Please, please save them! No matter how bad they are at least salvage some parts!
I'm of the folks who love digging through and finding wrecks like that!

It's a great feeling knowing that even though those games have suffered a fate worse than death, they can save other games and pieces of it can still live on.

I, as well as others in this thread I'm sure, enjoy the fun and excitement that comes with buying some junk and picking out gems.

Also a bit of a side note, but you should try recording any serial numbers of those games you can and putting them on the IPSND. I notice not many people do this it seems, even when they have games in great shape for years. I have come across just a few games that were just scraps and parts, and I record their numbers and try to indicate "yep it existed and now it's gone."
Not sure how anyone else feels about that, I'd love to hear some opinions.

Todd is a hero! Even when I first started a few months ago I saw that video and was like "WTF?!!?1"
and now I watch TNT every day and love them! Those guys fight the hard fight with the games they get in and Todd's running a business to make money!! He could take a dump in every cabinet he gives away if he wanted to! But he doesn't because he knows that nowadays people will fight for just the scraps and he helps out when he can!

At least it was a lot of crapper games too, nothing horribly rare. Not like those guys who smashed up the Star-Jet!

OMFG SPACE JAM! Gimme! :b Who wants the JP? we can split shipping

Very guilty. I don't get why people hate that movie. It was really corny and charming!

Thank you for saving it! If you don't want that BG let me know, it would make decent wall art

The rest of the side art is stuck in the future!

This is depressingly funny because that naval base was actually on my list of leads to pursue... I didn't know anyone and I had no way to get the Newfoundland but there were some YouTube videos and other Urban Exploring websites that had mentioned this place and it's stash of arcade machines. Due to its disused nature, lots of people were breaking in and such, (Mostly Vandalism but some Urbex) so I'd take a small bit of solace from the fact a great deal of those games WERE destroyed because they'd already BEEN destroyed by vandals... not terribly comforting but I mean hey, they weren't as much of a holy grail as that old ship raid in England.

A great opportunity for the age old wisdom: NEVER TRANSPORT YOUR GAMES WITH THE HEADS ON!!
and
ALWAYS KNOW THE HEIGHT OF YOUR FREIGHT AND THE CLEARANCE!

My Dad drove tractor trailers for nearly a decade and more than once told me stories and showed pictures of guys who make it halfway across the country, then do something stupid like rip off the top of their trailer pulling into taco bell.

Glad you are a wizard and teleported that head back to a time before it met the garage door.

Is that fire damage??? Wtf!!

Can anyone identify that cabinet?

Definitely looks like it was in proximity to a fire, ash and probably some smoldering embers burned the playfield.

Is that local to you?! If it's all out for free/scrap I'm sure lots of guys could use parts! I'd see if there are ang useful control panels for fighting games! Looks like there are some newish ones like Time Crisis and one of those Tekken tournement machines

They show their free stuff in all their videos. They always say "Look at the stuff being recycled this week!" and lots of people know about it but don't bother going. Eventually some scrapers come and take it

Same, I'd love to go get some of it! I wouldn't travel that far. Anyone in the area interested?

Hey... you looking for an accomp- I mean road trip partner?
Nothing more noble than saving old pins!

Maybe those habitrails are still good? recoup some money and sell some “slightly used/minor smoke damage” parts?

Comic relief aside, that is horrible really, and I feel bad for this guy. That’s a true nightmare...
I actually moved all my power tools to my outdoor garage because a friend just lost his entire house all because he had an old DeWalt battery charging and it shorted, exploded and burned down his entire house along with his antique firearm collection.

One of the leading causes of house fires are those 12v/18v battery chargers. That’s extremely eye-opening. The manufactures get away with it with those little tags that say “never charge unattended”

DON’T LET IT HAPPEN TO YOU! CHARGE THEM OUTSIDE, IN A SHED, ANYWHERE THAT’S NOT INSIDE! Even if you must charge inside, put them in the middle of a concrete floor away from any flammable materials.

Stay safe!

Wow, was the whole game in a barn or just an old playfield? At least it can be a wallhanger

True but typically you're not going to spend all the time in a room with the battery as it charges, it can take hours! Plus if it does explode and let's say you're sitting watching tv, you still need a fire extinguisher handy and will probably suffer some fire damage regardless! I'd say the true safe bet is a concrete floor away from flammable materials

Off-topic, but nice Halloween corner!

Beat me to it! Dammit!

I’m surprised the backglass is as decent as it is. I’d expected it to be completely flaked.
Where is that located, and how much? It’s a disaster but I seriously bet it could be flipping decently with some extra TLC.

