Talk to Steve at MI Pinball Refinery, he makes a custom LED speaker light kit that fully interactive with the machine, he also has the undercab lighting too. I have it on mine

It was done by a couple of people, I think one guy offered it as a kit but it was a little more than most wanted to pay at the time.

I've been thinking about it. Best place would be the mission insert, but it's not straightforward to snoop the control bus on a Premium. On a Pro if I recall these are simple insert, so it's relatively easy to monitor through an arduino

Does the lockdown bar button change with the mode selected?

99% sure all the RGB LEDs including the lock down button change with the mode selection Doug.

It flashes the color for a few seconds, then it flashes red, then it turns off, so not sure tapping in there would be a reliable way to go.

What about tapping into the apron lights on the premium/le?

I didn't really know how the button reacted, but I thought it may behave something like that.

There was a DIY thread showing how one user used the RGB info from the lockdown button on Game of Thrones to control some undercab lighting he had added. I'm not sure if the button is wired the same in a SAM game oppose to a SPIKE system game. His DIY work did quite well on GoT, but I believe I heard the way the button lit up changed with the last GoT update and botched it a bit.

Finally got a chance to noodle around on this. I removed the mission led board to look at it. The cat5 connector jacks are through mounted and the solder looked fine. I started thinking that maybe one of the tiny surface mounted chips could be the issue but the leads are way too tiny to work on with a standard soldering station. Then I remembered a trick I learned when repairing an old laptop with a graphics chip that had come partially unsoldered. Basically, you create a simple heat shield with a double layer of aluminum foil and cut a little window in it to expose the component you want to work on. Then take your heat gun and heat the exposed component just long enough to reflow the solder. You can roughly figure this out by placing a bit of thin solder on a scrap of foil and heat it with the heat gun while counting until it melts. In my case, I set the heat gun to 650F and applied heat for exactly twenty seconds. I did this for each little chip on the board. Then I walked away and let it cool completely. An hour later, I put it back in the game and…voila! All fixed

Good work on that and thanks for updating!

Would love to see a video of you using that technique.

Doug which speaker light kit of yours would work on the LEs for Star Trek?

Star Trek LE would use a type 9 light kit:

http://www.speakerlightkits.com/Type-9.html

Go to www.SpeakerLightKits.com
Select "Speaker Light Kits" on the left or bottom of any page.
Select the game you would like the light kit for: "Star Trek (Stern:LE)" in your case.
Then it will take you to the webpage with details on what your light kit options are for that game.

Doug (SpeakerLightKits.com)

I have a Stern Star Trek pro running 1.61 code. Is 1.62 worth putting in? Thanks.

Personally, any time they change / fix modes, I think it is a must have. So I would say it is time to update.

https://sternpinball.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/ST_PRO_162-readme.txt

V1.62 - June 5, 2018
=======================

- Fixed a presentation issue where solid shot lights in Destroy the Drill II were showing when they weren't available.
Now, all available shots blink including the roving 2X shot.
- Fixed an issue in Nero II where shots/lights were not being displayed correctly. This only occurred during multi-player games.
- Fixed an issue in Mode Select where mode select would not show up quickly between balls. This occurred during multi-player games.
- Fixed an issue in Kobayashi Maru where double scoring was timing out due to the presentation length of Kobayashi Maru.
- Fixed an issue in Kobayashi Maru where the background music was missing.
- Added sound FX and a longer light show presentation for the final shot in Kobayashi Maru.
- Fixed a problem if you Drill Down 3 deep in a mode, i.e play Destroy the Drill I, II, III. . When you get through the
last III mode, you could get robbed out of the second/third wizard mode (Enterprise Amok Multiball would not start,
and, if you made it to Five Year Mission, the game would instead start Enterprise Amok Multiball. After the last
wizard mode you couldn't start any modes for the rest of the game. It could also crash the game while in this state.
- Fixed an issue in Nero II where the shot count was not properly shown when interrupted by other modes/events.
- Fixed a bug that was causing the Magnet to ignore the "disabled" adjustment.

- Added audit for total number of one, two, three, and four players games that have been played.
- Added USA_12 Coinage 1/$0.25, 5/$1.00
- Added Sweden_3 credit pricing 1 credit for 10 Kr.
- Updated Norway coin door to 1/5/10/20 Kr for left/center/right/4th slot.
- Updated Sweden coin door to 1/5/10/2 Kr for left/center/right/4th slot.
- Updated Sweden dip switch setting default to Sweden_3 pricing.
- Updated Switzerland dip switch setting default to Switzerland_3 pricing.
- Updated UK dip switch setting default to UK_4 pricing.
- Added China Dip Switch setting (28 00111000) and currency, pricing, overrides, redemption, tournament, novelty, etc setting.
- Fixed an issue with replay score computation.
- Added ticket dispenser type "TICKETLESS".
- Added ticket dispenser motor rest time between ticket dispenses (AD_TICKET_DISPENSER_REST_TIME_MS) - default is 0 ms.
- Added ticket dispenser retries (AD_TICKET_DISPENSE_RETRIES) - if the ticket notch switch is not seen after a dispense, the system will retry
- AD_TICKET_DISPENSE_RETRIES times to dispense a ticket before marking the ticket dispenser as "jammed". AD_TICKET_DISPENSE_RETRIES default is 0.
- Fixed an issue where the ticket dispenser was still enabled after uninstalling redemption settings.
- Added timed game options to the redemption system.
- Added default redemption settings to the system for each country (DIP) install.

