EM
----------------------------------------------------
Bally 70s EM - standard : 20.25" x 41.00" [514mm x 1041mm]
Gottlieb 70s EM - standard : 20.25" x 41.00" [514mm x 1041mm]
----------------------------------------------------
Early SS
----------------------------------------------------
Atari - widebody : 27.00" x 45.00" [686mm x 1143mm]
Bally (Pre WMS) - standard : 20.25" x 42.00" [514mm x 1067mm]
Bally (Pre WMS) - widebody : 26.75" x 40.50" [679mm x 1029mm]
Gottlieb System 1 - standard : 20.25" x 42.00" [514mm x 1067mm]
Gottlieb System 80 - standard : 23.75" x 46.50" [603mm x 1181mm]
Gottlieb System 80 - widebody : 26.75" x 46.50" [679mm x 1181mm]
Stern Early SS - widebody : 23.875" x 45.00" [606mm x 1143mm]
WMS System 1-11 - standard : 20.25" x 42.00" [514mm x 1067mm]
WMS System 1-11 - widebody : 27.00" x 42.00" [686mm x 1067mm]
Zaccaria SS - standard : 20.25" x 42.00" [514mm x 1067mm]
----------------------------------------------------
Modern SS
----------------------------------------------------
Capcom - standard : 20.25" x 46.00" [514mm x 1168mm]
Data East - standard : 20.25" x 46.00" [514mm x 1168mm]
Data East - widebody : 25.00" x 51.75" [635mm x 1314mm]
WMS WPC (until 1987) - standard : 20.50" x 42.00" [521mm x 1067mm]
WMS WPC (1987 on) - standard : 20.50" x 46.00" [521mm x 1168mm]
WMS WPC - superpin : 23.25" x 46.00" [591mm x 1168mm]
WMS Pinball 2000 - standard : 20.50" x 43.00" [521mm x 1092mm]
Quoted from TheNoTrashCougar:More updates if you guys are curious about the Total Annihilation build.
http://www.scottdanesi.com/?p=714
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