Nice job on that head. The paint and stencils etc look great. Glad you are saving the game.
I have a Sure Shot and it's a good game to play.
Nice job on that head. The paint and stencils etc look great. Glad you are saving the game.
I have a Sure Shot and it's a good game to play.
It's bad enough you have to deal with a trashed cabinet. You have other issues as well. You're a trouper getting that thing going again. More power to you!
Progress!
I was able to find a lock bar that works, but it's of the wrong vintage.
The bar I was able to get was originally used on GTB games from Dancing Lady in 1966 to Jungle in 1972. It's part #D-10054. It has welded end caps. I'm looking for the one-piece, studded one they used later...but I can settle for this one for now. I'm sure someone, somewhere has a mismatched later lockdown bar with an earlier game that will want to do a swap.
20160629_135356_POST_(resized).jpg
I have the body of the cab completely empty and ready for structural work. I knocked out the rear particle board panel of the game (which was completely chewed) and have replaced it with a piece of solid wood of the same thickness. The back bottom corners were completely blown out, and I've added a wooden support to add structure and give the KwikWood something to bond to. I'll be using the reinforced leg brackets.
The next step before sanding the thing down will be to capture the side art to make my stencils.
Braved the Ontario heatwave (a walk in the park for you EM dudes in the Southern US) and got the Sure Shot cab back together after finishing the re-paint. I ended up knocking out the ass-end of the cab, and replaced it with a piece of ply. Pretty happy with how it turned out so far. The "TOTALLY AWESOME" coin door is no longer totally awesome, but cleaned up great. Next, I'll work on getting the bottom board gone thru before putting it back in. I'll be ordering a new shooter rod face plate from PBR, as the old one is too far gone to save. Notice the lockdown bar! Looks OK for not being the right vintage, right?
That's a hell of a job both in cab repair and stencil making. Not at all an easy stencil to do.
What did you use for stencil material and how did you cut it.
Quoted from EMsInKC:Not at all an easy stencil to do.
What did you use for stencil material and how did you cut it.
I use a velum/mylar type material. Very thin and flexible. Easy to work with. I lightly weight the stencil down with old leg bolts and other metal junk when it comes time to spray--that way it gets the ever important "overspray" effect. I've done a bunch of cabs in the past year: Solar City, World Fair, Jack Open, Spanish Eyes, two Volleys, two Joker Pokers and now this Sure Shot which required the most work of them all. On deck, I have a Melody and a Stern Stars.
Quoted from spiroagnew:I use a velum/mylar type material. Very thin and flexible. Easy to work with. I lightly weight the stencil down with old leg bolts and other metal junk when it comes time to spray--that way it gets the ever important "overspray" effect. I've done a bunch of cabs in the past year: Solar City, World Fair, Jack Open, Spanish Eyes, two Volleys, two Joker Pokers and now this Sure Shot which required the most work of them all. On deck, I have a Melody and a Stern Stars.
Similar to what I use and basically the same process I use, I'm just interested in what you use to cut it out.
Quoted from EMsInKC:how did you cut it.
Sorry...missed that part in my earlier reply. The material was cut with a standard X-Acto knife, nothing special. Cutting perfect circles is difficult even with a sharp blade and a guide, but the material I used and the weighting down process is very forgiving. For example, I didn't weight down the area around the cabinet pool balls when I was spraying. I got just enough overspray under the stencil to hide any imperfections in my circle cuts. If it was weighted down or stuck down with spray-tac, the paint would have hugged the edge of the stencil and you'd be able to see the cuts weren't completely round. That said, anyone ever seen the shape of Saturn on the Solar City cabinet? Gottlieb didn't seem too concerned with perfect circles back then either!!
I did circles on Royal Guard, that game has several of them, and I used a circle cutter that worked pretty well. That's a good tip about the weighting, I think at times I've weighted too much and gotten a sharp edge with little overspray, which does tend to show the imperfections in the cutting process. I've got some stencils I've used and am done with, I might practice on some cardboard with them and some lesser weighting and see if that helps. I've also bought a new X-Acto knife that is designed more for cutting rounded shapes, I'll see how that works when I cut my next stencils.
