Funny how this only happens at around 100 million, seriously though, the mechanism is a bit grindy and I think if it's not completely plumb little metal burs form on the shaft they restrict it from starting. For now I put a little grease on the shaft.

You can find them here: https://www.pingraffix.com/product-page/alien-pinball-mini-jaw-mod

anything NIB for under 10K now IS a steal..fml

Yup. One of the best deals I ever got. No taxes and under $500 shipping so just over 8k delivered.

It's cool, but I am not paying that price..lol Is it molded out of platinum?

close ....silver...

Thanks for the compliment and congrats on scoring a super deal on your Alien. It's 8.5dwt of s.silver plus the cost of caster and the polisher. If it was in platinum it would be between 4 to 500. If platinum is your thing and you're interested hit me up.

Now we are talking...At first I thought it was just a 3d printed plastic thing, price is justified now....lol

I think its been mentioned on here before - but is it confirmed that pulling power from the CPU USB port is a no-no? I want to just add some 5v LED lighting and it would just be super easy to use the USB port?

I also was shocked how expensive this is. Just way more than my budget for something like that!

As it turns out on the top of the ramp where the bend is the width narrowed. Bent it back out and it's shooting up better than ever. Now I know all those rejects wasn't totally my fault.

No harm in that at all. Your totally fine.

Those nights you waste 3 hours trying to program chips thinking you ordered chip A when in fact you ordered chip B doh...

This is a disputed topic. I would highly recommend not using the USB for power. Multiple people have reported that they have experienced problems when doing so. Not worth the risk.

And there is probably 10 times the amount of people plugged into it right now with no problems. I don’t vividly remember each post here but honestly don’t recall anyone having an actual issue from plugging in led lights to the USB. I’ve literally done that on almost every game I own and have never had an issue.

You make your own choices of course. You do you.

As soon as i tried my machine locked up.... but i was a very early run, so maybe they addressed it. I went with separate power supply for mods but that is me to each his own.

Not true. You will start to get random reboots because the usb port gets hot. Ask me how I know this.

I've not had this at all and I have a early run game. Now, I don't know that I would recommend plugging into the outbox, but the PC usb's should be fine. If you're getting reboots because of pulling 5v from that, you've got other issues. I have 2 5v USB strips plugged into the PC since I've had it.

I will caveat saying that the LV's seem to have a lot of hardware changes in them, so YMMV.

No other issues. After I unplugged the 2 led strips from the usb ports the problem went away. I instead got a y splitter that I plugged into the cord that plugs into the PSU and put a power strip inside the cab that has usb port power 2. I plug in the 2 led strips and my pinstadiums into the power strip and now also have a service outlet for my soldering tools.
A lot cheaper than having to replace the computer on Alien down the line for over heating..

https://www.monoprice.com/product?p_id=41094&utm_term=&utm_campaign=PMax:+Smart+Shopping+Monoprice+-+Power+%26+Surge+Cables&utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&hsa_acc=6614305189&hsa_cam=17499847838&hsa_grp=&hsa_ad=&hsa_src=x&hsa_tgt=&hsa_kw=&hsa_mt=&hsa_net=adwords&hsa_ver=3&gclid=Cj0KCQjw2cWgBhDYARIsALggUhrZLwHhsEiPNbAEUwEK0-5pB_dtPl-7FVHBqqF2xJKEhZjvakpQIkAaAq2MEALw_wcB

I know we've went through this before, but you are not going to burn up the pc by plugging in 5v to the USB for an item sized for USB. It simply isn't going to happen unless the items are faulty. I can't speak to what you plugged into it (or maybe you have a different model pc?), but if it caused you to reboot, there's something else causing it. If the PC was lacking the power to power it from the USB, the item would simply flash on and off or not work at all. You aren't going to overheat the PC other than heat form lights in general...and again, if that's the case, you got bigger issues. I would actually guess that your issue was probably more related to a bug in the software at the time.

Pinstadiums? I doubt you would want to do that but I think those are 12v expected and more amps? I've never used them.

Now, all that being said, I'm not leaving my game on for 12 hours a day (although I did leave it on for 3 days straight for bug testing). I do not disagree that the proper way to do it is to pull from the PSU. I just think the FUD around the USB ports needs to be addressed.

Can someone post a couple pics of their playfield where the ramps drop the ball? I am wanting to compare my playfields dimpling with others who have had their machines longer. I have about 50 plays on my SV so far. I did put Mylar under the ramp drops last night.

This game dimples, and it shows.

True statement. I can deal with it dimples I just wasn’t sure what would be considered extreme. On my Sterns they don’t seem to stand out as much under ramp drops. I guess it could be the glossy black that make them seem more noticeable

I wonder if it shows more because of the greater percentage of solid black on the pf? I never pay much attention to it because it happens on all of my pins.

Yeah, I think it's the shiny black and the way the light hits it that makes it more noticeable. I'm not sure if it is more about the black or the solid color though.

