I had to return the LED florescent tube that I ordered from amazon last week (see link below). for some reason, the LED light tube was about 1/8" shorter than my "real" florescent tube and the 2 contacts on either end didn't want to make a good connection in the ballast to light the new tube.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00852A8SO/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o02_s00

did anyone else that ordered one, have similar issues?

Yeah, I'm returning mine because it wouldn't lock in place and come on every time, so I'd have to open it up and adjust it. Then the other night my husband was playing and the light start flickering, the monitor display started flicking, and the computer started buzzing. We quickly turned it off, looked around, pulled the bulb, put the flourescent back, and no issues at all. So I contacted the company for a refund. It looked good when it worked, but I didn't want to chance it messing something up after the buzzing/flickering started in the machine's computer.

So, I got my replacement LED tube in. It worked as soon as I put it in. So then, I went to turn it just a tiny bit, and poof - stopped working. Hasn't worked since.

Here's the thing - you CANNOT turn the bulb buy grabbing the middle of it. You HAVE to grab the ends of the bulb. If you grab the middle, you are toast.

That's two down now. I'm putting my incad back in and leaving it in place.

Two bad mods in 1 month = I'm on mod break for a while.

So I DID go buy a new incad tube for my RFM to rectify this situation. Mine has always had a "light purple" bulb - hard to explain without seeing it.

Went and got a Philips T8 18" Cool White bulb for $6.97 plus tax at Home Depot. Looks way better than the stock bulb I had.

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I can't believe the problems people are experiencing with these LED tubes. I just got another one that I ordered for Mancave in Australia because they won't ship to him. I opened it up and installed it in my game to make certain it worked before shipping it to him. I put it in, turned on my game and it fired right up without issue. I took it out, bubble wrapped it up and put it right back in the box that they shipped it to me in so I can ship it out to him tomorrow morning.

I don't know what's going on with some of these, but I apologize and am sorry for the aggravation you all are going through. Thank God that with Amazon you can easily return it or get a replacement. I wish they all worked as well as mine. Sorry again. I feel terrible.

Don't feel terrible. You found something cool that worked for you and shared. I would have done the same thing.

I've been playing my RFM more lately now that I've got full LEDs in it. I had read where people were putting purple in the spotlights to give it a black light feel, so I tried that but my purples weren't strong enough and it just looked dark. So I put super bright greens in instead, with a Comet platinum flex spotlight in the back one to light up the ramp a little, and I think it looks good. It's a tiny bit green-washed, but the aliens look awesome.
I put pink in the outlane lights, blue in the inlane lights, a different blue for the SOL light, and UV purple on the large square "credits" lights in the bottom outlanes. I got tired of just red, green, and yellow. (It all comes together a little better and with less glare with the glass on, but somehow I don't have a pic of that.)

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Fingers crossed that I've got a good one out of the batch. It's been working for a week now so it must have been made on a happy day in the factory. When they work, they're awesome.

agreed. it's a shame that it didn't work out for me (or blondetall), but them's the breaks. it looks like it would have been a good alternate solution, but possibly suffers due to poor [chinese] quality control.

NewPinOwner is also correct that the part of the problem lies with the ends being able to turn independently of the tube itself (which kind of makes sense so that you can position the direction of the LEDs), but can cause issues since you have to make sure that you're rotating both ends to secure the ballast locks.

for me the problem was the total length. I don't think that mine was able to make a good connection with the connectors inside of the ballast because it was too short.

This is just a crazy idea, but couldn't you "slot" the holes where the ends screw to the main metal part so they can be moved inwards further, hence reducing the gap??

Time for a glareguard on RFM.

Look at that translite glare D: ...

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Whew... that's much better!

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Glareguard installed - a bit different but hey it works!!

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I remember when someone told me to get a glare guard for RFM. I thought they were joking, but then I tried one I had and it worked great. Which reminds me that I am still one short now that I added another pin and need to order one.

So, I went ahead and added the Pyle 3.5 speakers today per Nosro's Speaker Upgrade thread.

The difference is noticeable. It's not going to sound like a 7.1 surround sound system or anything, but the audio is definitely MUCH clearer than before.

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As Nosro already documented, the hardest part by far is removing the grill, which just takes a lil time.

The three nylon nuts in the back are a 11/32" wrench. There's not enough room for a socket - ratcheting crescent wrenches will save you time here.

The three Torx secruity screws are T-15. The are NOT ordinary Torx screws; they are Torx SECURITY screws.

Once the three nylon hexnuts and the three Torx screws are out, just gently pull, and the grill should come right off.

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Note, there is a braided ground strap that comes off the far right threaded stud of the grill.

Now, here are the old speakers:

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And here is old vs new:

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Here are both mounted:

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Here is what they look like without being painted black and the grill assembly back on:

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Here, you will finally see them with the flash on:

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The female connectors are the same sizes as the speaker male spade connectors, so it is a literal plug and play job. I mounted my speakers and tested my audio before re-assembly, and they worked great.