I've used French curves as a guide with a standard X-Acto before, but the blade tends to get caught on the edges. I think this new knife will help with that issue too. I repainted a Triple Strike with all those bowling pins on the sides and that was tough. Same issue, any deviation from perfectly cut showed up in the end result due to sharper edges.
Thanks for the tips. The more you do this and the more you read about other guys doing it, the more you learn.
I'll buy Pinball Pimp stencils if they're available but this is all good to know for other games he hasn't done.
I glued in the inserts last night. I was able to grab a donor 1" insert from a spare Gottlieb playfield I had kicking around for the "2" insert that was missing.
I scanned the exisiting "2" insert from the in-lane, and cleaned up the edges in Photoshop. Using some decal paper I picked up from DecalPaper.com, I was able to print out a "2" and water slide it onto the blank donor decal. Looks decent when unlit, however you'll probably be able to spot the difference when it's lit--it'll be more washed out than the others. I'll also have to carefully paint the keyline...and painting perfect circles ain't my strong suit.
I'll be touching up the playfield next...
Quoted from spiroagnew:however you'll probably be able to spot the difference when it's lit
I think I read in another thread at some point that stacking two decals on top of each other may help with that.
Quoted from ForceFlow:I think I read in another thread at some point that stacking two decals on top of each other may help with that.
What he said.
Glad to see you are restoring it. When you asked if it should be restored or parted, I was definitely on the restore side. I have seen way worse machines before which were restored. Of course, there is always a lot more work than you think, but all the work you put into it is the best part.
I'll try to stack the decals...makes sense.
I've finished the playfield cleaning and begun touch-ups...it's becoming painfully clear this thing is going to have to be clear-coated. Paint is chipping/flaking off when wiping with a iso- alcohol dampened rag. I'll be clearing with KBS Diamond Coat...rolled on with a sponge roller.
Hey now! "Totally Awesome" news!
The game lives! Playfield was stripped and touched up. Light clearcoat applied and buffed out to a dull glaze. BG Resto backglass...which seems to block a lot of the light...it's going to need LEDs behind there.
The game starts, plays five balls and goes to game over...so it'll be a bunch of little issues to sort out--like sockets not lighting, the special not activating, and probably a whole host of other little issues I've not discovered yet.
Looking great!
If you are having problems with light sockets on your Rack Grid and want a permanent fix:
https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/em-light-socket-grid-socket-replacement
Quoted from EM-PINMAN:Looking great!
If you are having problems with light sockets on your Rack Grid and want a permanent fix:
https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/em-light-socket-grid-socket-replacement
YES! I was just talking to bingopodcast about this earlier via text...thanks for the link.
I licked a bunch of little problems today. Got the ball and game over lights working as well as cleaning and adjusting the switches on the under playfield bank.
One problem persists: every so often I lose scoring and chimes to all rollovers, pop bumpers and slings. The associated rollover coil on the bank activates as well as the under playfield series relay. Pops still fire. Just no points awarded or the associated chime. The standups still score properly tho. Every time I think I've fixed it, it pops up again. It did it again tonight and I've left it that way...it must be a contact on a relay somewhere.. .just can't find it...
I think I have the intermittent scoring problem solved thanks to a kind Pinsider who took the time to help solve my problem. It was a switch on the score motor preventing scoring.
I've also noticed another scoring hiccup in the game while doing some play testing now that the game plays reliably. The left and right kickout holes award an in-game bonus based on the pool balls lit, 100 for each unlit ball, 1000 for each lit ball. The hole is omitting the #6 and #9 ball weather lit or unlit. So if no balls are lit, it should award 500 points, wherein it is only giving 400. Maybe its just me, but I can hear the hiccup in the chimes: ding-(pause)-ding-ding-ding. End of ball bonus recognizes the #6 and #9 balls. There are associated relays for these two kickout holes on the bottom board...I'll start my examination there.
there is nothing more satisfying then bring a game back from the dead. I am sure you learned a lot along the way. now find another basket case!
well done!
