Took the words right out of my mouth. Although I preferred the original art and Pinball Company had one NIB in stock. Winding its way here on a truck, hopefully will have it mid-next week. Something to do in between stints of working from home, here in the epicenter of the outbreak.

A big part of choosing this one over, say, Stranger Things, was that I definitely got the sense here that most of the kinks have been pretty well addressed by now, and I’m not afraid of a setup needing some tweaking to dial it in. Heck, I’ve had a 3D printer for several years and that thing is nothing -but- endless mechanical and firmware hell.

NIB original art Premium arrived today, my first ownership experience! Been having a blast with it so far. Right outlane gate was sticky, but a minor readjustment of the setscrew stopped it from rubbing against the bushing and now all is well. No other problems to report but still making minor tweaks to leveling, moved left outlane post to the bottom hole as well. Came with 1.05 installed, manufacturing date appears to be December 2019.
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Is Stern using Mylar or something like that on the playfields these days? It looks to me like the SW premium has some kind of clear plastic film applied straight from the factory in places.

Umm, never noticed this for some reason on my Premium, but there’s a post on the left side of the shooter lane just above the arch corner. On the left in the photo... No idea why it’s there, seems like a strange place. Also, looks like it should have rubber, but doesn’t. Can anyone else say whether there should be an O-ring on this?

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Thanks! Figured it was something like that.

A full four weeks into SWP ownership, I have finally destroyed the Death Star (once, via Endor) and gotten to my first victory multiball. Wizard, I clearly am not. It is amazing to me how I can play a series of games on this machine which are just absolute crap and then out of nowhere, I'll be breaking a billion or two and everything seems to break my way.

I understand how it works, but making sure it's exactly where it needs to be all the time to maximize the high value shots is still tough for me.

I agree, go Premium. The ramp shot can be a little tricky but it’s not impossible. The whole accelerator/hyperspace feature is a cool toy, lots of fun, and I like how the wireforms look. There are of course some other goodies in Premium too. Been an owner for a little over a month now and still playing happily (and frustrated too) every day. It’s a tough machine.

Speaking from my own experience, I've tried adjusting the DS wireform to various heights but still see a somewhat annoying number of "rejections" where the shot appears to have plenty of power with which to get to the first magnet, but doesn't. The ramp itself doesn't appear to be bent in any way from impacts, and the looping is perfectly consistent as long as the ball makes it in the first place. I just haven't been able to find a position for the ramp that seems to have a positive impact on reducing rejections, only interference with the ball rolling back out if it's placed too low.

My recollection either from this thread or the LE “problems” thread is that the microswitches under the playfield that are triggered by the cam position can be adjusted to change the exact point at which the motor stops in each of the three ramp positions.

I had a similar problem when the game first arrived after about 10 days of shipping. It diminished significantly after about two weeks of it getting acclimated in my house to the point where it’s no longer bad enough to worry about, though.

It’s called Right Eject Power, but if the VUK is properly aligned with the playfield artwork and the ball guide is too, the ball is intended to land squarely on the left flipper. These can be adjusted and bent slightly if need be, until the ball hits in the right place.

That’s not super normal, “escape” lights fairly easily and that’ll open the outlane gate. If it doesn’t seem to be working at all, test its coil in the service menu, which makes it open and shut again. If that doesn’t do it, pick up the playfield and make sure the mechanism seems to be free and clear and the coil connections to its board are good.

You should be able to easily swing the gate by hand. If it’s binding against the playfield that should be fixable as described above with the set screw/collar on the underside.

Here's a shot of the assembly: The keys here are:
- Free motion of the pivot within the bushing. The collar on the pivot sets where it stops against the bumper in the "closed" gate position (as does the finger that sticks out of the bracket), and the other end is not adjustable because the motion stops where the spring-loaded plate contacts the energized magnet coil.
- The spring obviously needs to be connected to pull the gate back when the magnet is de-energized.
- The roll pin in the collar is what translates linear motion from the plate to rotation of the gate. There is a "fair amount of slop" in the connection between the roll pin and its slot (directly quoting the Stern mechanical engineer) so it's not uncommon for the gate to whack into the far-side outlane plastics when the gate opens.
- When the set screw on the collar is loosened, you should be able to pull the gate away from the bushing a fraction of an inch from the topside if it's too tight and binding against the bushing. The gate should easily move back and forth by hand.

There's not a whole lot to it, it's a pretty simple mechanism.
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I’m curious as to what the problem turned out to be. Details?

Answered you about the ramp height on FB.