F2K project. This playfield is being recycled.

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I need to get moving on my F2k. It's in such a sad state but I really want to play it!

That F2K is worrying the hair right out of your head. Bring it down here and leave it. And all your headaches will disappear

Lol. It's on the rotisserie. I paused to finish (ish) Magic. Having stolen a few parts off a Gameplan playfield, that one is good to go for now. I messed with Af-Tor again (got nowhere) so it's time to get back to that F2k. But I'm definitely taking you up on the new floor when I head that way!

I'll probably pull the ball grabber (heh) mech and 3 bank after a bit so I can clean those. Still need to polish up the top of the pf as best I can and then wax the whole thing so I can start building the topside back up.

Hello, I'm new to the owning older machines game and am looking for some help. I have a stern Big Game, and my issue is whenever the game is played the sound will eventually go quiet then off.

Also, if the game is left on and in attract mode it eventually will stop with the lights how and make a buzzing sound with only one light lit.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Curious to see where this is going! I have 2 stripped F2K playfields in the garage.

You might be on to something. I'll repin the J3 connector next time I am at my vacation house. The OEM mpu had battery damage. It may have made its way to the J3 connector.

slochar with all your cool code updates, would you ever be interested or able to do a sound update on Split Second? The choices are just so wrong for the game but really I think the lack of background sounds dulls the experience for being a 1981 game, imo.

To be clear, I was talking about the J3 connector on the rectifier board, not the MPU. But yes, possibly acid got on the J3 MPU connector.

I keep meaning to delve into the endless extra ball bug on that one. I no longer have a SS though, and testing in pinmame with multiball games is extemely tedious.

I wouldn't mind coming up with some kind of way to create new sounds but right now all I've done is take other sounds from other games and adapt them.

Yes, but you got me thinking about the harness. It could only be the harness, rectifier or driver board.

Cheetah : Continued Switch Matrix issues (scratch build game)

Here is what happens.

When you rip the left spin Target, various switches in that same row will register, but mainly the pop bumper. Also the GI lights flicker and the displays get all garbled.

I've tried the following:

Used a switch tester board at the mpu and all switches register in test with nothing weird occurring. I'm 99.9% this isn't a board issue especially since the behavior is the same with the big game board installed. PIA at U10 already replaced with a known working one, and swapped in another known working MPU, no change.

I've replaced the diodes on every switch in this row.

I've followed the white/black wire through the whole row of switches and notice no shorts anywhere.

Even if I remove the strobe wire or the return wire from the spinner switch, I still get weird behavior with switches in the same row registering including the spinner switch somehow. Haha.

Not sure what to try next, but it has to be in my wiring of the playfield/cabinet somewhere.

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Then I did this:

I removed the spinner switch from the playfield. Left it wired up and attached to the spinner arm that attaches to the spinner itself. What’s weird is even if I hold the switch open, when I move the spinner back and forth, the displays garble and lights flicker.

The spinner bracket attaches via posts on either side that do not go all the way through the playfield.

I think I just fixed it by dumb luck. I’ll report back in a bit.

SOLVED: the wood screw from underneath the playfield for the GI bulb was contacting the post screw from the right side of the spinner bracket causing a short. Moved screw and all is good!

Always the weirdest dumb thing!

It took me 3 weeks to track down an issue just like that on my Nugent. I also had it happen on Stu’s old Wild Fyre.

I'm interested in hearing how the dumb luck found your problem.

First I thought it was loose screw that was lodged in one of the pop mechs. But that didn’t fix the issue. It was what I mentioned just above about the two screws meeting in the middle of the playfield wood to make a connection/short.

It is going. This caused a very late night and an early morning. I have a tendency to overdo things sometimes.

Fantastic!

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Oh, my....

Are you prepping for the possibility of repro playfields? Planning to make a series of decals?
I’ve drafted up big chunks of playfield art in the past but never to redo an entire playfield.
Intrigued!

Hey @chuckwurt, what did the lamp flicker look like? Did all the GI lamps blink in unison?

No. Mostly just some backbox lights.

Ahhh. Long time coming.

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What a pair!

Sounds like it is failing when things warm up. That makes me think of possible issues in the following order:
-Failing power supply.
-Poor connection.
-Failing component or solder connection (referred to as a cold solder joint).

There is a pinwiki for classic Sterns-
https://pinwiki.com/wiki/index.php/Bally/Stern

I would start in the section on rectifier test point values when the pin is not working-
https://pinwiki.com/wiki/index.php/Bally/Stern#Rectifier_Board_Test_Point_Values

I would be tempted to give that pair their own little section with some tall plants and decor to really give it that "jungle" aesthetic

Congrats!!!

Two cats hanging together. Two beautiful back glasses.

I have jungle queen too. Haha

OK, revisiting the pop bumper on my Trident. I just couldn’t shake the feeling something was just off where it shouldn’t be on the replacement assembly itself. I ordered an entire new assembly from pinball life. Here’s what I got in, and it looks just like the one off kilter skirt I have on the pop in the game. I’m going to disassemble this and see where the hangup could be. But is this normal, for anyone who has used these in their games? Right out of the box to have an uneven skirt? As I said, my other pop bumper is just fine in the game. Skirt sits high and even.