A couple questions for ST Pro veterans out there. I've only had the game for a couple months.

1) When in a mode, and after hitting a lit shot, AWAY TEAM is lit. What is the benefit of making the AWAY TEAM shot?
2) Combos. I understand what they are, but how do you get 20-30 of them in a row? Is this done using multiballs?

Thanks. I will do the update.

For #1, that starts the Galactic version of the mode ( I forget the actual name). It changes the objectives. It can be useful at times. If memory serves, the points you get for each shot during that mode are affected by how many initial shots you got before entering the mode. Space Jump is an example. I believe the Galactic version changes the mode to one shot right up the Vengeance. This then ends the mode with that one shot. As another example, for Nero, I believe the mode changes so you have to hit the standup targets.

For #2, you get 20-30 in a row by being awesome. Most people won’t get that amount in a row. Multiball will only make it harder.

http://tiltforums.com/t/star-trek-wiki/456

What is the procedure for updating code in a ST pro? I have the 1.62 code on a thumb drive. I put it in the pin and there are no prompts like when I have done LZ updates. Thanks.

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/how-to-update-code-on-stern-sam-pinball-machine

Big shout out to Andy SkyKing2301 Rocket City Pinball, I've been bugging him for months to make the coin reject buttons for Star Trek and he came through! Start Button and Coin Reject buttons are awesome and well worth the wait.

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Thank you! Update installed.

Thanks for this (and the link). Away Team seems to be worth the effort. I've made it KM a couple times now. I get too excited though and my play goes to shit and I don't make much progress before draining. Ha ha! I'll have to work on keeping calm.

The Away Team shot for me has been pretty difficult. I'll nail the shot and the ball will bounce back out before I can drop the flipper down and trap it in there. I've lost count of how many times I've dropped the flipper and managed to catch the ball between the flipper and the post. I can almost do it on purpose now every time.

Great game. I really enjoyed playing it on site and only knew a handful of the rules at the time. I'm really enjoying it now that I know where to stack the mode/multiballs and the more intricate details of the rules.

I didn't reset the scores on the pin when I brought it home. I like having something to aim for. The previous owner had 34 combos on it which seems ludicrous to me. I don't even know how close I've come to that. Maybe I'll try to see if I can reset the combo and leave the rest as is.

Oh, and 1 last question/request...

Does anyone have a clear image of page B37 of the Pro manual? My old eyes can't read the fuzzy text even when zoomed in. I just want to check the bulbs as I think my backbox has a hodge podge of bulbs installed right now.

Merry Christmas to those on the Enterprise!

I printed the manual from the Stern website when I got the game. Never noticed that those couple pages are printed so tiny as to be basically unreadable. The PDF doesn't seem to be high enough resolution to be readable when zoomed in.
Hopefully the original factory printed manuals are printed larger or more clearly.
I laughed when I saw what you were talking about. It's ridiculous when printed on stanadrd size paper.

Just reset the whole thing. Old scores in a completely different setup don’t apply anymore. Maybe it was setup really flat or easy. Maybe he wanted to play 5 year mission so he took the glass off and manually did everything to get there. But mostly the different setup invalidates the scores. Kill them and start building your own. Invite some good players over to put on real scores to shoot for.

Hmm... All valid points. I had never really thought of it that way before, but you're right. Hell, it could have been set to 5 balls the entire time. Thanks.

It's ridiculous that 5 ball scores aren't stored separately in the leaderboards.

Almost as ridiculous as your post. Almost.

I just picked up a Star Trek pro and I’m getting a “Center Lane lockup” error and the vengeance drop target is moving up and down continuously at the start of certain missions. Is this the same issue or separate issues?

Why ectobar? Surely it's not fair to compare a 3 ball score with a 5 ball? What am I missing?

I keep all of my pins on 5 ball as well. It seems like whenever I play the game I don’t get the feel for the game flow until the 3rd ball. I could care less if a guy from Nebraska on 3 ball beats my high score on a 5 ball game because I play on my own personal achievement. When I have friends over they can still try to beat the my high score on the 5 ball setting.

