It would help.

My ideal would be a divide by 10 version that fully uses all 7 digits. Someone might make such a version for the Weebly with its expanded program space, or with the new open source arduino platform. (Shameless plug for my adapter board kit.)

One weakness in Centaur IMO is the fact that multiball is just more balls; making the scoring multiply with multiball (as I think Black Knight does) would be an incentive, and with /10 the five ball multiball could have 10x scoring without making the game easy to roll.

As it is now, Centaur is too easy unless you use the Oliver K "Home ROMS".

Okay back to classic Sterns, sorry.

I have a nice flight 2000 empty backbox if someone needs it. Also to be used in any wide body stern. Thank you.

was working on these turds today. always fun

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Damn!!!

All of the classic Sterns, wide body and standard body use the same back box.

I didn’t know it. Thank you

And it doesn’t pay to assume that one classic stern wide body Playfield Glass is the same as another stern wide body , I just learned that Cheetah & Big Game are the same but
Iron Maiden is different

Is IM a double back glass? What is different?

Super nice collection. It looks like your Seawitch wire guides heading to your flippers are installed on the wrong sides. It might just be the camera angle. I know this because I just did a playfield swap on mine and almost did it backwards myself.

definitely possible bc I had to paint/touch it up and clear it a few years ago. it plays fine but I see now what you're talking about. good eye!

Yes IM has a double backglass

Playfield glass is wider on IM than what’s in Big Game & Cheetah

That is interesting to know.

Sacrilege!

Damn good eye! This is going to co.e into play for me in the next few weeks. I'm glad he noticed. I always just pull those out and do my thing and never really thought they would fit in backwards but it looks like he is right.

Just a FYI. This week I did something that I hate doing but felt was nessasary in this case. I installed a playfield protector on my Seawitch. My newly installed John Greatwich playfield was begining to get some dimples. The new playfields are a little on the soft side so I decided to install a protector from Beehive Pinball. The protector was ok but needed considerable trimming to fit nicely. If the cut needed is straight I used a razor blade. For everything else I use a dremel and sandpaper. A few hours later I was done.

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wow that sucks. i am about to put one in my seawitch. Now I should reconsider re-clearing it.

I'm not sure that would help. The clear is soft even after 100 days but the wood seems to be the problem. It actually has the properties of a new Stern playfield. Seems like it will hold up as is but the dimples are noticeable.

Any chance someone knows what these spacers are called or better even know the part number and where I can buy one. I’m missing one of these from my Trident pop bumper assemblies.

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This topic has come up before thankfully, here's some info on those bushings/spacers for you.

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/stern-galaxy-pop-bumper-parts

I’m sure I have one around here. Send me a PM if you need it still.

Ask Jimmy at pinball resource for "4A-123-16 (or suitable replacement)". I just got 6 of them to have around. there is no flared out base but the are the right size and dwork properly. have fun lining them up lol.

RB

A small amount of Elmer's glue will hold them in place long enough for you to put then back together.

good idea. wish i knew that when doing galaxy as I had to reassemble it while on the PF. seawitch was better becasue the whole assembly pulled right through the hole so i could do it on the bench. On a different note are you the one who modded the shooter lane orbit flap thingy on seawitch? thayt thing is bugging the hell out of me so I want a good solution ready when I actually do the PF swap. that's why i am in here today. I saw some type of spring actuated diverter somewhere.

A insider in Australia is the one who made the spring loaded flap assembly. For mine, I got the parts numbers for The Beatles launch ramp and installed the ramp in mine. Neither way is going to improve game play very much--if at all. I was hoping I could get better shots with the upper right hand flipper and get more revolutions around the orbit. That's a pipe dream. If you want to have many many many orbit shots around the loop, go buy a Beatles; The geometry of Seawitch is just not conducive to making multiple loop shots. I have managed to get 5 or 6 loops on my friend's Beatles but on Seawitch, 2 1/2 loops is the most I have done----one time only.

I'll say it this way: I am not sorry that I made the ramp mod on my Seawitch, but I would not do it again. The flap that Stern provided and the flap that Cliffy now provides does as good of job as you are going to get for play action, IMO.

Thanks for that advice. You just saved me time once again.. I was making a few loops in succession with the stock flap but he is right (I found the thread). It's frustrating not being able to rip that spinner on a more regular basis. I might still open up the right orbit entry like he did so I can make that shot from the lower flipper. Gotta gain something! What's your actual name by the way?

I meant left orbit entry oops

I am dealing with dimples on my Big Game. I don't remember seeing any dimples of any kind when I brought it home.

I had the play field restored 3 years ago and I coated it with clear. The dimples are not bad and can't be seen with the play field glass on, but when I pulled the glass, there they were.

