Quoted from Mcchris:Hi. I'm a new Black knight owner in the middle of a semi restore. The game has been in my family for about the last 18 years. It was purchased from an arcade shop and stayed in my parents basement until about 5 years ago when my brother took it and now I have it. It's only every been serviced by the shop it was purchased from but I think that's all of 2 or 3 fixes, not maintenance. So basically it hasn't been hacked up.
I took most of the playfield apart to give it a good cleaning and polishing, replaced all rubbers and polished all ramp metals. I replaced all of the lights with LEDs, replaced all of the fuses in the game with the appropriate fuses. The game turned right on, when right into attract and played fine with the exception of the upper right flipper that seemed to bind in the coil.
I decided to just rebuild all 4 flippers and then had to replace the 2 upper flipper coils as well. I added the new coils in wire by wire with the old coil hanging to make sure I wired them in correctly. Everything seemed to be working just fine. I followed VIDs guides here and also adjusted all EOS switches.
Now after playing the game I'm noticing some peculiar behavior, the flippers get weaker as you play and after about 2 games, the right magnet stops working, all other switches and drop targets, pop bumper, sounds, scoring and everything works just fine. It almost seems to me that the game isn't quite getting enough power consistently. If I turn the game off and let it sit for an hour, come back, everything works, flippers are decently strong, not quite as strong as I think they should be, but the magnet works again.
I've purchased a cap kit for the power supply but haven't installed yet, I don't trust my soldering skills quite enough yet, My father-in-law is gonna do the board work for me. If everything is working, would it help? I was going to start with replacing cabinet flipper switches but when the magnet issue popped up I thought maybe something else was awry.
Any thoughts on where to look next?
If the EOS isn't opening at full flipper stroke, the high power coil will stay energized, overheating the coil making things bind up. Next time your flippers get weak, turn off the game, raise the PF and feel the flipper coils to see if they are hot. Adjust the EOS so it is gaped 1/16" at full stroke. Do not measure by pushing the flipper bat, but by pushing on the pawl into the coil.
Newcastle, OK
