This has been happening pretty often lately. When the ball exits through the far left exit, the game resets and the intro music plays and the score goes to 500. Could anyone with some early solid state Bally pinball knowledge give me some pointers of what to check first? The wiring harness could be at fault---I've already re-seated all of the cables to fix a problem where the down direction lamp wouldn't light.

Any suggestions for bullet proofing this machine would be useful too. I have a new Ultimate Lamp Board on the way.

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This is a good suggestion. I've done this on my Williams arcade games and it's helped quite a bit. Is there a preferred source for connectors and pins? I assume the caps you're referring to are on the Solenoid Driver Board?

I found this link: https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/vids-guide-quick-bally-driver-board-repair-bulletproofing which I may have used when I was working on my Xenon about 3 years ago--I can't remember!

Well you win the prize.

If the first drop target on the left is dropped, and the outlane switch engages--a credit is applied to the machine. This either adds additional players or starts a fresh game somehow.

If it's a short in the harness that's a lot of wire to traverse...

There is a diode on that outramp switch... should I replace it?

This explains everything. I suppose there is always a missing piece to the story when we complain about a failure. This is mine: When I bought this machine the coin components had been completely stripped out of the coin door. Naturally, I rebuilt it from scratch using guts from another door or two. I never installed any diodes on ANY of the coin switches.

Now I'm off to my spare parts to see if I even had the right diodes...

Thank you very much for your help.

EDIT: Disconnecting the coin door confirms the outramp switch and drop target work as designed. Have to take a look at my wiring on the coin door.

̶I̶ ̶a̶d̶d̶e̶d̶ ̶d̶i̶o̶d̶e̶s̶ ̶t̶o̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶c̶o̶i̶n̶ ̶s̶w̶i̶t̶c̶h̶e̶s̶ ̶a̶n̶d̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶p̶r̶o̶b̶l̶e̶m̶ ̶w̶a̶s̶ ̶s̶o̶l̶v̶e̶d̶.̶

Spoke too soon. It's just my "expert" wiring made it so the stuck switch moved to another drop/switch combo.

I ordered a new wiring harness for the coin door and put it in yesterday. I wanted to make sure my MacGyvered wiring on the old door wasn't at fault. It isn't. But I've got a whole host of switch issues with this machine right now so I'll have to reserve the solution for this thread until I get those figured out.

Thanks everyone for the support and help.

When I wired in the new coin door harness I started getting other switch problems. Including when I engaged the left flipper--points were added to the board. (triggering that outlane switch again). So I started from scratch with the assumption that the problem was likely in the most recent change: The Coin Door.

Troubleshooting:

- I ran the self-test and switch 1 was stuck. I ran it a few times and it showed number 9 (Coin switch 3) was stuck intermittently.
- I disconnect coin switch 3.
- Ran self-test again. Switch 11 is stuck (coin switch 2).

Seeing as 9 and 11 were the two switches I added, I finally started to put two and two together. It turns out that I when I wired this coin door up nearly three years ago, I did it by sight--not by reading anything important like where the NC (Normally Closed) and/or NO (Normally Open) terminals were on each switch. I had assumed they were all made the same. So up until this point I didn't look at the actual specifications of the switches.

Turns out the original switch on the coin door was:

Coin Switch 1: COM - NC - NO

The other two switches are:

Coin Switch 2: COM - NO - NC
Coin Switch 3: COM - NO - NC

I had inadvertently wired the Common to the Normally Closed terminal on coin switch 2 and 3. I believe I was basically bridging the current which was affecting the rest of the switch matrix.

All I needed to do was move strobe wire for switch 9 (coin switch 3) and 11 (Coin switch 2) to the NO terminal and things started behaving properly.

Switch self-test checks out OK now.

No more wonky resets. Flipper and outlane operations normal.

Leaving these links here for additional help (I used them in my search for the solution):
Mr. and Mrs. Pac-Man Switch Matrix Troubleshooting Tips:

Pinball Rehab's infamous Switch Matrix Theory and Troubleshooting Guide: http://pinballrehab.com/1-articles/solid-state-repair/repair-guides/146-switch-matrix-theory-and-troubleshooting I actually didn't make it past the section entitled "Human Error."