One was for sale on craigslist at a garagesale I believe 2 weeks ago

I went and bought a Maximum Force from this really crappy, somewhat cryptic letgo ad. They mentioned other arcade machines but I wasn’t able to get out there for over a month.
This place was quite literally the middle of nowhere. No cell service, an EIGHT MILE DEAD END ROAD. All the signs of “you’re going to get murdered out here”
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Finally I get to this hillbilly heaven of a few ramshackle houses and folks having big bonfires on their front lawns.

On the side of the house there’s a pile stacked to the roof of absolutely destroyed games: Super Hang-On, a dual Time Crisis, two Silent Scopes, some Konami flying games. All smashed to pieces.

The only two games left are Maximum force and an abortion of an X-men vs Street Fighter (with a Big Buck Hunter gun attached for some reason)

When I asked WHY they destroyed the games, this was the pearl of wisdom I received: “Well they wasn’t working right so we’s figured tuh scrap em”

I asked if they had anymore pieces or any pinball parts and they said those had already been destroyed.
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I was looking around the piles of arcade tragedy and found this poor, pathetic Seawitch burned beneath a flight simulator. I wanted to save what was left immediately and they told me “well that’s ‘er burn pit, but if yous really wannit, it’s yers”

If I had just came in a month sooner I could have saved even more.
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They smashed up over 30 arcade machines and a few pinball machines because they didn’t work and they figured nobody wanted them so they never even offered. I heard that several other brave souls ventured out before me and grabbed a game or two, but they weren’t as explorative as myself. Which is completely understandable because they also had a small pack of pit-bulls roaming the backyard and they weren’t terribly happy to see me.

All in all I never thought I’d be in this thread but here I am and let me tell you seeing this in personal was abysmal.

Now I understand the feeling. I could have possibly saved some more bits and pieces, but digging through all the destroyed cabs was just so damn disheartening.

It was outside in the rain and elements under the burn pile for a few weeks. They weren't sure exactly what they threw out when...
I tried to gently explain the whole concept to them but... these people only speak "Banjo"

They destroyed the other games because "they didn't work" and I was able to fix 2 of them simply by adjusting the v-sync and other adjustments on the monitors...

The Seawitch is in pretty good shape for the whole ordeal and I'm happy I was able to save it. I've gotten a surprising number of PMs so I'll have to take a closer look tonight. I was absolutely exhausted yesterday when I got it

Buy it anyway and use the playfield as a wall hanger

Buy it anyway! Save what you can!

You can’t let that pin suffer anymore

Where was this posted?!?

I’ve seen this a few times... the light switch hack is so weird. It’s only like 4 inches from the stock position?? What’s the point?

Recently did the knee thing, got one leg on, mid-way through screwing the second leg on, the leg fasteners in the cab gave out and I was stuck there with a 3 legged machine on my knee. Eventually I was able to reach into the neck and hold the fastener in and screw it in, which was very tricky. I was so sore after!

Well that’s interesting.. can’t imagine what this guy’s car looks like

I like that they took out all the mechs in the backbox and cab for the EM, but then for some reason they cut a brand new NBA in half???
Someone in production was clearly an EM collector, gave them his old cab and trashed playfield but took the valuable parts needed for later repairs. Then saw the NBA gave it the stink eye :b

That’s awesome! The rotting playfields and games are sad though, did you bother even asking what they wanted for them? I mean I’d buy them to possibly help out another collector, but knowing ops, they probably wanted silly money for ‘em

Draining is not deleting, it’s more like “I don’t want to see this” so it hides it for you only. We all still see it

You’ll know the devil when you see him... he has the body of a classic Gottlieb but the head of a Bally!

AVERT THY GAZE

I’d take it if it was free! Strip all the hardware and build a new cab! Easier to polish and reuse parts in my opinion

Also the head looks decent and so does the lighbox. IMO not a bad salvage/parts pin!

I looks like someone decided to bondo the playfield to hell!

What game is that? Is the playfield severely damaged too? I’ve restored games with worse cabinets and... worse everything really. I think you could still bring it back to life.

I’d buy the rare glass or offer a trade. Mephisto is a really badass one!

Why on earth...
Just the front panel??? I don’t understand the reasoning?! I’d tried kicking one out before when I had to rebuild a rotten cabinet, and also for a cabinet that exploded.
Both times those panels were really damn hard to separate from the sides. I mean full body weight would not break them. Took pry bars and half an hour of working it over to break them off!!

I actually used the sides of a rotten cab as wall art, looks kinda cool if you clean it up decently. Seal it and nail it up, now you can have even more pinball machines, on your walls!

