thought I would post as I just saw this in a thread

Stern Receiver

https://mantispinball.com/product/stern-receiver-old/

Now, we just need lockdown bars remade

Been hammering away at this Cheetah restore.... got about 30 hours in repairing the back box, was worst condition BB & Cab I have ever worked on. This machine had seen a tremendous amount of moisture in the past, all the MDF parts were frayed heavily etc. Large chunks of wood also just missing from the back box on the top & sides....

I ended up making a new rear panel for it out of 1/4" Maple ply. Hand reproduced the slots etc. Just shot it in blue over the weekend, now have to talk to owner to see if he wants to do the black trim on the front like factory. I think it looks so much better in blue....but that's his call. I'm not a huge stickler for originality, but this machine probably should go with the black trim due to the value.

Will start shooting yellow & black here in a few days, & probably going to do a semi gloss clear when all is said & done to seal it.

The Cab has about 40 hours of repair & I just shot the bottom of it in blue last night & will shoot the rest later this week. It's in the background hiding behind an Evel Knievel I am doing as well as a Stars.

IMG_20200426_171034 (resized).jpg

IMG_20200614_183148 (resized).jpg

IMG_20200617_091605 (resized).jpg

IMG_20200617_091738 (resized).jpg

IMG_20200620_154735 (resized).jpg

IMG_20200620_154745 (resized).jpg

IMG_20200620_154801 (resized).jpg

Transformer is 16B-3 not 16B-6, so it’s underpowered. Coin door is different and as mentioned above lockdown bar and receiver are different. You’ll spend a lot of time, effort and about $400 to find these three correct parts.

I’d suggest finding a rough Meteor or Galaxy to convert as these three components are correct in these two titles

I am of the opinion that the MPU-100 Sterns have the better lockdown bar and receiver assembly.

The MPU-100 bar has two ball sockets and two jam nuts. These ball sockets are adjustable so if your lockdown bar is a little loose you are able to adjust the position of the ball sockets to make them tighter or looser as needed.

The MPU-200 lockdown bar and receiver are of a slotted affair. No adjustment is possible. If your lockdown bar comes loose the only way you would be able to tighten is to remove the play field, plug some screw holes in the cabinet where the receiver is attached and then drill new holes to reset the receiver.

The only reason Stern made the move to the slotted bar/receiver assembly is cost reduction, IMO. The 2 ball sockets for the MPU-100 assembly are machined parts with machined threads. And the 2 jam nuts are a special design; You will not be buying any of these in the hardware store. In addition to this, the receiver plate on the bottom of the lock down bar has to also be tapped/threaded.

The slotted units saved a lot of work. On any production line of any size at all, looking for cost savings ( or pinching pennies ) is paramount.

If anybody has the ball and socket MPU-100 type and would like a slotted MPU-200 assembly, let me know I'll trade you straight across as long as you pay for the shipping.
==========================

The coin door is different and perhaps not as desirable, but all it takes is a re-wire job for about 8 wires. Not a slam dunk, but not too much effort is needed to make that conversion.

If you are going for a Star Gazer or a Quicksilver, you will get your play field wiring and backbox/displays harnesses from Shawn at Third Coast Pinball. And Shawn can probably easily make you a new cabinet wiring harness, as well. The speaker can be moved to the floor of the cabinet. Get a saber saw and cut a hole in the floor of the cab.

You probably need to replace and old crapped out, sagging floor anyway. Installing a new floor is not all that hard; You can locate the transformer anywhere you want.

Now, the only item you have left to find is the larger more powerful 16B-6 transformer. This will be your challenge. This fits in with bluespin saying to find a Meteor or Galaxy. My least liked MPU-200 Stern is Lightning.

Are you going to spend some money? Yes. You are. Get your checkbook out. If that bothers you, sell your pins and start collecting stamps as a hobby.

Galaxy = 5,130 produced

Meteor = 8,362 produced

Lighting = 2,350 produced.

Meteor is starting to climb in price a little bit.

I may take you up on that offer! let me check my parts i think i may have both left, if not maybe just the MPU-100 lockdown bar.

The main difference was around the 1 button vs 2 switch for service options, and more difficult is the metal bracket to hold these 2 buttons

Did you use Bondo to fix the flaking corner of the black section on the side? This seems to be made from crappy MDF as well and I was thinking of replacing them but I am not sure how I would make a repro since they are not straight...

