OK, so I haven't had too many problems with my LOTR since I've owned it but, now I'm up against a strange one. When I go to DTR and the ring holds the first ball sending out a second one to knock it out with, the second ball fails to knock the first out. Instead, it gets stuck right behind the first ball in the ring. This has now happened to me twice during gameplay and once now after I took the glass off to test. Even with the glass off and I sailed the ball up the ramp at furious speed, the ball gets stuck again behind the first. I eventually pushed them both through and it kept them both in play. I kept sending balls up the ring ramp and it finally registered a DTR but, without knowing a locked ball out.

So, my questing (besides WTF) is has anyone else ran into this problem and if so, what was the resolve? is there some sort of opto back there that is failing to register? Thanks in advance for any input that my fellow Pinsider's can offer here.

Well, worst case I can set it to one ball. Is that what most LOTR owners are doing?

I have not had this issue until recently so, I wonder what changed. I thought it was flipper strength as well the first time this occurred so, I rebuilt them but the problem is still there. If fact on my test (with glass off) I flung the ball as hard as I could get away with and it still stuck there. It was sort of cool knocking the first ball out. Seems like there should be a way to fix it so, it works like before.

I checked all my switches in the ring and they are all working. So, what I ended up discovering is that my spinner was bent outward some (not very noticeable) so that the balls going up the ramp were contacting the underside of it and slowing their ascent into the ring. I never realized it before as it made it up their when I needed but, not enough to dislodge the locked ball from the ring on DTR. I bent it back to where their is a slight inward tilt and now the ball zips right up there and the spinner really spins fast. I believe this has resolved my original issue. If funny how you get used to a problem and fail to notice it until it starts to effect something major.

Also, during my probing I discovered there is a flasher behind the ring! It was burnt of course so, I replaced it with a red one. I don't think this had worked since I owned the game so a little bonus.

Same here. I like LOTR better with plain old bulbs (at least for the GI). The movies have a darkish tone to them so, it seems like the pins should as well.