The second scoring issue seems to be cleared up. I noticed the #6 and #9 were ganged together on the left and right hole relays, and traced it to the associated switch on the score motor stack 2C. A little adjustment and cleaning, and now there is no stutter in the bonus count, it scores all billiard balls!
If my back agrees, I may haul this thing into the basement gameroom tonight seeing as it seems to be working 100%!
I got the game into the gameroom. It's surprisingly fun, and there are lots of ways to score points. I think I held some prejudice against the game from the beginning as GTB rollover games don't grab me as much as drop target games. That said, it's probably doesn't have a long term home with me.
IMG_20160917_195555 (resized).jpg
The center plastic below the middle pop bumper was missing a large chunk out of it, so I made my own replacement using a sheet of PeTG/Lexan and those waterslide decals I used to make the "2" on the rollover earlier in the thread. I had clear decals, so after reverse printing, I sprayed the ink side of the decal with an off-white primer to seal it, and mimic the white shielding of an original. This plastic isn't back lit, so there wasn't a real worry about light bleed, more just to make the colours a bit more bold. Once the decal was applied to the bottom side of the cut plastic, I gave it a shot of triple thick, to ensure it stayed in place. Overall, it looks decent...better than what I had before.
Great Job!
Just one thing is that the center target plastic you made is upside down as I owned a Sure Shot and Bank Shot. If you look at your right and left stand up targets they have the curved part of the plastic facing out, the middle should be the same to match. Another tell tale sign is the part number is upside down. This is a pretty common mistake folks make as it is confusing with the round part of the pop bumper being right there as well.
That homemade repro plastic looks great! I think the little guy likes the game. Maybe keep it around for him?
Nice job!
Your homemade plastic looks great, but it is indeed mounted backwards. The curved side definitely goes to the target side, not the pop bumper side. To be sure, I also confirmed this on my Sure Shot.
I'm not trying to turn this into a pissing match, because I'm clearly not as seasoned as some of the others here...but I don't think serial number orientation really means much, as the plastic right next the one in question, which is mounted correctly, has an upside down serial number:
I was questioning the orientation of the centre plastic when installing it....so I referenced the original Sure Shot flyer...which seems to have the flat green side oriented towards the flippers and the red/yellow protuberances toward the bumpers. Are my eyes working correctly? I've looked at the low quality IPDB flyer so much I'm not sure anymore:
That said, I'll totally agree that I have it in upside down despite the flyer telling me otherwise...because Solar City/Target Alpha/El Dorado have the same shape plastic, and their flyers have the bumps pointed towards the flipper and the flat part against the bumper. Thanks for pointing it out...I'll change it up. However, I wanted to bring these points up for discussion.
My vote goes to having the flat side to the pop bumper. It makes breaking the plastic from an air ball less of a possibility when there is less plastic right above the stand up target face.
I'm all about not beating the game up during gameplay.
BTW, nice work bringing this game back. You really got it cleaned up nice. I bet it plays great.
Based on the flyer from manitouguy it would appear that you were originally correct. I see the green side near the target, the red bar closer to the pop bumper and the yellow on the left.
http://www.nypinball.com/showdetailbro.php?br=897_front_org.jpg
Quoted from CrazyLevi:Loose inserts are common with this title. They aren't hard to find either.
$250 for a new backglass and you are still only 250 into the game.
I don't know that I'd bother with full blown restoration but that's not my thing. It looks like it's in nice shape inside and that's a pretty simple/easy game to get working mechanically. The Iron Workers local sticker is also badass.
I'd say save it, unless you really need a parts machine.
If it were me it would probably be stripped for a parts machine - I don't have space for a major project like that but maybe you do.
Where do you get a new back glass for the Sure Shot?
Quoted from Kominkay:Where do you get a new back glass for the Sure Shot?
bgresto.com
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