You can peel that substandard ( It is not MDF. It is more like fiberboard) material off with an oscillating cutter. Use one that you peeled off as a pattern to make replacements from wood planks you can buy from Home Depot or Lowes. It helps if you have some basic wood working tools like a clamping devise and a plane. Or maybe you could locate a millwright in your area that could cut you a pair for a reasonable price.

https://www.harborfreight.com/variable-speed-oscillating-multi-tool-63113.html

I appreciate the knowledge and info everyone. I'm not afraid of the work, but probably going to hang onto this Wild Fyre as is. Again, it just seems too nice to sacrifice. I have a Meteor, but definitely don't want to convert that beauty. I guess I'll keep any eye out for a Galaxy.

Anyone selling in the near or around upstate NY?

This Cheetah display board was horrible. Every staple had rusted to dust. One of the corners was rotted off on the front from water damage etc.

Repaired, leveled & primed/shot semi gloss white & starting to run new braid & all new sockets.

Display trays before & after pic, bead blast & clear coat lightly to avoid future surface rust.

IMG_20200227_205826 (resized).jpg

IMG_20200429_164623 (resized).jpg

IMG_20200612_092430 (resized).jpg

IMG_20200623_194939 (resized).jpg

I have been looking to join the club. I even randomly messaged folks with a game listed in their collection looking to see if a sale could work out.

Well I tracked one down and after about a week of trying to get a deal done I have it.

Stars!

I am making a list of stuff to fix. So far the lower left standup target, right slingshot are both not working. The right spinner spins like crazy but barely scores. It will probably need displays soon. One drop target doesn't come up and a few aren't correct. But it fires up and plays! Super happy to have this one.

20200625_210136.jpg

Going back to one of my previous post on plastic pop rings. When using the shapeway reproduction plastic rings with the data east pop bumper plastic bracket has anyone done this with the data east plastic thumper base? and if so, what diameter of hole or drill bit was used to widen the hole in the bracket(thumper base) so that the plastic rings can slide through the hole freely?

I would like to use plastic rings but also know drilling the hole out may weaken the hole for stability?? Or I can just use metal rings that fit through the hole.

I assume you are talking about this pop cap base mount? If so, the originals measure .320" dia. or 5/16" dia.

I also have some repros; They have enough meat that you can use the 5/16" drill to open them up without issue.

image (resized).jpeg

any advice on how best to restore real rusty plungers?

20200626_201933 (resized).jpg

Buffing wheel and polishing compound.

If you don't have a buffing wheel, then sandpaper with 400 grit sandpaper. And maybe some 600 grit, too.

interesting, i dont use my buffing wheel much but I will definitely give it a try! Thanks!

Posted this in the Seawitch club but cross posting because I find this very interesting.
Anyone know what’s up with these very different plastic posts?

46760A5B-D9BA-4D1B-8D59-E7EAEF8F922D.jpeg

D114662A-CA65-4A0D-9461-82A60E48E92F.jpeg

Ones a tall and ones a short, often used on games of this era. Those aren't Stern posts though that I know of, but I've never owned a Seawitch.
Tall can often go holding up the plastics, with the shorts underneath....or all talls like slings.

Shit man I aint got time for a tiny Dremel tampons....wire wheel and be done!

Does anyone have 1 or 2 good working 7-digit stern display(s) they’d sell?

I have one outgassed display and another flakey Bally display in a recently acquired Nine Ball.

P1 & P4 are actually good, I swapped them to confirm this. I still need to redo a couple of daisy chain wires.

0F2CB800-4670-4AB1-87B4-BF5ACA56B131 (resized).jpeg

A could of people have made good YouTube videos of how to fix old Bally and Stern displays. It looks like all of yours are missing one digit, but that should be fixable.

The digit is a wiring harness issue triggered somehow by player 2.

E3EECCB8-2445-4B70-A27E-5E90AA7166DA (resized).jpeg

Obviously I know what the short and talls do!! But I’ve never seen the ribbed ones before and noticed most seawitches don’t seem to have them.
Were they more common on a different Stern game, or was this something an operator could get from Wico for a quick swap?

I truly don’t think this whole game was swapped by an operator so I think maybe at some point at the factory they used the ripped posted briefly

They are Williams posts, I think. I don't know which pins. They are tough to wax around.

https://www.pinballlife.com/pbl-300-0050-00-xx.html

PBL-300-0050-00-xx_300x300 (resized).jpg

Someone put Classic bally posts in your classic stern

Note: back in the day... Two manufactures
Made ribbed posts for the pinball companies.
1) Parts for Bally
2) parts for Williams
1a) Bally ribbed posts---- cone shaped hole in bottom of posts
2a) Williams ribbed post --- straight #6 hole through posts.
1b) Bally posts part #C-952-7 "long" #C-951-7 short.
2b)Williams post part #03-7491-9, #03-7491-10,#03-7491-11 [all 1-1/16" tall]

Thank you both! I appreciate that a ton.
Anyone interested in these?
I don’t even need them

Seawitch also came with ribbed posts as shown. both short and tall depending on location. nothing new here. The only difference is they used the deep, deep purple like on the Williams to hold on light boards. You won't find any of those but you can use what Pinball Resource has for sale on ribbed posts and repost your game with new.

