the first ball lifts when all 8 balls are in the ball trough. You need 1-1/8" diameter bingo balls in the game or the leftmost ball won't push down the 8th ball trough rollover and complete the circuit to the ball lifter.

there's other possible problems tho, so the easiest thing is reset the game and if no ball comes up, manually step up the timer unit once and see what happens. If still no ball lifts, the problem is elsewhere in the circuit.

the shutter closes when the second ball is lifted - timer unit steps to the second step - so you need to get the ball lifting working first.

what relay are you opening to make a ball lift?

the relay on the bottom of the playfield is the lifter start relay. When that's powered, the ball lift motor will NOT turn on.

lifting the ball gate flap at the top of the runway/shooter lane should unpower the lifter start relay. However, if the lifter start relay is powering as soon as you turn on the game, the only thing it can be (except a short) is the ball runway switch is stuck closed.

the ball runway switch is under the rollover wire directly in front of the shooter. Usually what happens is someone lowers the playfield onto the front of the cabinet and mashes the switch blades together. The runway switch should only be closed when a ball is sitting on the rollover.