I am going to get the text up in here first and then add the images in over the next two days.

So you got yourself a fancy new PF and it wasn’t dimpled. If you’re like me you may have had a fainting spell and consumed mass amounts of alcohol to deal with this unforeseen hiccup in your restoration process. If you’re normal, you probably just cussed a lot and shook a fist or two.

Either way, we got to get er done. When I asked my local bros about what to do, many brushed it off as no big deal. Most having done it before, but for me this was unchartered territory. I know my limitations and this definitely falls within those. 

It is not an understatement to say this caused me massive amounts of stress and worry. I am a perfectionist and the great unknown is not something I embrace. That being said, for better or worse, I did it and I would like to share what I learned with you. So perhaps I can save someone from making the mistakes that I did or simply making the process a little less intimidating.



If you receive a PF and it is not dimpled you have three options that I am aware of open to you.

Options One: Save yourself the stress, the worry and the damage to you liver and PF by contacting kruzman as he offers a dimpling service.

Option Two: If your old PF is beat to heck and you don’t plan on selling it, use that as a template by clamping the two PF’s together and drilling straight through from your old PF to the new.

Option Three: If you want to save your old PF to resell and recover some of your costs you can make a template using wax paper, frisket or other materials.

Below I will walk you through the options and try and address things that may come up.

Buckle up my little Pinsiders, this is going to be a long ride. 



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Option One: Is by far the simplest and great for those of you that lack a sense of adventure. Simply drop kruzman a line, and send that baby off to be dimpled. Then you can spend all of the time you saved with the wife and kids, picking flowers, writing that novel that you always talk about, or whatever it is you do in your spare time.


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Option Two: Is slightly more complicated. Great for those that like adventure, but not too much adventure. Like mocking sharks from outside the aquarium glass. 

Please note that this method does not allow for heating the clear coat on your new PF and may result in cracking of said clear.

Option Two, Stage One: Prepping your old PF.

Tools For PF Prep (if you old PF underside has been stripped you can skip most of this and just get right to the sanding):

Hammer, Block of Wood, Lock Nut For Pop Bumpers, Pliers (for removing staples), Small Flat Head Screw Driver (for removing T-Nuts), Orbital Or Other Sander.



The first thing we need to do is to clear off the underside of your old PF as we don’t want to gouge or scratch our fancy new one with leftover debris.



Step One: Remove any and all pop bumper nails. You do this by threading the lock nut to the end of the nail, placing the block of wood over it and giving it a solid whack. This is a great way to get out some of your frustrations over your non dimpled PF. All in all just one whack should do, but if you like whacking feel free to whack as long and as much as you like.

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Step Two: Remove any T-Nuts from the underside. You can take a post and hammer out from the topside, but I find they are easy to dislodge with a small flat head screwdrivers and it causes less damage to the underside.



Step Three: Remove any staples or other metallic debris remaining on the PF. A simple tug with some pliers of whatever you prefer should suffice.



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Step Four: With your PF free from bits, it’s a good idea to give it a nice sanding to remove any of the rough stuff. Sure the new PF is cleared, but why risk scratching the new surface by not taking the extra few minutes to sand. I used a 120 grit paper and it cleaned up fine.

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Option Two, Stage Two: Getting Down With It



With your old PF prepped it’s time to line old and new together and clamp.


Tools Needed: Clamps (at least four), Power Drill, 3/32 Bit (for #6 hex screws and posts), Bit Clamp to Mark Depth (or paint pen to manually mark), Bolt Guide, Plastic Sheeting (if you don’t want to take any risks with scratches and gouges).

Step One: Lining up the two PF’s. Roughly align your top and bottom PF, don’t go crazy dialing it in, we just want them sort of aligned, install the clamps in the four corners. Putting these on before the PF’s are aligned will reduce risk of dislodging them afterwards. This way we’ll just have to tighten down the clamps when we are finished. 



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Step Two: Dialing in the two PF’s. If you’re like me, your first instinct may be to try and line up the top and sides of the PF’s. This is a mistake, as the PF’s may not be square or may have used different data points. Instead, work on lining up major landmarks (drilled holes, inserts, etc).

The majority of the dimples are for the posts, guides, etc. that interact with the components that the holes and routed areas are cut for. So when drilling the dimples, it is essential that we work off of these major landmarks and not arbitrary borders and boundaries of artwork or PF.



Once the PF’s are lined up and your major landmarks check out, tighten up your clamps. When finished go back and verify that everything is still in line. 





Step Three: Take your bolt guide and go around the old PF to get an idea of the various sized holes that we’ll need to dimple. For most of the Williams system 11’s you’ll need to make pilots for #6 hex screws and #6 posts. I know some like using a 7/64 bit for these, but I prefer to err on the side of caution and use a slightly smaller 3/32. 



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Step Four: We are going to need to determine the depth of our drilling. Take your drill bit and measure the distance of the old PF, and depth you want to drill on new PF and mark the bit. I have had little luck with the clamps and prefer to just mark the bit itself with tape, marker or paint.



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Step Five: It’s time to drill baby drill. It’s pretty straight forward, insert your bit into existing hole and drill down until you are at the correct depth. Rinse and repeat.
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Tada, you now have a dimpled PF.

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Option Three: Adventure Level: Diving into shark tank covered in SPAM AKA For those that hate themselves, happiness or just life in general. 



This is the method that I “embraced”. I personally went with a .33 MM thick plastic sheet that I sourced from a local art supply store. It cost a bit more than wax or tracing paper, but was far more rigid and IMO better for accuracy.



Option Three, Stage One: Making a template out of our old PF.



