I try to rescue as many games as I can. We only have a limited number of these older games, and new ones will never be made.

Too many of them get parted out for relatively minor problems.

The electronics and mechanics of games can be fixed or replaced easily enough. Artwork tends to be more difficult, expensive, and time consuming.

How much time, effort, and money you decide to throw at a project game is totally up to you. I try to at least break even. If an $800 game needs a new $600 playfield, then that's not going to happen--but, I'll put in the effort to try to get scans and create decals to patch problem areas to get the game looking somewhat nice again.

I have not had my RFM for very long, and my friends and family soon found out I was looking for a project. They all asked why, and I responded "I just need a project to work on". It's like crack for pinheads that enjoy fixing things.

I feel ya. I love project games and always have one or two in line to get worked on. Otherwise tweaking and modding stuff that's already been repaired.

I go in and out of having time to spend on pinball. It's fun to gain knowledge and fix stuff, but at the end of the day it's way different than playing. I'm currently shopping out JD with my babe friend, I joke to her that the most important part of restoring games... is to take a break and play

Plenty of people enjoy projects. Sometimes I'll save a game from being scrapped and do enough so that the remaining problems are manageable and sell it to someone else interested in a project. This saves a game and provides someone else with a project. This approach can save you a ton of dough and keep a project from growing stale.

Usually when its far too late ...

Yeah, addicting thing aint it?
I think if you like doin it, decide what your gonna sell them for, and stick to that number.
you are already at a loss when you buy them, so, you will not recover the money.
So fix them, and post then for a reasonable "recovered" price, and just do it.

I decided a while back to not concern myself with the resale value so much and look at the project as enjoying a hobby and saving a game from the dumpster. Any cash you get when you sell is just a bonus from that perspective.

However, ForceFlow is right about avoiding a money pit - I do think about the resale value of the game in terms of material costs. So if you have some unloved EM game that sells for $400 max, I won't spend more than that to save it. My time is essentially valueless in the equation, though.

I believe I would rather work on them than play honestly. I love to play but I get tired of a game fast. Only a few have had lasting power. Getting one running that was left for dead is an awesome feeling

That said I have to break even. I do not count time into the dollar amount but total all parts and even the gas it took to go get it. All the money I spend on pins comes from pins so if I lose all my money then there are no more pins.

The real problem is some collectors do not know when to stop.
Early on this is not a severe problem, but eventually it becomes more than an addiction, if not tempered.
It is like a new reality TV show, "Pinball Hoarders".
I still remember visiting the long term pinball flyer and paper collector from the "History of Pinball", I just can't remember his name off hand.
I have never seen so many file cabinets in one house.

I recently visited a friend whose home has now been completely overtaken by projects.
I had not seen him in close to 10 years.
All over his house, garage, storage facility, basement...everywhere.

At brief count over 60 machines in pieces, with parts in bins, backglasses on the floor (big no no), playfields upright in maintenance position, etc.
Only 25% of his machines even worked.
I really do not know how he kept track of his tools.
His wife was more than annoyed, I could tell, she was outright pissed.
He was completely overwhelmed.
He finally was in the process of downsizing after 15 years or so in the hobby, broke down, and was asking for assistance.
I don't turn away to help get things under control.

Another new collector I knew (many years ago) had so many machines in his 2 bedroom apartment, he slept underneath them on a mattress, but no full bed.
Not sure how he ever managed to keep a girlfriend.
Most people in this second category eventually fold like a house of cards, especially if they do not know how to do even basic repairs.

I never recommended having more than 2-3 projects at any time, if you want to do them correctly.
You are NEVER going to recoup the value of your time anyway.
It makes no difference, if you have space or not.
If you do have a proper storage facility, break them down if they are EMs or early SS, or just fold them up if later SS.
Do not give yourself to look at them and say, "I can fix that quickly".
Keep them out of sight.
Sell off what you cannot handle, "rainy days" are never going to be enough.
Even if you have all the necessary game specific parts to bring a game back from the dead.
I don't even list project machines "in my collection" unless they are finished and are "keepers", which most are NOT.

