Diner - Found loose wires hanging on - Need help!

Hi all,

I've been working my Diner, raising and lowering my playfield a few times. Now I'm done, I realize my upper eject hole switch does not work anymore. Looking down at it, I see 2 wires hanging loose so I'm assuming my switch lost power. See picture:

Diner_hanging_wires2.jpg

#1 is the faulty switch
#2 is hanging wire number which come from an unused GI lamp socket I believe this wire is not "live"
#3 is other hanging wire coming from the back of the PF, from another lamp I think, it's hard to see. I believe this wire is "live"
#4 is the unused GI lamp socket I'm talking about
#5 is the hole the GI lamp go I believe

Can someone who owns a diner or who has knowledge tells me what wire goes where? Pictures with comments would be appreciated!

This area is a pain to troubleshoot, deep in the cabinet, so I want to make this right the first time.

Thanks all!

#2 8 years ago

GUS

Plumonium

Pinside member

Anyone? I'm in a pickle here.

#3 8 years ago

DDS

presqueisle

Inactive member

Presque Isle, WI

11y 92,550 1,994 10 18

Maybe put Diner in your title. Good luck!

#4 8 years ago

WTS

WonkoTSane

Inactive member

9y 44,150 655 43

It is obvious to see where the lamp socket pulled out of. The hole for the lamp and the screw hole are right next to the switch.

The yellow wire should not be attached to the switch at all. I would say that your switch has never worked if it has always been connected like that. Looking that the switch matrix, (You should know how to do this yourself - http://mirror2.ipdb.org/files/681/Williams_1990_Diner_Full_Operations_Manual.pdf) the wires to the switch should be white/brown and green/violet. If you look at the lower switch it has two green/violet wires soldered to it. One of those should probably go to the upper switch. They are on the same column of the matrix.

#5 8 years ago

GUS

Plumonium

Pinside member

The lamp socket (to work) is the least of my problem. It is the switch to the eject hole that is the problem. It used to work. But is does not anymore. I did not mess with any wires during my work. I just assume the problem came from those loose wires.

So you think that yellow wires does not affect the switch at all? Doesn't the continuity loop for the switch needs to go through this yellow wire?

#6 8 years ago

WTS

WonkoTSane

Inactive member

9y 44,150 655 43

There is a yellow wire that is attached to the switch and to the lamp socket. Someone did this. If you bought the machine this way, the switch has never worked. This wire needs to be removed from the switch.

One of the green/violet wired attached to the lower kickout switch looks like it was a poorly soldered post manufacture job. I am betting this wire came loose and someone did not know where it came from and attached it to the same spot as a wire of the same color. Remove it and attach it to the other switch where the yellow wire was connected before you removed it after reading the last paragraph.

#7 8 years ago

TAB

terryb

Inactive member

Banning, CA

11y 90,150 4,795 14

Edit: Wonko beat me to it. Get the switch number and then on page 34 in the manual you can identify which wires should go to it.

#8 8 years ago

LTG

Pinside member

Easy to go into Tests - Single Switch - and then stop on the switch you want. Hit the start button, and then start hitting the + Diagnostic button. This steps you through switch name, WIRE COLORS, connector info, etc. etc.

Get the right color wires on those switches.

It is possible there was a yellow jumper wire from one to another, if the green wire and what ever color stripe have the same color stripe on both green wires/switches.

LTG : )™

#9 8 years ago

GUS

Plumonium

Pinside member

Quoted from WonkoTSane:
If you bought the machine this way, the switch has never worked.

I bought it this way and I can assure 100% that the switch worked before.

Before starting swapping wires around, I would really like to have someone who owns a Diner to check on his.

#10 8 years ago

GUS

Plumonium

Pinside member

But yeah, you are right, there is a discrepancy between what the connection should be and what it is now.

#11 8 years ago

GUS

Plumonium

Pinside member

Quoted from LTG:
It is possible there was a yellow jumper wire from one to another, if the green wire and what ever color stripe have the same color stripe on both green wires/switches.
LTG : )™

What do you mean by that, I'm not sure I understand.

#12 8 years ago

LTG

Pinside member

OP
Quoted from Plumonium:
What do you mean by that, I'm not sure I understand.

There are times when there are switches close to each other. And they have a common wire to one of the lugs on each of them. The first one gets the common color wire. Then yellow jumper wires go from that spot to the same spot on the other switches.

So your yellow wires in there may have gotten mixed up over time. If any were intended to be a jumper wire from switch to switch, and got put on a lamp instead.

LTG : )™

#13 8 years ago

???

pintime

Pinside member

The loose yellow wires look like they go to GI lamps that are on backboard on each side of coffee cupimage.jpgimage.jpgimage.jpgimage.jpg

image-655.jpg

#14 8 years ago

GUS

Plumonium

Pinside member

Thanks pintime!

I see that there is indeed a jump wire between the switches. Although, on mine, it looks like the jump wire goes through the GI as well.

