Sometimes the breaks in the wires cannot be seen, because the conductor is broken inside the insulation. You can try connecting an ohm meter at each end of the wires and wiggling everything to see if you get any breaks in continuity. Another thing you can try is this. Look for and bends or crimps in the wire and give it a firm tug. If the wire inside is broken, the insulation will snap in two.

I just worked on a LOTR with this very issue, where one of the wires had actually separated inside the insulation. The switch would work just fine when the wire was loose, but as soon as it went taut, it would stretch the wire apart inside the insulation causing the switch to become flakey. Anyways, I just completely replaced both wires to the connector and switch and it solved my issue.

I have a similar but different problem with the Balrog. My flasher doesn't work and I've traced it to the orange (hot) wire inside the bundle. Oddly enough the bundle for the flasher has two larger gauge wires and two smaller gauge wires, the former being used for the flasher. The switch uses the striped wires. Both connect to the IDC connector under the playfield.

My follow-up question is -- did you just remove the wires from the IDC connector and then force new wires down into it? IIRC there is a special tool to put wires in IDC connectors. Is there something (like a screwdriver) that will work in lieu of the tool?

Keith,

I have the tool for punching down into the IDC connector if you want to come by and borrow it. You can do it with other things, but the tool works best.

Prosedsp, glad you got it fixed! KiethinMI, there should be nothing wrong with the IDC connection. Just cut the wire farther up, strip, twist, solder and wrap it up. That should do it!

I know I could do that and it'd work fine. Just wanted to run a new bundle from flasher to connector so it doesn't look like it was hacked. Silly, perhaps, but since judremy is going to be kind and lend me his idc tool, why not have it be a brand new wire flasher to connector. I think this time, to replace it, I'm going to use some wire that has more strands so it's a bit more flexible. That should prevent the problem from happening ever again.

Oh, slightly o/t but I got my 10.0 roms to replace the 4.01/4.03 pair that was in there. The machine is pretty much completely different now. What an amazing difference six major iterations of the firmware makes