I had to do absolutely zero modifications to anything to make this work or for re-assembly. With the correct tools, this was a 100% replacement plug and play job.

Thanks, Nosro, for the info and research on correct replacement speakers; they sound and look fantastic!

Sorry to everyone that I haven't been in here for awhile. I've been a little busy (an understatement) with Pintastic stuff.

@BlondeTall...Thank you for the kind words BT and I apologize again to everyone who had problems with their LED tubes. I just don't get that. Ughhh.

Your RFM looks beautiful and I'm glad that all your hard work paid off and has you playing it more.

@j_m...I know we just PM'd each other, but I just thought of this. If your tube was just short, I wonder if you could've taken the ballast ends and slightly bent it in a teensie bit on both ends to get it to make solid contact?

If anyone else has or gets one with the same issue, try that and let us know if it works. Thanks.

@NPO...Great job with the speaker upgrade. Really looks nice and is a definite clarity upgrade over the originals. Looks nice and congrats!

Additionally, I took one of Comet's 7 strip purple LED light strips and stuck it up under the ball catcher. It shines beautifully on the PF and illuminates the area nicely for game play. The light I have it tied in to makes it come on intermittently and sometimes stays on for a little while. It adds a lot IMO to an otherwise dark area. I will add a picture to this post so you guys can see it soon.

Hi Guys, Firstly, can i say, Pinfidel, TY mate, i very much appreciate you taking the time and FAITH, to buy, and then send the LED tube BEFORE getting any payment from me, that's bloody awesome. The tube turned up (bubble wrapped enough to survive a mini nuke) and it is EXCELLENT. The difference between the fluoro is quite noticeable and, of course, the LED tube will be far better physically on my translite (all the more reason being a new translite). There was a slight difference in size (as has been pointed out by some people on here), but i put that down to good Ol' Chinese construction (it is getting better let's be real, Japanese produced electronics were once ridiculed as shite too). It is sad to hear to that some people that bought these tubes had failures but i can only guess that these people were just unlucky. I must also point out that i agree entirely with Pinfidel that if you bend the ballast ends in (the metal part), it will fix the problem with the gap between the tube ends. I personally just got a bit anal with it and felt that "maybe" doing this "may" change the angle of the ballast contact points so my solution was this :-
I used my trusty Dremel tool and cut off the end (on the right side) close to (or just in from) the inner point, trimmed the cut off part flush, and then Mig welded it back on, about 5-6mm in total (but i recommend measuring your original fluoro up against the LED tube and noting the difference in size between the outside of the pins). That's about it really, if you don't have access to a mig welder then i also think you could glue a plastic spacer to the back of one ballast, but you would need to leave a small "cut out gap" at the back so the plastic "pin" can seat behind it. I will just point out that bending the ballast ends in should work just as well, it came down to my own "preference" in the end. I have attached some pics, but ask any questions if you guys need to !!
END NOTE "I LOVE THE LED"

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I'm not sure if something is missing from my machine, but the key lock to the left of the coin door doesn't seem to serve any purpose at all. The cam inside doesn't actually lock into place anywhere. I assumed it was to stop the lockdown bar ratchet from moving but the cam on mine doesn't touch the mechanism or slot into place anywhere at all. What's the go guys?, has something been removed or changed on my machine that i'm not aware of?

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That key was for routing operators to leave with the establishment personnel. If a ball got stuck, they could use that key to releas the lockbar, remove glass, and clear any stuck balls as needed. The playfield could NOT be opened, so money was still safely locked up.

This. a really ingenious feature if you ask me!

Chris

I agree, it does make sense and after reading your explanation, the reason why mine was just spinning uselessly around and making no contact became clearly (and embarassingly obvious) The lock down bar handle had been bent inwards towards the back of the cabinet, hence not making any contact. Easiest fix in pinball history (well, mine, anyway). TY

There would be a lot more cleaner sited machines if this idea took off.

I just finished shopping my RFM and everything looks great except the black vinyl decal that goes on the lower front of the ball catcher. The ball beats the heck out of that sometimes when it comes off the skip ramp. I cannot find anyone that has this or any generic adhesive backed black vinyl that looks like it would work. Does anyone have a source for something to replace this with?

@ManCave You're very welcome my brothah. I was more than happy to do it for ya. I'm just glad it worked out for you. That is a real nice custom light job. Wish I could weld.

That is also true on that key lock. NJGecko told me about that and what is was for. It's an awesome idea indeed.

I noticed the same on mine and would love to hear if anyone has found a good solution to that. I've thought about taking some black gaff tape to cover the catcher front. It's one of those things that once you notice during a cleaning it will drive you crazy every time you look at the game.

I have a piece of textured vinyl that I got from someone on RGP or Pinside long ago. I have an extra that you can have if I can find it.