What if I was connecting wire #2 to the lower eject hole switch (bridging the 2 switches through the GI socket) and connecting wire #3 to the other end of the GI socket? Could this cause any harm?

As a side note, before I realize the switch did not work anymore, the left side GI was also off. I found that the fuse to this side was the wrong one (again, the strange thing is everything worked fine before...) So I replace the fuse with the correct 5A SB. Would someone change the fuse to match a hack that has taken place where the bad switches are? Just thinking...

#15 8 years ago

GUS

Plumonium

Pinside member

Btw pintime, what the GI wires coming from the back board to the tea cup lamps look like? And also to the GI socket that I have hanging around.

#16 8 years ago

GUS

Plumonium

Pinside member

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/williams-system-11-issue-diner#post-1835483

I found a thread dealing with similar issues and great pictures, what do you guys make out of it?

#17 8 years ago

???

pintime

Pinside member

There should be no wires from GI circuit connected to switch circuit. The wires for the two 555 tea cup lights are very thin and prone to breakage. On my game I replaced them with 18 gauge and added a molex plug so i can remove the backboard .The socket hanging goes in playfield where you have the number 5 on your picture .I would connect the switches as ther shown in picturesimage.jpg

#18 8 years ago

GUS

Plumonium

Pinside member

Neat, thanks! Yeah I find that those GI wires are rubbing against the backboard and harness protector when raising the PF all the way... Pretty tight.

I'm not a expert a soldering yet, how would you go to do those repair? Right there everything in place, unscrew the switches to get some leverage, or remove the playfield all together?

#19 8 years ago

LTG

Pinside member

OP
Quoted from Plumonium:
I'm not a expert a soldering yet,

Practice at a table or workbench first. Youtube has lots of short how to videos to teach you how to flow solder.

Then move onto your game. I'd do it in the game.

LTG : )™

#20 8 years ago

TAB

terryb

Inactive member

Banning, CA

11y 90,150 4,795 14

OP
Quoted from Plumonium:
What if I was connecting wire #2 to the lower eject hole switch (bridging the 2 switches through the GI socket) and connecting wire #3 to the other end of the GI socket? Could this cause any harm?

There should be absolutely no connections between the GI circuit and the switch circuit--that wire needs to be removed or bad things will happen. Someone seriously messed up the previous work, so your problem is much bigger than a loose wire, you need to also undo the improper wiring. As said previously you need to identify the switch number and then figure out which color wires should go to it.

#21 8 years ago

???

pintime

Pinside member

Yes practice ,also a temperature controlled quality solder iron and good solder help . For lamp sockets that have multiple wires on them you may find it easier to twist all the wires together and tin them then add good amount of solder to terminal and solder them together .

#22 8 years ago

GUS

Plumonium

Pinside member

When come times to adding a wire to an existing connection, can I just eat up the existing connection and add the new wire in? I'm sure it's not the ideal but is it ok if the other wires hold in place?

I find I always run out of 1 hand when doing soldier, holding the iron, the soldier and the wires... What the trick really?

#23 8 years ago

???

pintime

Pinside member

If you can find a flat place on connector to add fresh solder you can add a new wire .Tin the new wire then heat the new solder on connector and as soon as the solder starts to melt add your new wire .The solder on connector and wire should melt together if they don't touch top of new wire with iron you should see the solder melt and get pulled to heat source. The key is time the longer you heat the connector the more likely it is you will melt solder holding existing wires and then they'll come off

#24 8 years ago

LTG

Pinside member

OP
Quoted from Plumonium:
can I just eat up the existing connection and add the new wire in?

Yes. Fresh solder on both, heat good so the solder flows, and you don't have a cold solder joint. ( one that can break easily ).

LTG : )™

#25 8 years ago

TSC

Bowlingpin

Pinside member

Nassau County, NY

9y 62,900 636 3 41

Don't hold the solder... Put that on before you are ready to put wire to switch/wire etc

Twist end of wire
Put solder on wire tip
Now use solder on tip to adhere to switch/wire

#26 8 years ago

GUS

Plumonium

Pinside member

Thanks! That's all good tips, looking forward the repair and I'll keep posting.

#27 8 years ago

GUS

Plumonium

Pinside member

Problem fixed! Everything's back in place where it should be. I must admit I had a hard time with some of the solder considering where those switch and sockets are on the playfield, my back is sore of bending inside the cab... I'm not the fastest to do soldering yet.

I'm glad I figured this one out and thanks for all your help, you guys are the best!

#28 8 years ago

LTG

Pinside member

OP
Quoted from Plumonium:
I'm not the fastest to do soldering yet.

You don't have to be the fastest. Be the bestest.

LTG : )™

#29 8 years ago

???

pintime

Pinside member

Good news enjoy your diner its a great game .You can see now why i put a molex plug on backboard GI lights .With the added plug I can disconnect everything thing on backboard and remove backboard to repair a light or remove tea cup .

#30 8 years ago

GUS

Plumonium

Pinside member