Can u identify these mystery wires? (System 1)

There are 4 unattached "mystery" wires on a Totem (System 1) I'm working on. The game works perfectly, however.

* 3 green/yellow wires terminate on the ground plane. 2 of them stop adjacent to the small transformer; 1 stops adjacent to the large transformer (see pix). Based on the length and bends in the wires, it would appear they originated on the transformers. Also, these wires are all bundled in the original stringing, so they do not appear to be later add-ons.

* 1 solid green wire comes off the right-hand lug of the right-hand bridge rectifier and goes to an unattached wire connector.

FYI: this machine has previously been updated with a Rottendog power supply and Niwumph board. It does not have a sound board installed.

I've checked the Totem manual, but it does not go into this level of detail.

Any guidance would be appreciated.

Mystery wire 1&2 (resized).jpg
Mystery wire 3 (resized).jpg
Mystery wire 4 (resized).jpg

#2 6 years ago

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ForceFlow

Green wires with yellow stripe are ground.

The transformers usually have a terminal connector with a green-yellow wire screwed down on one of the mounting brackets. Are those wires present? If not, those might be for grounding the case of the transformers.

Also, it kind of looks like those wires aren't factory. Maybe that was someone's idea of a grounding mod for the circuit boards?

#3 6 years ago

???

jaybird5619

Pinside member

Neither transformer has a grounding wire attached. So, the stray green/yellow wires must go to the transformers. But why 3 wires (since only 2 transformers) and any idea why someone would have cut them (they are cut clean -- no exposed wire or lugs are attached.)

#4 6 years ago

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ForceFlow

Example photo of where one of the ground wires attach to the transformer:

20150109241719464 (resized).jpg

OP
Quoted from jaybird5619:
any idea why someone would have cut them (they are cut clean -- no exposed wire or lugs are attached.)

No idea. People sometimes do strange things to games when they don't know what they're doing.

OP
Quoted from jaybird5619:
But why 3 wires

The third wire has a crimped connection on it. It doesn't make sense to me to do that, so I have no idea.

But, there is a ground wire soldered to the EMI filter, so maybe that's where it's supposed to go?

20150124195404981 (resized).jpg

#5 6 years ago

???

jaybird5619

Pinside member

Thanks for the photos (man, that's one clean wiring board!). I definitely do NOT have the ground connections you show. I'm going to go ahead and connect them to the transformers (but not the one coming from the rectifier). I traced all 3 green/yellow wires back to the ground plane, so I don't think I'm risking anything.

#6 6 years ago

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ForceFlow

OP
Quoted from jaybird5619:
man, that's one clean wiring board!

It sure didn't start out that way

OP
Quoted from jaybird5619:
but not the one coming from the rectifier

Is it actually coming from the rectifier?

Is there a green-yellow wire attached to the middle pole of the EMI filter?

#7 6 years ago

???

jaybird5619

Pinside member

1). Yes, the solid green wire is soldered directly to the rectifier. Where you have 3 solid red wires coming from your rectifier, I have 3 white-gray-red AND the solid green (which ends in a crimped connector).

2). There is no green-yellow attached to middle pole of EMI filter.

3). I found another cut yellow-green wire by the knocker -- sure seems like someone went through and intentionally de-grounded this machine.

Also, this machine was manufactured for France. I can't imagine that would affect the need to ground everything, but just FYI.

IMG_0033 (resized).JPG

IMG_0034 (resized).JPG

IMG_0032 (resized).JPG

#8 6 years ago

TEB

homebrood

Pinside+ Frequent

Glenview, IL

17y 81,300 1,309 12 10

OP
Quoted from jaybird5619:
1). Yes, the solid green wire is soldered directly to the rectifier.
Also, this machine was manufactured for France. I can't imagine that would affect the need to ground everything, but just FYI.

The fact that it was wired for france might explain some wiring differences, and perhaps this was part of a conversion for 110v power?

#9 6 years ago

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ForceFlow

Quoted from homebrood:
The fact that it was wired for france might explain some wiring differences, and perhaps this was part of a conversion for 110v power?

There's no reason to remove grounding no matter what the incoming voltage is.

OP
Quoted from jaybird5619:
1). Yes, the solid green wire is soldered directly to the rectifier. Where you have 3 solid red wires coming from your rectifier, I have 3 white-gray-red AND the solid green (which ends in a crimped connector).

Huh. Very strange.

OP
Quoted from jaybird5619:
2). There is no green-yellow attached to middle pole of EMI filter.

You need a wire going from the middle pole to the grounding strip, otherwise the game will not actually be grounded to anything.

OP
Quoted from jaybird5619:
3). I found another cut yellow-green wire by the knocker -- sure seems like someone went through and intentionally de-grounded this machine.

That wire is probably for the metal plate housing power switch (which is hidden under the black plastic cover).

#10 6 years ago

???

jaybird5619

Pinside member

Hmmm.... Is there any danger of me re-connecting them (I double-checked and all the green-yellow wires go back to the grounding plane). Or am I better to let sleeping dogs lie?

#11 6 years ago

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ForceFlow