Besides, I think shaking the pin so hard in order to get it out of the outlines is considered cheating as well. If not, then why did they install the tilt bobs in all of the pins?

I don't consider it cheating. Nudging is a skill. Some tilt bobs are not positioned correctly, but they should be adjusted for your style of play. I like keeping mine pretty tight. Enough to allow you to nudge, but not enough to let you slide the pin across the room. If you're getting Danger, DANGER then the tilt bob is doing it's job. I still manage to tilt at home, so I think I have it tuned perfectly for me. If I'm playing pinball with my kids, then I avoid nudging. They don't have the strength to bump the machine, so I try to even the playing field for them. It's difficult to not nudge when playing them. Ha ha!

EM for me will always be 5 balls. All others are set to 3 balls. That's just my preference.

To make more money on location and prevent possible abuse to machine. I loosen up the tilt tightness on all home games that are very deep or brutal difficulty, some games just deserve a more forgiving tilt than others.

I like 5 ball too, but pinhead friends don't like it because they play on location all the time and see some of the same games there. This is why co-op is so cool. I had it on my ACNC and now on my Hotwheels. We can play 3 ball against each other and then do a co-op together to try to beat the machine! You get to see the upper levels of the game and it's a load of fun! Also can compete as two teams of two or even all three players against one (which nobody ever does) LOL! All new games need this feature IMO! Stern Star Trek with it's nearly impossible to reach '5 Year Mission' wizard mode would be a great candidate for co-op mode!

This Star Trek drop target issue is driving me crazy. I've been reading and trying various fixes including the washer fix which worked but then the drop target wouldn't register hits. I took the washers back out. Everything seems tight. Any advice welcome...

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Use thinner washers. Or make a spacer by cutting a strip from an old credit card.

Credit card would be thicker than a 1/16" washer I believe? I need to go thinner than 1/16". Thinking of trying a layer of mylar on the backside of that plastic piece. I know this problem has been talked about for years but the more reading I do the more I realize there never was a great solution. Using washers creates a tiny gap which some people said eventually caused the plastic ledge to break.

Yeah, it’s about finding that sweet spot. I initially used thinner washers — 1/32” maybe ? — and my ledge then cracked but was still somewhat held in place. Ironically, it worked perfectly broken like that for probably 1000 plays or more. So, my sweet spot was with thinner washers and a semi-broken ledge. Go figure.

3 layers of mylar so far cut to the exact shape of the plastic ledge. Not sure if it will be enough. Also used a smaller profile screw for the side with the spring.

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Is it normal that the brass looking arm is crooked like that?

That's what 4 layers of mylar stacked behind the plastic piece looks like. About half the thickness of the washer.

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Ok, I reinstalled it with 4 layers of mylar which is much thinner then a credit card or washer and probably 3 out of 5 direct hits it was not registering a hit. I went down to 3 layers of mylar and now I would say maybe 1 or 2 hits out of 6 are not registering, which is much, much better. I think I am close on this, what a pain. I'll go with it for a few weeks and see how it behaves. I'll go down to 2 layers of mylar but if I go any thinner I'll be back to the problem of the drop target not staying up, it sort of bounces up and down 3 times after you hit it and doesn't want to stay up. So far with the mylar solution that problem is gone and replacing the screw on the spring side might have helped. Thanks for chiming in on this Nokoro.

Hi everyone. Couple of newbie owner questions for everyone.

1) Should the Vengeance ship be tilted or level? Mine seems to be drooping down on the right side.
2) Does anyone have the -56 plastic that fits under the Vengeance ship? Looking to replace mine. Let me know cost and shipping. Please keep in mind I'm in Canada, but you can just use letter mail.

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droop (resized).jpeg

Thank you!

I've been messing with tweaking my drop target all day and have been looking at this pin a lot today. My ship is not tilted crooked, although I can't say it's perfectly perpendicular to the back side (side to side).

As far as the plastics, mine doesn't say -56 on it. Not sure if you can buy them separate but you can buy the entire set.

https://www.marcospecialties.com/pinball-parts/803-5000-E6

That's listed under the premium.

I wanted to avoid buying every plastic. It's just a waste. I wouldn't use 3/4 of them. Plus it's $200USD before shipping.

Anyone else have inserts with ghosting that has had it for awhile? I don't think these have gotten worse since I have had the machine. Playfield still feels smooth around them.

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Interesting. Is this a vault?

Nope Sep 2015 build. Im the third owner and its HOU so I was told. Machine is in great shape besides some of the inserts, I have had the machine since Nov of 2020. I didn't notice them when I bought it. I'm assuming there is nothing that can be done other than hoping they don't get worse. It's in my basement that never really gets above 68. Just wondering if any other ST owners have this issue, and if theirs got worse overtime, or just stayed static.

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