Yeah I don't know enough electronics to explain it. All I know is power had to be going through the bracket, the coil, and return wire to/from the 8 driver board. I do not know what voltage or where the voltage was from.

I'm assuming the mosfet and diode on the rottendog 8 driver board are toast. Still no schematics for it.

I THINK this was all caused by the coil lug grounding to the bracket... not sure though. I should probably add another tieback in the backbox.

I guess it's possible that the power leads, and only the power leads of both coils were / are shorted to the bracket creating a path from one coil to the other but that seems so very unlikely to me. Easy enough to test with a DMM though.

Warp 9.9 bitches. Only took 2 years.

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I thought it was just me that ended up with project machines.

I can guarantee that if anything was shorted to ground, the MOSFET would not blow from this.

Oh good guess i just need a new coil.

Installing new leaf switches for the slings today. Any advice? Will I need to disassemble the canons to get to it below the play field ?

We are talking past each other here. The ST:TNG has been working since the day I got it with about 2 weeks of down time over 2 years. It just took me 2 years to get to Warp 9.9 because I suck.

Don't read too much into this, I didn't say your MOSFET isn.t blown, it probably is; just that a ground short wouldn't blow it. The subway mounting bracket shouldn't be grounded, but you can easily tell if is by performing a continuity test between the cabinet ground braid and the subway bracket.

I'm wondering if this meltdown occured initially, and the smoke didn't become apparent until your daughter played the game later.. sometimes that smoke can take some time to linger out of the box...But you said you disconnected the coil after you saw that it was locked on...meaning to me that the transistor was shorted and locked on...when I've had this happed, the transistor smokes too...what was the condition of the coil when you disconnected the wire?

The coil was definitely working when I disconnected the +50 wire. The game was even playable before this. I turned the game back on to test other things, went across the room to get my multimeter, daughter was playing F14 next to it and smelled smoke.

After I turned the game off, the coil was blazing hot, wrapper burned, and the sleeve melted (the smoke was the plastic burning).

I was just going to replace the mosfet and diode since it looks like it got hot (see below). Maybe there is more going on here than just the coil being stuck on for extended period of time? Anything to test? Only thing I can think of is its still a tieback issue.

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Good idea on testing the bracket for ground... it is NOT shorted to cabinet ground. So what that tells me is that for this coil to have melted without its power wire attached, both coil lugs had to be contacting their brackets and voltage went from the second coil through the subway bracket and over to the first coil bracket, and back through the black/white return (since it was the only path to ground). Just like bobukcat said.

Here's a picture I took before I unsoldered the power to the top coil. Coils were upside down here. Notice how the bottom coil is turned, the lug HAD to be touching the bracket at this angle. Also notice the wrapper isn't burned here.

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I just put the burned coil back in upsidedown and took this picture to show how close the lugs are to the bracket...

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Congratulations Captain!

Definitely the most exciting mode in pinball for me. Once you hit warp 9 and the engine sounds begin, along with a constant hurry up to 9.9!

Nobody who makes this can say they suck, every table setup is different, and it's a mode that many might avoid just because it can be dangerous to brick it.

Does the MOSFET test shorted? I'd replace it regardless at this point but it's a quick test to find out.

I never bothered to test it, but I will when I get home because now I'm curious.

This piece of plastic broke on my side bumper. Would anyone know what it's called and where to get it? I assume I just need that one piece? Thanks all!!!!

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Here you go....

https://www.pinballlife.com/williams-tapered-flipper-link-old-style.html

The whole page here

https://www.pinballlife.com/plungers-cranks-and-pawls.html

Thank you so very very much.. no idea what it was called.

I have never had luck removing or inserting new roll-pins and since I don't have to I just buy the complete assembly instead: https://www.pinballlife.com/slingshotballshooter-plunger-and-link-2-plunger.html

Just for fun, here's a picture of my total nightmare hacked up wire harness. Check out the bottom right in the cabinet.

If anyone has any reference pictures that might help me figure out how to bundle this back up and route the harnesses properly I would be very grateful! I'm trying to make this machine sane before embarking on a full tear down restore.

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Ugh… That‘s painful to look at!

Honestly, for me it's not that bad .. lol, but then, 90% of my machines were projects brought back from the dead

you can purchase wire by the foot from marco if your up to going through the looms and repinning all those that are in disrepair...