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Why would you order that? It’s a DE/Sega/Stern assembly. Not the same. Pinball Life does not carry many vintage parts
unless they are “universal” parts across many games.

IMO. this is not normal. I have purchased 3 sets ( 9 total) of the Pinball Life pops. I have not seen that in any of mine

Because it fits ? Although, he may ned to add a diode.

Well as long as you know it’s not the same mold. They are totally differently parts. You can’t complain or wonder about something that doesn’t quite work right when it was never made to fit that game in the first place. Maybe you should take it to Terry in person and slap him around a bit when you voice a complaint. I’m sure he would totally understand and just apologize and not beat you until you are unconscious.

There are plenty of posts in this thread about using this exact assembly in these games. And the trident I bought uses them, as installed by the previous owner. Happy to set it back to standard if there are replacement parts out there—feel free to point me to them if my research has missed them instead of saying I should be beaten unconscious for asking a question, weirdo. It’s a stretch to read any part of my post as a complaint about pinball life. Just asking for advice on a part I got from them. I’m sure they’ve got a whole big bin of these that don’t have this particular issue they can send me, if this one does in fact have an issue.

https://www.shapeways.com/product/V444LZ2SY/classic-stern-gen-1-pop-bumper-brkt-conversion?optionId=227810695&li=marketplace

Thank you sir! I saw these but it was my understanding there is no functional difference between this and what I bought, except I need to shave the gen 2 replacement I bought down to fit the smaller hole. And because of the price, I went with the pinball life one. But I guess I can try this with the same parts as what I have from the pinball life assembly and see if things sit more even, assuming I can’t find someone tearing down an old playfield locally.

They look the same to me except one is white and one is black.

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I think i found your problem. This is my friend's pop assembly. Notice the leaning skirt. I loosened the switch and the spoon and centered it up. Now the skirt is sitting straight.

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Good. Now beat yourself unconscious.

It actually appears to be the lamp socket/pop body screws. If I back them off, the assembly raises a bit and the spring isn’t getting compressed just a smidgeon like it does if the body is screwed tight down. There’s still enough bite where I can’t move the body to be loose, so I think this will work. The one in my game however doesn’t like this particular fix. I’ll have to take it apart and see if I can find a similar issue, or just swap this one in. Pic of it with them backed off, and with the lamp squished down by finger.

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Something I noticed a while ago was on a new Data East/Stern/Alvin ect housing I had I found they have a shorter round collar where the housing fits through the playfield compared to original Stern housings.

The repros are around 1-1.5mm shorter on this collar than an original Stern housing, therefore the skirt ends up sitting lower making switch adjustment a lot harder & gapping needs to be very close.

I was looking at the Planetery repros as they look like a good replacement for original Sterns as they are white, but i'm assuming unlike the original Stern housings they will have the shorter collars as well & are molded from the Date East style? I can't quite tell, but, if this is the case, I will probably just keep using my repaired originals rather than buy some only for this reason.

https://www.planetarypinball.com/mm5/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Product_Code=PPS-545-5100-00WH

I remember now that I noticed height difference several years back. The diameter of the skirt is smaller than the hole so there is no interference. At least I have not had problems. As noted earlier, I have installed 3 sets and actually 4 sets.

I have a set of blacks in my Big Game. I have a set of blacks in my Quicksilver. I had a set of blue units in my Seawitch to try them out and they worked without issue so I moved them to the Star Gazer I built.

I have never had a problem at any time with them. And adjusting the switches has never been a problem. But I need to mention that I adjust the switches so the switch gap/contacts make connection at the last possible moment so the ball can roll all the way in before the pop rings activates.

I will be buying them for my upcoming Cheetah build and for my 2nd Star Gazer build.

I wouldn’t go

You just need your Panthera back.

The difference should be the PinballLife assembly is designed for the metal rod/ring. The Shapeways assembly is designed for the plastic rod/ring.

Maybe if everyone in the thread that thinks they are the same part just keeps concentrating hard on that thought, then all the parts will all magically become the same and then they will somehow all magically work!

Kidding. But yeah, the Shapeways one chuckwurt mentioned is the correct part.

That comment was not directed at you. It was an inside joke from back when Terry @ Pinball Life had an open house event each year at Chicago Pinball Expo.

Terry used to beat people until they were unconscious at Expo?! Was it, like, a cage match type of thing??

Sounds like the shorter collar/lower skirt doesn’t really create a switch problem if set up correctly - may have been other reasons I had a lot of problems getting switch adjustment right. I have since replaced the Data East housing with an original Stern housing I managed to find.

Seems to be very common with the original Stern housings to have corners broken off where the screw holes are. In my case, the screws were installed way off centre & hard up against the hole corners adding pressure to most likely cause them to snap over time. You could see where the screw had cut into the plastic quite a bit. When I epoxied the corners back I enlarged the holes so there was some free movement with the housing when installed. Have been fine since.

I also bleached the housings first to convert the ABS back to a nice bright white look.

No real need to replace them with new ones I guess as the repaired originals should be good for years .

I have not tried the plastic pop rings and cannot comment. What is the design difference? Will a plastic pop ring not fit in the PBL unit?