That’s amazing! LOVE THOSE!

Just a single side? I have a secret service head and playfield if anyone wants to build their own :b

One of the rare times I would honestly advise just gutting and parting a game. That looks roached on all levels and being a Playboy.... it’s a no from me

Oh shoot!! You bought that? I had no idea it’s been listed for almost 3 years! I was talking to that guy in February and I had negotiated a deal but I was unable to make the time to go pick it up. I figured it would be a decent game since it looked pretty untouched aside from being in a disgusting garage setting.
I’m so surprised it had everything with it and I’m kicking myself for not setting aside the time to go make the trip.

Congrats on the pickup, and congrats that it was actually in working condition, what a score! Backglass is ruined but otherwise that’s great pickup, and Trade Winds is an interesting EM in my opinion.

I can’t believe it had all the documentation, keep that stuff, it’s priceless and really adds to the value of a pin for some collectors

How many pins in total?
That’s depressing...
now for the obligatory, “It’s not too late, you can save them!! Restore it!!!” Just to annoy some folks :b

I see Flash, Meteor and Firepower? But I’m pretty sure there are a few others also. Meteor looks to be the only salvageable game. At least there are some great parts to be harvested, always good when you can, at the very least, use the guts to save other machines.

Harbinger of mold.

She was, I hope you’re not implying I was not paying attention because I was and I was slowing down as was traffic. You can’t come to a complete stop in 2 seconds, even the trooper and the car that was hit first said that she hit him without any attempt to stop. I hit my brakes but brakes can’t stop you as fast as stationary object does!

I didn’t take pictures of the first car she hit, but she hit him pretty squarely and I had swerved as best I could so it was mostly the passenger side that took the blow

Well based on the story of the BWM driver who was hit by the Honda, he claims he was standing still and saw the whole thing happen and watched her hit him and saw that we didn’t have any chance to stop. Thankfully he told that to the troopers too. I wouldn’t have known since I couldn’t see around the huge Honda.

Actually happened to my friend I went to school with last year. Kid has a suped up WRX and the engine landed in his lap. Still in a wheelchair and probably won’t walk again.
Not gonna lie the thought briefly went through my mind when we crashed and I was amazed how the cabin wasn’t compromised at all by the impact

Figured I’d find the idiot here. Have you ever been in rush hour traffic? You don’t get to have a large gap between the cars. Someone cuts in front of you.

That’s completely understandable and my feelings as well. I was pretty upset as I was actually paying attention, of all the times I’ve been a less-than-attentive driver, I was most frustrated that I had been scanning traffic and just started slowing down accordingly and still hit this woman. When I got out I was confused by this until I saw the other car she had hit, who had moved further up the road about 50 yards or so.

I did state in my original post too, that she didn’t apply her brakes at all so there were no tail lights or any typical warning signs. The car in front of me was driving and then hit the car in front of her causing her to come to a complete stop without ever hitting her brakes.

Not even useful for wall art!! Take the pop bumper caps, strip all the metal parts and use the free firewood.
Probably couldn’t even get a good serial number off of it to record for posterity. How sad!

I wish I had this kind of blind confidence to ask money for literal, complete garbage. Boy, how do they do it?

Did they save everything? Looks like a shitton of pins, great pics though, those warehouses of imprisoned pins still exist! It’s our job to save them :b

The seller assured me this WASN’T a mouse nest. Just some crap under the glass.

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This was already posted, a while back, I’d have to dig for it but it was very early on in this thread.

Update on those, sources tell me they have been saved and are living a new life!

This was already posted probably a dozen pages in, too!

Found it! It was 6 months ago. But the video you posted is much higher quality! Thanks for that. Also it turns out the melting arcade machines from Sleighton had not been posted here before. I think it was in another thread about abandoned pinball machines and such. I will find my pictures from the school and post them! The machines have since completely disintegrated into the floor. It was kind of insane. A very surreal experience.

The hell did I miss?!

Some folks had been pissing on me for saying “oh wow you can save that!” To some of the worst basket cases.
My opinion is that if the playfield is at least decent, a machine can be brought back, the playfield is truly the heart of a game. In this case that playfield looks like it suffered excessive exposure to the elements and has been absolutely ruined. These are common enough that I’d purchase a new one. The wood must be pitted, chipped and warped beyond repair. The rest of the game and cab looks like with dedication it can be an playable game.