Xenon had them and most of them faded from Blue to Pink. It was extremely difficult 20 years ago or so to find non-faded ones. Finally PBR remade them.

#flight-2000 owners interested in new software posted here:
https://sites.google.com/site/allentownpinball/galaxy-asm/f2k-release-3347M.zip?attredirects=0&d=1

Thread discussing the software mods:
https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/opening-flight-2000-new-software-up-to-the-community

Have many of you experienced an apparent corrupted software glitch on any classic stern? On our recently acquired Nine Ball, I know that I have a display issue which I think is a problem with the display wiring or related connectors.

I can leave player 1 connected and it seems fine.

But what has me confused is that scoring seems to increase but then there seems to be a glitch and it drops 10,000 or 100,000.

All other functions appear normal. Also, the board is original and all 4 EPROMs appear to have been replaced at some point.

Attached is a picture of a final score, glass off. The high score to date flashes afterwards and it shows correctly with all 7 digits displayed.
E762E386-F80F-4821-A23C-16E9AE2D6C49 (resized).jpeg

052463E7-0624-46CD-B55F-89FCA93945AE (resized).jpeg

Nine Ball is plagued with problems... Check out new software over at the Nine Ball club.
As far s displays, check cold solder joints, connectors, PIA, display transistors, etc,etc,etc.

So... i replaced the power switch on one of my Stern but the replacement one from Marcos and DigiKeyare longer than the factory one, meaning they stick out from the bottom of the cabinet and would be damaged if it was laying flat on the ground...

Any other options out there that are around the same size as the original one?

20200706_202936 (resized).jpg

20200706_202947 (resized).jpg

20200706_203015 (resized).jpg

20200706_203335 (resized).jpg

Hmm...never though of laying a machine down that way. Now I have no idea if my replacements stick out!

It is on the way you mounted the neck of the switch.
Use the nuts to screw down the neck so as to move the assembly
further up into the cabinet.
If that does not work, then grind the tip of the switch stem off and round off.

I’ve got Orbitor laying down, easier to work on it and take the playfield out with it on the floor and legs off.

You can always shim it higher in the cab.

interesting, i'll have a close look and compare with the original one from another game.

vec-tor knows his stuff. Adjusting the nuts will probably work for what you need.

But if not, Go get a paint stir stick from the paint store. Stir stick wood makes good shims.

These you just throw into a Walnut shell tumbler overnight. Wake up and super shiny.

Well interesting you had this problem. I said the same thing when I replaced the switch on my Gamatron. It stuck out and said I would never lay it down. Well I go to move it about 5 years later and rip the switch right out of the cabinet. On the replacement I made a spacer that put the switch high enough so it wouldn't hit if cabinet flat on cart or bed of truck.

I noticed this with a switch I replaced too. I ended up ordering a DPST switch from Amazon that fit correctly.

so comparing the new to the original one, there is about 1/4" in length more on the replacement switch. So definitely 1/4" too long... I'll try adding a 1/4 space on the thread, it looks like it may fit. If not, i can do like Bally and add a woof shim to raise it though i'd rather stick with "original" look

Do you have a link on the one you ordered?

20200707_142629 (resized).jpg

20200707_142719 (resized).jpg

shim it. done.

https://www.pinballlife.com/williamsbally-14-nylon-spacer-03-6047-1.html

Four of these should do the trick. Just move the ground braid above the spacer so you still have contact.

Will an early Bally bracket work here? I think they might be the same?

Bally ones don't have the little tab the goes into the recess, it's just a flat bar, unless the very early bally -17 games have it.

All the Bally SS pins use the same bar. It has two tabs that hold the glass. Look just like the early Stern bars. Just wondering if they fit in a Stern backbox.

Maybe that's why my BOPP glass won't stay in I don't think it has the tabs. Wonder where that bar came from??

Recently aquired a Stern Galaxy.
I would like to join as I'm going to do a restoration.
How and whom should I speak with?

Message_1593821047259 (resized).jpg

You are at the right place.