Ok, so essentially the wire you removed didn't matter as the lug on the other coil was contacting the bracket energized the entire assembly at +50VDC ... AND the coil lug on the melted coil was also touching the bracket and energizing it at 50V regardless of disconnecting the wire ... AND the Mosfet on the 8 driver board failed providing a constant path for current to flow through the coil. This is a very interesting set of cascade failures that all had to occur in order for the coil to melt ... I have never seen this before, it could be a first.

Go to Planetary Pinball for wire (by the 10-foot length); some of the wire I recently purchased from Marco appeared to be copper-plated something-or-other (aluminum probably) rather than pure copper.

This may not be the most useful set of pictures, best ones I have of the harness (first is prior to playfield swap, second and third are after):

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ugggghhhhhh ... It looks like someone installed your wiring harness in the opposite direction of how its supposed to run ... and at the end they had no way to hook up the subway as its connectors were on the opposite side of the play field.

This is how its supposed to look:

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good to know.....keep it in mind...

Yeah so like whatever dumbass screwed up your harness also couldn't figure out the right side playfield support rail should have went into the 3 open holes in the playfield ... I guess he just made new ones.

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Looks great but the harnesses were all only installed correctly in the first one.

Since the subway was installed nearly last during the assembly of this machine with only the 3 VUK assemblies installed after it, it would stand to reason that all of the wiring harness would be out of the way of this area so the subway and subsequent VUKs could all be dropped right in place.

I know right? And that one is not even the correct support rail for this machine. Like how do you even lose one of those?

Great picture, thanks!

You’re right, the entire subway opto harness is on the wrong side of the playfield. They had to splice in additional wire just to reach the optos. I pulled most of it out but still working out what else is out of place. It’s kind of impressive this ever worked.

Maybe I’ll start a new thread to track this mess.

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/star-trek-tng-next-chapter/page/6

This post has a lot of detailed pics of a total restore of STTNG. I've used it from time to time. You may find it useful, or at least a fun read.

Can you all see my posts? Testing, testing ….

Nope, can‘t see it.

I guess not. I’ve asked for some advice and help on multiple occasions and I get no responses. Did I do something wrong ?

I see lots of people answering questions in your posts (me included, at least for Pinsound questions). Support isn't real-time around here....as much as we try not to, most of us do have lives outside of reading pinball forums. Might take a few days or more to get answers you're looking for....sometimes never if no one simply has a good response to share.

What are your latest questions that have gone unanswered?

Beautiful restore, thanks those are great pics. The more I dig into this thing the more I want to do a full restore. Goodbye $$$.

Last post I saw from you was a picture of a subway replacement and some ugly electrical tape hack job the previous owner did to your machine.

You had the "AR" to disassemble that electrical monstrosity and report back.
I haven't seen that report back.

I don't have any advice to offer on the Sling switches... as I haven't done it.

Oh man. That was a mess. Previous owner had electrical tape and wire nuts to fix broken wires. There was a bunch of them. At least 6 that I had to solder and use shrink tubing on. Yeah it came out nice after I got done with it.

Refinement on the media for the new STTNG Borg Alcove Display Mod (version 9)
Installation video coming...
Several media additions include the following. Animated Picard and animated Borg Alcove stations
(screen captures)

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Not at all - I (and I'm guessing others??) haven't shopped out a STTNG, so can't offer advice on those specific questions you've ask. But we chime in when we see a question that we can answer

If you look a little more closely you'll see the free end of the playfield harness (with the black slit tubing) is looped back up onto the front playfield supports counter-clockwise from the bottom where it exits the playfield; I tie them up this way when replacing the playfield in the cabinet. The harness *is* routed correctly on the playfield.

Does this wire get plugged into this switch here? I was working on my sling switches and noticed it wasn’t plugged in. I don’t know if I pulled it out accidentally or if it was already like this. Thanks!

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It can be really fun if you enjoy that sort of thing.... which I do! I'm almost done with my restore. I'll post soon when it's finished.

Yes the green wire always goes to the middle lug on the switches

Wow! Your machine looks like it just came off the assembly line! Very nice and shiny.

Has anyone replaced their wire cannons with the cat 5 cable someone had mentioned earlier? My left cannon wiring needs updated. There is no shroud covering the wires. It’s just loose bundle of wire. Will do the right as well.

I wouldn't use CAT5 cable. Even if it is stranded I doubt it is meant to handle all the flexing. Looks like Marco sells a set of Flexible harnesses. Would be nice to see other options. My cables are both working but are really hacked so I eventually want to replace them both.

Yeah I checked Marco, but man, they want 99$ for a set. Kind of pricey, IMHO

Marcos prices are stupid, which is why I haven’t placed an order there in a decade.