I am wondering if some of the dimpling is related to the clear coats we put on.

There has been some discussion lately with spinners.

Moving right along, I weighed my spinners as a starting point.

I have 3 Big Game spinners.

They weighed in at............................................................... 33 grams,
..........................................................................................34 g
..........................................................................................34 g

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Next are 3 Stern spinners

1) White is.......................................................................... 38 grams

2) yellow is..........................................................................33 g

3) The white Big Game is me trying to silk screen.....................38 g
....It is a Stern spinner, though.

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Next up are some Stern MPU 100 spinners.

Hot Hand x 2........................................................................27 grams
Nugent.................................................................................27 g
Dracula................................................................................27 g

then Seawitch which is an MPU 200 pin....................................34 g

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And then some Bally .

Skateball...............................................................................37 grams, 37 g, 37 g

Lost World.............................................................................37 g

Bally spinners. x 3..................................................................38 g

Of these spinners, I have used the white Stern spinner at 38 grams. This spinner and its sister spinner on my Big Game are giving me gobs of spins. I removed this spinner and installed and old Gottlieb spinner from a Snow Derby. I have not weighed it but it is more like the 27 gram Stern spinners I have.

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So, for ripping spins, I am trending to the heavier 37-38 gram spinners. For my very limited research, the heavier ones seem to give the better action.

However, if a heavier spinner is installed in a pin designed for the lighter spinner, I am guessing it messes with the play action regarding scoring and you might be left with and unbalanced score.

That said, does anybody have some of the heavier spinners to trade for the lighter spinners. Anybody need a Dracula spinner? Or Nugent?

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Hey all, my son is embarking on becoming the next Jack Danger. Still some ways to go This week we shot my recently restored Stern Quicksilver.

Given he's only just turned 7, it's more directed towards kids, but you may enjoy also. There's a couple of decent games in there, haha.

If you're kids like pinball, please subscribe and show them the link.

How to fix your bricking drop targets.

There are 3 drop targets all the way in the back of Star Gazer. When I got this build up an running I was having problems with dead on ball hits causing the drops to brick. I could knock the targets down with a glancing sideways ball hit but straight on hits were bricking bad.

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So I started looking around. This is what I saw.

Before I get started, this drop target worked just fine while on the bench. I could manually push the drop targets and they would drop at the slightest push. But when I installed them into this particular position on the play field, they would brick.

So, on the bench, they work 100%. Mounted on the play field they just bricked.

This is a dramatization:

I noticed when I gripped the drop and pushed backwards that it would hit the rubber band that sits behind the drops. What was happening is that contact with the rubber band would cause the drops to brick.

What I did was remove the 3 posts at this drop target position and moved the holes for the posts back and away from the drop slot. I filled the holes with dowel rod and moved the holes back one half of the hole. Moving the posts backwards gave the drops more room to drop with out hitting the rubber band, which was just pushing them back onto their landing rest bar.

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That rubber band mounted to the posts can be removed. You can replace it with some string, or some flat rubber bands, or even some masking tape and see if getting the rubber band out of the way stops your bricking problem. If removing that rubber band stops the bricking, then you need to consider moving your posts about 1/16".

I have ran Star Gazer through its paces after moving the posts backwards and the bricks are no more.

So, if you have bricking problems, remove the post rubber band and block the posts with something and check the performance with the rubber band out of the way.

my idea on this is that if the DT don't have enough space to move back without hitting a stop and/or bouncing back they wouldn't be able to drop "quickly enough" for the spring to pull them down. Often if you DT are not fully flushed to the front of the through PF hole that accentuate the pb.
The post/rubber location is definitely another contributing factor. I sometime had to "shave" some of the DT back as well so there is more movement before it hits the end of that backward move.

Another way around this is to use a slightly smaller diameter rubber ring. Like 1 1/2 instead of 1 3/4, etc. This will stretch the rubber tighter and make it thinner thereby giving just a tiny bit more space between the back of the DT and rubber.

fantastic! Lovely quicksilver!

Neil.

Hello All - Anybody have one of these they can sell me? I need one to finish a restore. It is the retaining clip found on a classic Stern coin door and holds in the coin mechanism. Please let me know.

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Restoring coin door on Seawitch.

Where can I find replacement for light sockets & test switches located in coin door?
Lamp sockets are different then PF sockets
Thanks

I believe this would work, Marco & PBR are out

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https://www.pinballlife.com/interlock-switch-3-leads.html

Steve at PBR also sells these switches

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I’m gathering thoughts for a “feasibility study” on the idea of scratch-building a Nine Ball.
I see people doing these builds on other games, and since I missed the window on this title before it shot up stratospherically in price, figured “shoot, maybe I should just build one.”

