Good day fellow Pinsiders! I've picked up my next project, a fair Silverball Mania. By fair I mean the cab is in good shape, some minor scuffs that need filled and simple repairs, then re-do the paint & stenciling. The playfield will either need a complete restore or replacement it looks like it may have sat outside at some time. It has lots of paint wear, severely cupped inserts and what appears to be white paint overspray. The electronics will be gone through and updated. There appears to be one hack on the MPU and what appears to be the original battery is still mounted. Surprisingly only a hint of battery alkaline damage. This will of course be cleaned and battery replaced with NVRAM. If I'm not satisfied with my repair of the boards, repin, reflow, cap replacement etc, I'll consider new boards, but as of today, the game does work 100%. There is one display that has some intermittent issues, again could be in connectivity or capacitor issues. I am considering replacing all the displays with LED modules for longevity as I intend to offer this machine for sale when all the work is done and I would like the next owner to have years of problem free play. There again why I'm considering updating the existing boards but these appear to be in pretty clean shape. This will be the first machine that I have taken on that actually worked before I got it, so maybe I'm in for a treat. Thanks for checking in and please check back soon for updates, they will be slow based on the cost of items I wish to "make new" on this machine.

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Riddle me this, the SDU in my machine has a transistor Q24, which after zooming in, appears to be an 2N3904.
The versions of the manual and repair procedure I have do not list this item! Further, my board does not have the 3/16a fuse F1.
Anyone have documentation that shows the variation of the board (early version?) that I have?

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Still looking for knowledge on the mysterious transistor Q24 from above, but since I've now discovered the AS-2518 club, I'll post there too.
Now for updates... Not a whole lot. Unlike most of my other machines this machine worked before I got it, thus I decided to just do some "bulletproofing" while I wait on some capital equipment to arrive.
I've replaced the caps, fixed a hack (w/o a new board, it's as good as I can get it) installed new sound POT... I will be replacing / re-pinning all the connectors soon also.
I've scanned the cabinet and backbox images to create templates, and as mentioned, ordered such capital equipment such as scanner (which has already been put to us), part tumbler and polishing media, Silhouette Cameo and I think that is it.
I had originally intended to purchase a new backglass but this one was actually better than hoped so I treated it with triple thick, some some light touch up, put a finish coat of triple thick on and think it will be just fine.

Here are some images of work done thus far.

Check back soon, updates will likely be slow until the new tools arrive!

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Yes, the plan is to attempt stencils to try and keep the factory look.

Yup, took care of that the day after I got it!

Well lookie what Mr. FedEx man just dropped off...a pretty good Ebay score!
I see this weekend shaping up to include learning how to use my vinyl cutter.
I'm also expecting my crushed walnut shell polishing media to be delivered today, the tumbler arrived earlier this week (I went with the Lyman Turbo PRO 1200, another good deal from Ebay). I had planed to go by the hardware store and get the makings for a rotisserie tonight after work with parts list and plans from Vid1900. All this should allow me to begin playfield disassembly over this holiday weekend.

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/vids-quick-and-dirty-rotisserie-guide

Got myself a full weekend now!

Hope to have plenty of update pics next Tuesday for ya'll.

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I got some tasks accomplished over the long weekend, learning to use the Cameo was NOT one of them. Hopefully that will come this week. I got all of the plastics, posts wire-forms etc off the playfield. I made the attached to follow when it comes time to re-assemble everything, took over 300 images of just the topside of the PF too!
Got a great start on my rotisserie, it should be finished this evening or tomorrow evening. I had come into work to perform the drilling and tapping. Once complete the PF will come out of the cab and I will begin marking everything and imaging the underside of the PF.
Got all the upper PF metal parts polished, I had no idea the bits and pieces would turn out so nice. A few before / after pics attempting to illustrate the results. Check back soon for the next update...