I put a square of Mylar under the ramp drops maybe that will help a bit

So how many of these Alien LV's are effected by this issue? I am a little worried about getting mine now?

We had one. Tried to take the glass out and it fell on the playfield.They said it expanded during shipping... Another cabinet was sent to us. The second cabinet seems okay so far. We also bought a second game. This one was fine (as far as the glass and cabinet). They both seem to freeze quite often even after several updates. I imagine it will all get sorted. They do pretty well in earnings. Everyone of our regulars seem to be pretty understanding.

That is good to know if I get a bad cab they will send me a new one.

So long as it's populated.

Had just a few harness, buttons, switches, we had to port over the playfield, back box, legs power supply, woofer, coin door and pc. Took less than an hour with two of us. Maybe just at an hour. Seemed fast.

I just tried this with my arduino nano and it sometimes messes up the xeno grabbing the ball, and even extending the tongue. Gonna use a buck converter and tap into something else. Unfortunate that the usb ports can’t be used for bus power.

Here is the current rev of my sentry gun mod.

Interesting. Was this with something running off of it? Those g90 servos pull quite a bit of mA spikes. I'm going to run a buck converter as well for all the crap I'm doing, was testing it all tonight actually.

Also yours is an LV right?

Edit: Most computer USB 2 ports supply maximum current of 0.5A, USB3 (which I don't believe any of the monitor or cab USB are) is .9A and a single g90 pulls around ~600mA top end, so 2 of them would take you over the .5 considerably.

I’m running the arduino nano, and split the servos onto one channel. I’ll reply to your email when I get to my computer. I kinda like the other guy’s idea of splitting the A/C power, before the computer, then running a power strip like he did. I can tell that it’s messing up the xeno at times, when my game has been flawless since tonight’s usb insertion.
EDIT:::: After a few other games, the main screen went black..so definitely not a good idea to put any load on the usb ports..maybe a small string of lights, but after what I witnessed, I'm keeping those slots unused..I unplugged the guns, and the game ran flawless again..and this is the LV #61 (pictured in the video above).

Sterns have mylar at ramp drops and the entire inlane these days. My LV was cluttered with dimples at the ramp drops from factory play testing. Just put a square of mylar there and you'll be fine.

I've designed a wedge that can be 3D printed for the defect cabs. I'm going to test it in mine first and put it on Thingiverse if it works. $0.44 worth of filament. I can't be asked to swap cabs when it's a $1 fix. The thinner and lesser AR glass is going in the trash though lol.

The audits are fucked. You have to add coins left and coins right and divide by four. It gives you a crazy inflated dollar amount on its own. I told PB about this and they said they'd get right on it. That was around 8 months ago.

They also will not make me a fucking DBA harness.

I have voodoo on all my games but the standard glass on alien is super quality so ar glass is not needed! When you pull the standard glass it just feels super quality with those sanded edges!

Yeah that is what i was getting at. Those servos draw more amps than the port can handle. Not like a string of lights designed for a USB port.

That is cool AF, man. I'd be down for one of those if you're offering. I like the ammo boxes and cable that moves, nice touch

Unless someone decides to 3D print those guns that's going to be tough. There's a few versions out there, but they are few and far between and costly to tear apart. Those guns are premade toys.

Sorry to sound totally dumb (I definitely am when it comes to anything electrical), but just to be clear, you simply tapped off the power to the internal psu with that Y splitter, then added a regular power strip/board (with usb outputs) inside the cab? If so did you need a mains socket adapter like this one (imagine its for a US plug, not an Australian one):

https://www.jaycar.com.au/iec-c14-male-to-3pin-mains-socket-150mm/p/PS4100?gclid=CjwKCAjw_MqgBhAGEiwAnYOAei1jbjFG8tOaL_xINbgiMLHKv-bWu9Rg62kBae4dq4E0mMWPGrf_bhoCwoEQAvD_BwE

Thanks!

Putting a splitter on the incoming PSU cord will result in an outlet that's always on.

It's quite easy to put a switched outlet on the game. Just cut off the male end of of an extension cord, strip the hot/neutral/ground wires, then piggyback onto the PSU hot/neutral/ground terminals.

0E1B2265-8AF9-4A34-A573-079A70B08F11 (resized).jpeg

...because you need some extra wattage for this.

DE93AE99-7817-499C-833C-CA38D7934768 (resized).jpeg

It's the united States, i heard you don't need no stinkin' power switches.

Not really clear what you got going on there. Is that backglass screen split?

Yes - the one feature I missed about the Heighway version was the playfield screen, so I mirrored the main screen on the apron to get some of that immersion back.

4D491D1D-11BF-402D-84EC-1F77ADC7D4D2 (resized).jpeg

If we didn't already have that awesome apron...you could almost cut it into the center (or maybe use a bare LCD screen and mount it under/thru!)

And......how did we do that???
Getting my LV in week or two. That mod is awesome.