I finally decided enough was enough after the shame of calling a "pinball guy" to work on my 1977 Williams Liberty Bell, and decided that I should pick up a non working EM on the cheaper end of things and learn how to repair them on a non working one, rather than risk the health of my existing toy.

I came home with a bit more than I bargained for with a barn find 1975 Williams "Little Chief", non working. There were not that many issues with it and no real big issues, mostly a few small parts missing, a few solenoids gone bad, and the right side rail, and backbox cover plate retention hardware gone missing; but, overall, its really been a great experience in learning how to repair EM's and how they work, and I've fixed every major problem I've come across with it so far!

One final major problem I'm struggling with is the coin door. It seems like the coin door may have been sabotaged at one point when the machine was taken out of service. The coindoor wires were mostly hanging loose. I resoldered them and replaced the missing lock reloay coil and the coin door seems to be behaving correctly now besides closing the switch doesn't seem to result in the game adding a credit to the wheel. If I roll the wheel manually it detects there being a credit on the wheel and uses it and takes it off; but, I have to advance the wheel manually, the coin switch doesn't actuate it.

Any suggestions?
Alex

Thank you for the in depth answer, it seems like the switch might be faulty. I will replace it and see how things go from there. With the switch dismounted, if I close the connection between the 3 wires manually, it adds the requested credits!

Cheers
Alex

Hello,

I've replaced both of the coin switches, and they are both now triggering the 25 cent relay.

The problem is that I would like to have one trigger the 10 cent relay, as well. I'm sure theres an adjustment that I'm just not seeing; however, I just don't know how to change that!

The big problem is that once the 25 cent relay is charged, it doesn't move the credit up to the credit wheel, maybe I'm missing something!

Cheers
Alex

There are quite a few different Jones Plugs that control various functions of the coin mechanism; but, there do not appear to be any that affect the way the mechanisms are seen by the game. Please see the attached images from my machine.

I've also flipped through the original manual and there doesn't appear to be any mention of a plug to change anything in that way.
( Source: http://www.planetarypinball.com/ )

One source of problems I identified is that the replacement switch I bought to replace a broken original, is different than the originals.

However, the behavior of the machine is the same with or without it installed along side the original, and it seems to trigger the same behavior (setting the 25 cent relay) that the original switch triggered.

Any suggestions?

Alex

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Hello Phil-lee,

Sorry for the 2 week delay in getting back to you. I'm working on an issue that crept out of nowhere on my machine, and the coin stuff slipped my mind.

Yes, the free play works fine! It also counts down correctly, and stops giving credits when it hits 0, when you wind it yourself manually in the back.

It seems the circuit that gets credits onto the wheel is malfunctioning!