Tools and Materials Needed: Power Drill, 3/32 Bit (for #6 hex screws and posts), Bolt Guide and/or Circle Guide, Plastic Sheeting or Wax Paper, Marker (that will work on your template material), Painter’s Tape, Calipers

Step One: Line up your sheeting with your old PF, and tape in place. Once taped mark your top and sides to use as a reference.



Step Two: Mark your major physical landmarks (mechanism holes or routed areas) My first instinct was to mark the outlines of the artwork which was absolutely useless and will result in misplaced pilot holes/dimples. 

The position of the dimples we are creating have little to nothing to do with the PF artwork. They are there to work in conjunction with the major mechanisms.



Step Three: With your major landmarks outlined, it is time to start marking the dimples. The method will vary with the type of material you are making your template out of. This is another reason why I chose thicker plastic sheeting as opposed to tracing paper.



With wax or tracing paper one would take their hole guide and simply go over each existing hole with a marker or pen. 

With the thicker plastic sheet I was able to drill out the holes IMO making for a more accurate template.

Again take your bolt or you hole guide, lay it down over the existing hole, center your drill in it and drill through the plastic and into the exiting hole on your old PF. 

Using the bolt guide allows for better control over the bit. There is less room to deviate which is welcomed given my unsteady hands. Rinse and repeat until finished.



When you have all of your dimples drilled out flip over the template and unlike the state of FL remove any hanging chads. For accuracy’s sake we want the template to be flat as flat as possible and we don’t want any scratchy bits under there.



With the chads removed I went around with my calipers and did random checks between my template and my old PF. Measuring the distance between the dimples and the components they are associated with. All of my marks were pretty spot on so I felt as comfortable as I could moving forward.


All in all it took me less than thirty minutes to crank out my template like this. It was definitely easier than I thought it would be.

Option Three, Stage Two: Dimpling Our New PF (Adventure Level Bananas) 



Tools Needed: Power Drill with Brand New 3/32 Bits or For The Faint Of Heart A Pokey Dimple Thingy AKA Awl (for making indentations), Heat Gun or Hair Dryer, Painters Tape, Bolt or Hole Guide



Step One: We need to line up our template with our new PF. Again we are focusing on the major physical landmarks and not arbitrary borders of the PF or artwork. Once you feel like you have your template alined onto your new PF tape in place.



Step Two: We now come to the choose your own adventure portion of this project. For those that question their work and don’t want to risk turning their new PF into Swiss Cheese, I would recommend using an awl or something similar to mark the location for the pilots. 

For people like me, who like to throw caution to the wind and that maybe don’t like to think things through, I would recommend your handy dandy drill with 3/32 bit. Because who doesn’t love a $750 swiss cheese PF.



Regardless of what option you choose I would again recommend laying down you bolt guide, lining it up with the template hole, heating the area with a hair dryer or heat gun and marking the location with weapon of your choice. 

If you are drilling you don’t need to go deep at all maybe 1 MM. If you don’t trust yourself enough, mark your drill bit using a marker, tape, paint, etc 



Again Rinse and Repeat until finished.

So there you have it. If you are like me you probably spent a good deal of the time drinking and questioning your poor life choices. If you are a more rational human being you probably embraced the challenge and feel wicked good about a job well done.

Feel free to chime in here peeps. This was written off of my experience. I posted as I know a few others that are in the same boat with their PF’s. 


It wasn't the best day, but I did manage. If I had the extra $$$ I probably would have gone for option one myself, but I was already living beyond my means with this restoration.

I know there are a few others in my boat that will also need to get this done so I wanted to do a more thorough outline than what I provided in my restoration thread.

It's a step by step guide on what to do if the topside of your PF has not been marked or dimpled. There are a few of us going through this right now. I wanted to get the text up, and am doing my best to get the photos up in the next two days.

No problem, not everyone has the skills or time to do this themselves. Doing a basic swap is stressful enough, factor in having to mark and dimple the topside while trying not to turn your new PF into a pin cushion or wrecking the clear pushed me to my limits. No greater fear than destroying your beautiful new PF. If I had the extra dollars I would have sent this off to have you do it.

You're welcome. I learned a lot doing this. Things came up that I wouldn't have thought of (and didn't). I tried to outline it all as best as I could so the rest of you would have an easier go when it comes time to do your swap.

Thanks Blake. It was definitely hairy there for a while. I am looking forward to populating the PF and seeing how I did.

Feel free to drop me a line if you have any questions that weren't addressed here.

Yesterday while working on dimpling the bottoms side of my PF I once again had difficulty getting the top half of the PF (above spinner discs) and bottom half to line up. When I did the first template I had this issue and thought perhaps it was sloppiness on my part. I even lined up my old and new PF and didn't see anything amiss.

Yesterday when it happened again I decided to lay the new PF on top of the old and then the issue became apparent. There are very clear physical differences. This is something to keep in mind when deciding which method you use. It made me glad I went with Option 3 using a plastic template versus using the old PF as a template.

I will edit above accordingly to let folks know.

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This was an error in the production process. There is not a lot that can be done post clear.

As per the perfectly aligned, even Williams made mistakes. The big problem that I ran into which I will add up top is that there is a good bit of deviation from my old PF to the new. As others have commented Williams would contract out different companies so deviation was normal. That being said, it's also why it's a good idea to dimple from factory and original data points. My data points were different than CPR's. I have hit a couple of snags during the re-population as a result.

Another member mentioned that thread to me yesterday. Hoping to give it a read today.

Agreed, I just finished the HEP Tax thread. It's going to make the rest of my swap easier.