Well - I finally get to post. I'm the proud owner of my very first pin - MMR SE.

It's in shipping and scheduled to arrive on Monday. I'm pretty excited (as I'm sure you can imagine). I'll be making an unboxing/set-up video to share and hopefully can get things unpacked, set-up, and running fairly quickly. This is my first pin and I'm excited to have a NIB to start with.

Hello all - loving my MMR and I’m about 200 games into it. Some minor issues that I’m in the middle of resolving, but one major one that I’m wondering if anyone has advice on.

In the video above, you can see that my machine is looping the “lost ball” flasher on the back glass and goes into search mode when it drains. This happens during the entire game play. As soon as I launch and put a ball into the castle trough, the lightening “cow” flasher starts flashing and making the pulsing sounds. This continues through the entire ball. When it drains, it sometimes takes awhile, awards the bonus, and ejects that next ball. Other times, it takes while, initiates a full ball search and then completes.

I’m wondering if anyone has had this issue and found a fix? My initial thought is that there is a sensor inside the trough that isn’t tripping and acknowledging a ball. I really appreciate any help that anyone can provide.

Fixed!
I took a look under the playfield to make sure all was well - and, sure enough, the eject post for the trough was slightly askew and the sensor was not aligned. I reset it to the correct positon (alignment) and it is working well once again. How if got out of line I do not know, but I can keep an eye on it now.

Well... I "sort of" fixed my issue with constant ball search, but am still having some issues that I was wondering if anyone has insight into.

1) I no longer get the constant lightening flash/sound in the back-panel "cow-rider" image - so that's good.
2) However, sometimes in the moat - and more often on a drain - the system "loses" the ball in play, times out, does a ball search, and either ejects (moat) or adds bonus and progresses (drain)

I've removed/attached all the cables to these two areas to try and reset and I have been looking at the sensor on the moat to see if there is an alignment issue - to no avail yet.

I'm wondering about a couple of things that I can't seem to find the answer to on my own (hope someone knows here)

1) What/how is a drained ball "sensed" by the system? I assume that if I know how it's supposed to work then I can better troubleshoot it.
2) How does the system know that a ball is in play? Are there time-out adjustments that I'm missing in the menu? Other than free play and volume, I'm running this machine pretty much as a factory set-up.
3) Could either of these be related to incline or balance? I was pretty sure I had things set-up at factory recommendations, but this will be my weekend project - to triple-check the double-check that I did on levels and inclines.

Any help/direction is much appreciated. I'm new to pinball ownership, but generally not technically shy. I'm happy to learn.

Will do! They are super-helpful. I just don't want to bother them until I at least try to answer the issue myself. I was having a Switch issue as well and they were very fast in helping out. A new Switch should arrive any day.

I've put in a ticket on this as well, but also wanted to ask here - do all Switches pretty much work the same? I got a replacement for a failed Switch, but it's the wrong "side". I'm wondering if I can just drill two new holes under the playfield and attach it? (photos attached).

I'm probably just going to wait for the replacement of the replacement part - but I thought I would ask for my "future" pinball repair skills when this goes out of warranty.

PartWrongSide (resized).jpg

Awesome! Thanks everyone. I appreciate the advice. Being new, I didn't know how the switches worked and that they can be used interchangeably and remounted for left/right.

Can anyone provide some technical advice on the Merlin's Magic eject? Mine is working "okay", but occasionally the ball sticks in there and, in a worse case scenario, won't eject until a ball search. I know I can just contact Chicago for support, but I thought I would float it here for just some general pinball tech skills. Is there a maintenance task (or set of tasks) that I should be performing to take care of my machine? Things that need re-alignment/tightening... just general "stuff" that a good pinball owner should do?

If there is a "general guide to pinball maintenance" I'd love a link! - I'm trying to figure things out as a new owner.

Thanks! - I did take a look and that little switch seem "loose" so there's my starting point - I appreciate the help!