But the more I looked into it, the more challenges presented themselves.
Major challenges I have identified so far primarily have to do with game-specific parts:

- one-sided spinner is unique, as far as I know. That means sourcing or fabricating a reproduction of birth the spinner and the bracket.

- single drop target mechanism in front of the horse shoe. In theory, one could install the Williams single drop mech from ST:TNG or IJ, and then 3D print a wider faced special drop target. Like I said, in theory.

- 9-bank of drop targets. This is another hard to come by item, and the drops also have individual solenoids, correct? This on its own could be a deal-breaker.

The rest of the parts needed seem like a matter of patience and scavenging (apron, transformer, coin door, etc.)
What do the rest of you think, is this a pipe dream or is it something worth pursuing?

I thought someone repro'd the bracket (not the spinner itself though.... there is a thread somewhere on here that I can never find about how someone just replaced the spinner wire that was busted on a normal spinner, you should be able to do the same thing and just put the longer wire on it)

Update found the link:

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/is-there-a-way-to-add-wire-on-spinner#post-6039319

9 drop mech you can get from a flight 2000 it's the same mech just needs 3 reset coils added. Since people are parting out F2k's for Cheetah builds, you should be able to get one from there, and anyone that parted out a galaxy to build a quicksilver has 4 of the memory reset coils as well (as would anyone that has a 5 bank from a Trident or a Cheetah).

The single drop mech you could use any of the multitide of EM's that have the single drop mech.... many williams games have this mech. Just add a diode (or change the coil) for DC use. I think the 9 ball one is a leftover from Chicago Coin days.... hey, we got a lot of parts when we bought CC's assets - let's use them up. (See also Hot Hand's large spinning flipper, leftover from Big Flipper)

You can buy new memory coils from PBR, maybe other sites.

Yes, but you also have to locate the brackets that the coils mount to. More of challenge.

If you contact Cliffy he may have some 9-ball spinner brackets left. I recently purchased one from him.

I recently dropped a Nine Ball scratch build into my perpetually long project list. Thanks to Jjsmooth for sending me a plastics set and the fact that I have all the needed drop mechs (one being an F2K bank that just needs 3 additional targets and relays added.). We just ordered the spinner bracket from Cliffy last week, so he should still have them.

I should have a couple extra of the single-drop mechs. The only other game they used them on is Pinball, which used 4 or 5 of them and I recently picked up a parts game. PM me if you're interested.

Now I can continue to think about how I didn't buy a fully populated Nine Ball playfield like 3 years ago for $250

https://www.pinballlife.com/miniature-bayonet-base-2-lead-socket-with-long-mounting-bracket.html

Hi,
Currently restoring a Meteor and in the process of buying parts but having trouble with 2 parts.
BUMPER BODY - DEAD (B-10431) Marco or Pinball Life dont have stock and im having trouble working out what part number i need to replace the yellow stand up.
Any help would be appreciated.

I replaced my dead bumper bodies on Meteor with parts from The Pinball Resource but was told they're hard to find right now and that Steve was almost out of them. I imagine he'd also have the yellow target.

Try emailing Pinball Resource at [email protected]. He may have the dead bumper body.
The yellow stand up target is part# BLY-C1024-3. I'd order a second one to have a backup.
http://www.pbresource.com/pfswitch.htm

Some may call this sacrilege. Last year I picked up a cheap Galaxy that I'd intended to use for another scratch-build, but my dad ended up really falling for the game and started playing it non-stop. With considerable effort to keep the game alive, I decided to pop it into an old beat up Bally Supersonic cabinet I've had banging around in the garage for a few years. After repairing some water damage and general joinery issues, I was going to repaint it. Now, I hate hate HATE the factory cabinet artwork on Galaxy, so I was thrilled when I discovered the original prototype stencils, which are pretty incredible!

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I took some liberties with the cabinet colors as the original base white didn't fit the theme to me. Kinda hard to photograph but I think it looks pretty alright and the design is much better than the stars and text. I've since learned that you can actually get them through Pinball Pimp (not listed for some reason), but I hand cut these myself. As a result, many of the lines and bleed are... not great. One thing I did notice though is the they're seemingly a bit incomplete. There's a few spots where I added some additional lines and asteroids to better suit the layers. Anyway, this Galaxy lives on in a new shell.

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FWIW, the original cabinet needs a ton of work anyway. It's been cracked and put back together with ugly steel brackets around the corners. Fixing it will be a serious chore.

That looks SUPER RAD! I love it!
Might have to pursue that option when I get around to restoring mine. I had no idea!