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Finished up the rotisserie last night, I deviated slightly from the noted 1/4-20 threads to 3/8" and the hardware store I sourced the pipe from only had 18" pipe and not 12", so this version should be extra steady! I think I will continue to look for 12" pipe (I hate to cut and re-thread this stuff) and may opt to use 3/8" bolts over the eye bolts, I've already tripped over them once just putting this thing together, but overall, I'm excited to have this built and ready to pull the playfield off and start it's underside disassembly. Also note I placed "beer seal" foam insulation on the angle iron to add some cushion.
One other thing I got done last night was to dye the nylon stand offs a nice shade of blue, closely matching the blue of the cabinet.
I'm looking for any help one can offer for use of the Cameo, specifically the materials that have been used successfully for stencil material for both the cab and playfield. I read in the Cameo club thread something about Oramask 813 and GerberMask, but can't seem to find a source for the GerberMask, Amazon.com went into convulsions when I tried searching for that one.
Any advice would be much appreciated!

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Thanks for your compliments. I found the 12" black pipe, it is actually a "nipple" that is 12" long, I just did not think to look in that section for such a length. Anywho, as Vid states in his guide, it takes longer for the paint to dry than to build one! If I was not going to be using my rotisserie soon, I'd let you borrow it! Sorry.
For polishing in the tumbler, I found some Turtle Wax Chrome/Metal polish at Walmart in the automotive dept. , I could not find the brands listed in the tumbler threads on here so I gave it a try. Very pleased with the results. I tumbled the parts for 48 hours, I would periodically check to see how the parts were looking and as others have indicated, 48hrs seems to be a good number. I have another set of parts in tumbling now that should be done this evening. Most of them are wire guides, I'm eager to see how they turn out as they were pretty good to begin with.

Thank you Mr Ball, I've actually already reached out to him, and look forward to his response (Only sent him a PM yesterday). I noticed some of his posts in the Cameo Club thread. I'm eager to glean anything I can from his magnificent work.

Update from this weekend, made just a small amount progress. Successfully pulled all the items from the top of the playfield so I could scan it in preparation for reproduction. This is going to be fun -
I've already spend over 20 hours in Photoshop and have made this much progress... fingers so close together no light can be seen by naked eye...

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So this week's update isn't much that is visible. Placed large orders with Marco & PBL. Received my LED display kit from pinballsolutions.eu and started assembly of those. New boards from Andrew at nvram.weebly.com arrived (Lamp driver, MPU, voltage regulator and sound), ordered the components to populate all those and started placing components on the regulator board that were supplied with that DIY kit.
Performed much of Photoshop and Illustrator image manipulation getting images ready for the Cameo.
HFS there is a lot of digital work to be done! These images are before and after, with the after (including scanning) a culmination of around 24hrs. I've done more than just this one section this week but with all the color layers in this example, I felt it made the best representation the work to date.
I'll be back Monday with an update as to the progress the weekend allowed me to make.

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I used the black as it is what was suggested in the DIY by Vid. My guess is that it was suggested as it is more difficult to paint galvanized steel than the black. I did not even look at the galvanized when shopping for my materials. Depending on the cost difference, I would have likely settled for the galvanized and just not bothered to try and paint it.

Another brief update, my Marco and Digikey orders came it. I'm not ready for them yet but still feels good to see everything coming in.
I finished building the LED display kits and threw one in the machine and powered it up to see how cool they look, very happy with the results. The displays currently in the machine are fine but I wanted a set of these from gianfri to offer the eventual buyer of this machine the option of LED displays. Same too with the boards from @barakandl, boards in this machine work fine and have been updated with caps, reflow & new header pins / plugs, but again, if the next owner wants a "bulletproof" machine, I would sell them the new boards as options.
Over the weekend I got more Photoshop and Illustrator done, see another example of that. I also tumbled more of the hardware over the last few days.
Getting very close to starting the minor cab repairs / repaint as well as playfield work. I dread that one but it has to be done eventually.
Thanks for all the comments and check back soon.

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Here is how the playfield artwork has shaped up for the week. Obviously I saving the center "Silverball" for last... but overall I think it's coming along.
I hope to continue de-populating the underside of PF this weekend and remove the old inserts as I've sourced all new "starburst" type to use instead. I will also try to carve out time to play with the Cameo this weekend as I finally have some stencil designs done that I can use to learn on.
C-yas on Monday.

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Holy Craps, I spent pretty much all of the past 3 full days working on the "SILVERBALL MANIA" section of the pf.
I'm taking a break now and going to do my day job.