The ol’ lightswitch on/off switch trick. I assume the other turns it to freeplay somehow. You see them a ton for some reason and they’re all stupid when the original switch was pretty damn simple to begin with

I considered that, but with the location of the box in the picture, it seems like an odd place if you were trying to turn the chimes off. Also could a simple lightswitch actually work in that manner? I wasn’t sure if that would actually work or not.

Assume that anything you want or any closed operators have been picked clean about 10 years ago haha
I remember I was the same way when I joined 3 years ago. Nothing beats local contacts you make along the way.
Most longtime operators are also extremely miserable old men who never want to sell unless you pay NIB prices. Make friends with their wives just for future reference...

I can leave you a “hypothetical” situation (for legal reasons): if you find old rundown buildings that house old coin op you want, sometimes slipping the groundskeeper a Grant will allow you to do some impromptu “Junk Removal”

Stolen from herbertbsharp off his Facebook.
Original Caption:
“Of all the beautiful things I've seen in Paris, today's find will have me waking up in the middle of the night screaming, for years to come.”

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This was in my drop target bank

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Seeing the rusty neck in the background just makes this a bummer, are you gonna salvage this?

Damn and it’s a premium too

Wrong thread!
You want this: https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/no-rainbow-puke-club-post-pics-of-worst-color-gi-fails

I’d say this counts as horror pics.
This unfortunate game from JonCBrand
https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/freight-companies-trashing-pins
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Wow already? Offer him something really low for everything and you can fix that cabinet in less than a day!
Cheap Aerosmith!

Sir, this is Pinside, you’re not allowed to use “Stern” and “good” in the same sentence

In all fairness, that cab is pretty sick and I would have absolutely found a good use for it. I’ve fixed worse.
Yes, the shrink wrap was the only think holding it together in the first pic.
(Allegedly fell off a truck)

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Damn, that guy could fake a DaVinci! Need an expert to spot those fakes!

Why would the guy do that??? What a fuckin’ ass.
Record the serial number before it gets parted out

Haha you just noticed my magnificent ghetto-rig?
It provides me the convenience of wheels and the utility of a table... sorta.
These née big plastic carts they make hold the body just fine without any extra mods.

Lol what game is that?

Couldn’t see it through the dirt!

Reminded me to check on the guy locally with the SFII that comes preloaded with a 5 pound rat nest and tons of shit and piss.
Totally rusted out and not working, bargain deal of $3000!!!

What game is that? Such a shame looks to be in great condition

Are you sure it’s the termites that got them and not the seemingly collapsed building?

Poor bastard someone will probably be willing to buy it for parts or restore it if it a good one, so at least he may get some money for it still.

The stripped everything out of them. It’s true that at the time pinball was NOT hot. It’s hard to believe but since I joined the hobby I’ve met a LOT of operators... you’d be sick at the stories of Medieval Madnesses and Twilight Zones and other greats that were literally just junked. Sometimes after less than 2 years. Many folks view them like a car tire, toss when worn...

The bracing is real!
Since the cab is totally gone, nail up the sides in your gameroom or shed. They look awesome! If the rest of the pieces are there just rebuild it into a fathom. It’s so good a game, I’d do it

I could certainly use that Williams back door, and the saying is funny too!

I reached out to the seller.
This YouTube video looks to have the metal rails thing going on, too.

Just a tragedy...
And it’s outside

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Where is this!? Take it!!!
Post in the “Heads missing” thread! I’ve got a few games without heads and eventually you’ll be able to reunite a whole game

Cleaner than most projects I work on lol!

I’ll ask what dump it was and call them up. Don’t care how long ago it was! Pinball is always worth an attempt!

It looks like the entire layer delaminated and they taped it back on. Probably cleaned it with some harsh water-based shit and it peeled that playfield apart.

Or it could be Mylar well after the playfield was destroyed and they’re hopelessly taping it back down. Like a piece of tape when you rip it off a cardboard box.

Reminds me of the City Slicker I bought, had zero work done to it, and someone shoved a tiny plastic football into the eject saucer to block it.

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Record the serial numbers! I also see a Target Alpha in there sell the whole thing, I’ve rebuilt a worse cabinet and that game is WORTH IT. One of the best EMs of all time.

Hey I did it for DAC. It’s worth it because some of them are fun and EMs don’t for much anyway. It’s either top dollar collector quality or under 1k players condition. Or in this case better-be-free junk that would make a great restoration project if you’re handy for woodwork

God help me

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Could be yours for $100!

Sad! I assume it must not have been climate controlled

This is what happens when you spray some WD-40 and start a game up.

Even in that condition that checkpoint ramp is better than 99% of them lol. They get absolutely demolished

That looks pretty cool, big donked out wheels too!