I’ve noticed dimpling seems far more noticeable on a dark or black playfield section vs. a light colored one. My TNA has some fairly nasty dimpling in the dark section in front of the left scoop kickout, right where the light from the LCD reflects off the clearcoat, really accents it.

Nothing to be done about it, but it feels like getting that first scratch on a new car. Which is why I usually buy used...

I will say that the dimpling on my TNA in front of the left scoop does seem to be less noticeable as they accumulate over time as the region flattens out more uniformly. I tried to take a picture but couldn't get my camera to focus where the reflection hits the PF.

I do not care for the look of a dimpled playfield. Perhaps I have a mild case of trypophobia.

This raises the question though, if a playfield will eventually evenly compress due to ball hits so the dimpling is not noticeable, why can't the PF manufacturer "pre-compress" the top layer of the PF wood before it is painted and cleared so it would be less susceptible to dimpling? Hammer it with a million ball hits or a giant press or something?

The weird part is how deep and steep some of the dimples appear to be. if you look at that Houdini, they don't even follow the shape/curvature of the ball. it's like someone put small pebbles on the playfield and pounded them in. I guess I don't understand how these are being created.

The deep ones creep me out. The others seems fine/normal.

Lots of people will buy Maiden in SPITE of the fact it’s a Stern game, not because of it. They will consider Stern’s recent poor quality issues (dimplegate excluded) and naively hope it doesn’t happen to them. I’m currently one of them, holding my nose and hoping the clear doesn’t chip in the first 100 games like my MET did, the inserts aren’t 90% crazed or ghosted, that the decals don’t fall off the cabinet, that the cabinet doesn’t come apart under home use only conditions.

I also know a lot of other local collectors who felt burned by GB and SW and won’t be buying anything from Stern in the foreseeable future.

This is not something to celebrate or gloat over.

Well see, there's the problem, Stern's playfields are too "Janka-y".

My God look at that thing! No wonder they decided to pull it from the rotation...

All I can say is just because they've been building pinball playfields out of substandard materials for the entire history of the game doesn't mean someone shouldn't look to improve the situation now. If we play our cards right and start making playfields out of long lived synthetic materials maybe one day when you walk along an unmaintained shore somewhere you can wade through interesting old pinball playfields instead of empty water bottles and caps... "Look at this one, not a mark on it!"

Oops. Forgot the emoji!

There is certainly a marketing opportunity here for some young interested pinball company to come up with a none-dimpling playfield. It clearly bothers some people quite a bit and I'm sure folks would pay a little extra to have a playfield without the wear/fault characteristics of a traditional maple ply pf.

Like I said before, they could probably just pre-pressurize the PF to compress the top layers the same way the ball does over time. How hard can that be?

Oh yeah, what about "Ironwood"?

Seriously though, I have no doubt that dimpling is normal, always happened, etc. So I see no argument with what vid1900 has been telling us. I also wonder if some of the more extreme examples aren't games that have unresolved ball launch issues where the PF in an area is being slammed over and over onto the same patch of PF in a semi-abusive manner.

I agree dimpling is normal, etc. I would still prefer a PF that didn't dimple if possible.

I wonder how much the increased awareness of dimples is simply due to games going into a home use environment that don’t get enough plays to level out the playfield in a noticeable time frame?

Back in the day a game was routed for years before a collector picked it up so dimples were everywhere and didn’t stand out as much. Now everyone has these games in their basements and they get stuck in the “highly noticeable” phase of dimpiliation (tm) for long periods of time since the games get so few plays.

My TNA had very noticeable dimples right away but it’s on location and I can already see them flattening out in high traffic areas. By the time I bring it home it should like any other routed 90’s Williams game with a nice uniform pf appearance.