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I would but I am at work...

" I wouldn't say I've been missing it..." - Office Space

Thanks, too many continuous hours of PS, everything running together !

I will certainly correct it before the "hard" work of paint.

The color seen is just for the screen, actual paint color TBD.

Great, thanks for the info Vid!!

Thanks for the compliments!

The main reason is because I am CHEAP! I am giving this machine a work-over to resell once complete, thus cost is of primary concern.
For example, I had wanted to chrome everything but when I got the estimates back, the chrome would be what I hope to eventually sell the entire refurbished machine for. Again, since this won't sit in my collection, I chose not to invest in those "luxury" type items. I have to do what I can to preserve / make better what is there on a budget.
Currently my time is what I have most of and as such I can make considerable time investments in the machine that I won't end up "charging for". Like making the cab stencil and pf repairs, repaint my self.
I've not read very good reviews of the overlay's, but would still consider if viable.

I finally got the Cameo fired up, ran a few tests and then cut some samples.
Overall I'm very happy with the results, it is much easier to use than I had thought. Whew, what a relief!
I might scale the 5000 and WHEN LIT to make them a little larger, the Cameo can cut the fine minute detail but the Oramask has an issue "hanging onto" the small cutouts.
I think a small amount of fine tuning and I'll be inching closer to finally starting on the pf paint...

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Yes I am, templates for the PF and the cab. This is my first foray into this level of restoration, so a very steep learning curve.

So I noticed upon further inspection, the Cameo is cutting along the red path, no wonder my first sample looked funky and run together.
The cut line can be manipulated to more closely match the outline, but it so time consuming. I thought it was going to be a simple import / trace procedure of vector images but seems more complicated than I originally thought. Surely I'm missing a step somewhere.
I won't have time to tinker with this more this weekend but hopefully next week I can figure it out and make more clean results.

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Made some progress with the pf over the weekend, finally got the wiring harness off! In all it is pretty clean so will not need to get "the dishwasher treatment", just new connectors. Hopefully this week I can figure out how to solve the Cameo issues with the fact it is not cutting along the image lines, rather it's own "trace" extrapolations. As mentioned in previous post, worst case, I will manually adjust the trace lines (cutting lines) to more closely match what I want it to cut.

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Thanks cosmokramer for the compliment.

@vid1900, your depth of knowledge is awesome!
Thanks for the tips!

I played with the Cameo a bit this morning and just decided to manually manipulate the cutting lines to meet my expectations, and have achieved the desired result. It takes about 30 minutes per "insert" to adjust the cutting lines but I'm pretty happy with the outcome! I'm not sure if the "Designer" version of Cameo that allows direct import of SVG files would be less time consuming, but the method I've used is the right cost, and again, meets my level of perfectionism!

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...And the playfield is now bare and the GI wire path traced in sharpie. That is the good news.
The bad news is that while attempting to clean up the BG metal trim, the paint flaked off completely. However, I've got a plan... I've scraped away the paint to the mirror finish and will simply make reverse stencils for transparent paint to redo the lower portion text and then finish with a top coat. That is the goal anyway, will see how it works out. I was successful at scraping the paint to the mirror finish to pretty hidden points, just don't have any pics of that this morning. Will add those tomorrow. I took some 70 pics of measurements front and back to hopefully get the placement of re-paint correct. Finger crossed!

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Images of the BG with the paint removed to the mirroring, looks like it should be a nice canvas to re-do the "Silverball, TILT, Same Player Shoots Again and Game Over" lettering, I hope. And with the new findings about using the cameo:

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/silhouette-cameo-pinball-restorers-club/page/4#post-3841926

I'm getting more amped to eventually start the painting!

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rufessor, thanks for your compliments, input and question. Your thought process is pretty much on target, I am working to make stencils to repaint the artwork, not decals. Although, I had thought of doing decals, but wish to try and stay close to the original method of artwork.
I would still consider decals if I can find a good printer for this type of application.
As far as the Oramask, I did note your great comments in the Cameo thread and just ordered some Gerber yesterday. I'm eager to give it a try once it arrives.
Thanks again for following and providing very helpful suggestions!