At one point, I personally was carrying over 5 tons (>10,000 lbs) of general purpose, game specific, and electronic parts to manage repairs for over a dozen manufacturers.
Those days are completely over.
I keep my extra "overflow" machines in my collection in storage.
I refuse to set them up in locations they do not belong.

You just cannot save every rat turd / mouse urine game, and some are just not worth the effort, even if you bought them for $50 at a yard sale.
Make a coffee table out of the playfield, save the backglass, and harvest donor parts for other machines to help others.

My brother had 20+ project pins. He finally dialed back to just 3-4 pins when he sold 23 pins this week. Granted he's a restorer and finishes games in like a week or two with 2 other employees but those projects just kept going to the backburner. He finally leveled up, got organized and only a couple in pieces at a time.

"Learning" and the sooner the better.
Pinball project machines stack like unread books.

I always like to have 3-4 project games in the cue by fall. That gives me something to do in the basement in the winter months. I'm finishing #3 GTL Royal Flush - to have it ready for the MGC.

It gets routine: finish dinner clean-up, turn on some music, dig into a machine. In my opinion, it beats sitting in front of the tube.

I've been in this spot in the past. Picked up a shed find of 6 machines. One of them was bootable. Added a non-booting but nice condition Firepower when it found me shortly after. Got overwhelmed, because I just didn't have enough knowledge or experience to deal with that volume of projects. Ended up stripping 2 machines for parts (a Gorgar and a Charlie's Angels both full of mouse nests, poop, and water damage), selling 4 (Xenon, Bally Rolling Stones, Genie, and the Firepower). The one that was bootable (Jungle Lord) is still in my house.

At this point, I know more, and I have more machines, and am even routing a couple. So a project or two is not as overwhelming.

But routing is proving to be non-viable as a business in this town. I have 1 project machine which was a basket case but is now coming together very nicely.

I think in the near future I'll thin the herd drastically. The new plan will be to keep 3 machines around, maybe a stretch of 4. One will be a project with which I'll push the envelope and start trying high end restoration stuff. This will definitely not be a break-even prospect, but I'll enjoy the project and end result. The other 2-3 will be for play. No new machines may come unless an old one goes, or unless there is an extreme circumstance like coming across a grail machine that someone just wants out of their house.

I guess a shorter answer to "when do you stop" is "whenever the combined factors of space, free time, and money" make it enjoyable to keep at a project, I'll keep at it. But whenever the joy is gone, so is the project, and that's probably a moving target for everyone.

I used to think like that, 20 years ago - I passed on tons of projects, sold off games, got rid of all my extra parts. Then I did a big purge before a renovation, and taking a 10-year vacation from pinball.

When I came back, all those games I got rid of are now worth 10x-20x what I paid. I have another friend who didn't get rid of all those cheap games and now has a warehouse full of games worth probably a million dollars. No kidding.

So, like anything, I guess there's a middle ground between hoarding and keeping it minimal. I have five projects and five fully working games.

So I am the proud owner of the SF2 rat project. Goal is to put as little money into it while cleaning it up.

So far using evapo rust 1 of the legs is trash. The plating was flaking off before I tried to soak it.
The side rails have been pulled from the machine and I am trying to figure out the most efficient way to derust them.

Part of this is testing what works and what doesn't on a machine that I won't cry if it gets ruined. Aluminum foil and coke works surprisingly well. Sandpaper of course always works. Going to try some quick-glo next.

The goal is to bring the machine back to being desireable, but I am not going to go overboard. I could pull everything from the cab and sand the inside so it looks nice again, but not worth it. The same goes for the back of the lighboard.

I do have a buddy that has two goldwings. Now, some would argue they could both be saved, but I think one is a write off. The playfield has melted inserts like no machine I've ever seen. These things melted so much that they got filled in with caulk. Also the main ramp is melted beyond saving. Could it be saved? Sure, but at that point it makes no sense. My project I took because the main pf is nice and the cabinet isnt terrible. The rest is just elbow grease and wiring.