Well...................
Hesitant to admit it, but I used black electrical tape. Just ran the strips long and trimmed off the ends neatly with a razor knife. It actually looks pretty good. Much better than the fraying, ratty old vinyl. That area is pretty dark, so you do not notice what it is.

Great. Let me know if you find it. I would be happy to pay you for it, mine really looks bad.

there was a pinsider that had a couple of NOS ball catcher vinyl decals on hand and he was going to send one to rick @ pps to see about getting them re-made but I have no idea if that ever happened.

I know that rick's had a lot on his plate lately (MMr, taking over all of IPC's assets and moving them to california), so this might be one of those things that either got lost in the shuffle or put on the back burner.

edit:
and the only place that I've ever seen these carried was pinball.co (pinball spare parts australia) which were probably had by the buy-out when WMS shuttered the pinball division back in 2001, but they've been sold-out for quite some time.

http://www.pinballspareparts.com.au/31-3547-1.html

Very interesting. Loved the pictures!

finally had a fantastic game this past saturday morning and felt like sharing. my machine is set up with the factory default settings; no ball saver, 3-ball games, extra ball at 50M and 200M, etc...

I've owned the game for about a year now and until 2 weekends ago, I've never even made to the 'attack mars' mode. two saturday's ago I had a stellar first ball, completing 7 or 8 of the saucer lights and got to 'attack mars' on the third ball but didn't realize what I needed to do (I guess should have read the instructions about the use of the 'action buttons'
even so, without defeating mars, it bumped my high score to date from about 365M to just over 610M

this past saturday morning, I didn't start out that great, but ended up having a terrific 3rd ball, make it to the 'attack mars' mode and finally defeated the martians. my new high score is now 793,288,780

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Here is what I used for in front of the ball catcher, hockey stick tape, made from rubber with a small raised portion in the center. Works great.

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Hey everyone!! My family and I are stoked to be a member of this club. I traded me DE Star Wars for this pin and we have not been able to turn it off. I have cleared all errors except two.

Check lamp matrix B - it has all LEDs

Check drop target switch/coil

I also posted on this:

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/revenge-from-mars-rfm-drop-target-error

Thanks for any input and glad to be a member!
Rob
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I haven't had my machine for that long myself but i recall reading a post about the lamp matrix error before. From memory, the machine will do this when regular bulbs have been changed to LED's and won't effect the machine. As for the drop target switch error, i have seen something about this before too but can't remember the reason behind it.

Drop target fixed, switch just needed adjusted. That damn credit dot irks me though! I understand it is from the LEDs, I just wish there was a workaround.

Go back to incandescent bulbs. I did that and couldnt believe how much better the light show was. I normally LED most of my pins, but RFM was the first pin I owned where I yanked out every LED.

Me too. With the video amp making screen bright enough and the LEDs, the game just pops.

LEDs that I've seen in this game tend to really overlight the PF. Frankly, the majority of LED treatments on games overlight PFs and make them look like a LiteBrite.

Black paint stick!

Just picked up mine Sunday only issue is it has the original software code in it version .7! I have watched the youtube vid on updating and just ordered a null modem cable and have 1.6 to put on it. I have an old desktop with windows xp on it and serial port. Anything else I need to look out for on the update.
Thanks,
Joe

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just replaced the black on the front of my catcher with black gorilla tape...(duct tape)

Did you download the updater and the 1.5 software? That should be all you need. Let me know if you have any problems. You are not far from me if you need help.

Chris

Sign me up...just nabbed one and loving it.

Finally beat the game today! So fun. That last level ROCKS!! What is the deal with people dissing this game?!

I have a few theories based on what I've read and people I've discussed this with.

1. It's too different and therefore not real pinball. I've noticed that pinball enthusiasts, like most people, are slow to accept radical changes. Slowly introduce a new kind of pop bumper or fancy toy and that's tolerable. Turn the DMD into something like an LCD or on-field overlay and the knives come out. Just look at lack of buzz around the P3 games.

2. It's one of the last games made by the best pinball company of modern times and pin2k is blamed for their untimely demise.

3. Humor sells the game, but does not translate as well to noisy places. Play it at a convention or a noisy barcade and you lose the audio end of the humor and lessen the game.

I just think this game is an absolute blast! My 90 year old Grandma is staying with me and thinks the same. Just awesome!!image-951.jpgimage.jpg

Dude. Your grandma is awesome!!

Dang! I thought I was the only one with the World's Oldest Pinball Player in the family! My mother, who is also 90, played my TAF all afternoon!

Mike in Kentucky

I picked up a RFM at York 2014 and i would like to add the saucer mod also.Waiting to see what happens with the newest version from the UK when it will be available.

This just made my night! Thanks for sharing your grandma's pics with us. Tell her we all said that she really is...AWESOME!!!

I ordered the saucer mod. It should be here by Christmas. Can't wait!