So I’m having a great game and suddenly this machine screw and a good size washer seem to materialize on the playfield! I’ve spent a few minutes looking for a loose part or hole to match, with no luck. Anybody have any wild ideas?

BD00C9A7-A6E8-4863-BE02-EA974790C1C6 (resized).jpeg

Look above it in the photo. If memory serves me the metal rsmp above the playfield has a screw like that in it.

BINGO thank you

59AF57FE-2596-4242-B613-A6DCC4AF65B6 (resized).jpeg

I see a few folks like painting or putting decals on the cannon covers,,,I usually only sell these with my laser kit, but I am offering these to anyone without the lasers if you want. I re-manufactured these many years ago, and as you can see, I changed the design a bit, raised the highlighted areas to make them a bit more noticeable, made the mounting screw holes in the rear more adjustable, and of course make them available to include the standard red, or as a free option, green or, clear domes if wanted..

Mick

https://www.mickspinball.com/star-trek-tng-kit-options

Cannon Covers (resized).jpg

cannon 2 (resized).jpg

I’m going to be selling my Brand new STTNG pf (Mirco) and Reese Rails that go with it.

I just don’t see me getting to it in the next few years, so would rather it go to a good home.

I wanted to offer it to the group first.

Let me know if you’re interested.

EDIT: PF is spoken for, but the rails are still available

Shared with someone who is waiting for PF for his.

I was today years old when I realized that most of the time the drop target should be down during the plunge. My "drop target down" coil (the red one, pictured above the green one) was energizing but the target wasn't dropping except on ball impact. Turns out the "down" coil was a bit loose, and the plate the coil pulls on was snapping away too far and binding against the PCB holding the lane lights. So I added a bit of foam, circled in red. Now the game plays as it should!

C04F1FE9-0DB0-45D2-96BD-283BD44EC0AD (resized).jpeg

Brickout will appear in attract mode if the game has been sitting untouched for one hour. When it does appear, you can play it. Otherwise, you can do the code when the ball is in the launcher in a game and go into Holodeck to play it.

Looks like your Frame & Eyelet Assy (A-14913) is broken, this part should have a small metal hook that prevents this from happening; if the armature get too far away from the coil, the coil wont be able to pull it in.
pasted_image (resized).pngpasted_image (resized).png

Great catch and just had to order one for the machine I’m working on.
20327C7F-2230-497E-9E30-B2CC11FBDD47 (resized).jpeg

I’m working on getting this pin dialed in, I have a question on the top diverter, when I hit the shot up the ramp, the diverter catches the ball and then after a second or so it releases the ball down to feed the flipper, in gameplay videos I’ve seen there is no delay and the ball is just fed right back to flipper, any thoughts would be greatly appreciated

I am guessing you are talking about the Delta Quadrant Ramp.

When LOCK is NOT lit, the diverter should activate and send the ball directly to the right flipper.

When LOCK is lit, the diverter should NOT move, and the ball should make it up to the borg ship and lock. However sometimes a shot that's not hard enough to make the bork ship hump will roll back down and then to the right flipper so in this case it would seem like there is a delay.

Yes the Delta ramp, the diverter is actually catching the ball and then there’s a 2-3 second delay, the diverter then releases the ball to the right flipper which just seemed weird to me, it’s not a smooth flow back to the right flipper like I’ve seen on videos, maybe the position of the diverter is off? Should it be flush with the back panel?

I still don't get it. The diverter is a curved piece of metal. When is it triggered the ball should follow the curve and onto the ramp to the right flipper. I can't understand how the diverter could "hold" the ball. Makes no sense! Pic?

I know, it’s weird. 1 out 10 shots will get rejected by the diverter and come back down the ramp, the others are actually held there for a moment before it’s released. That’s why I’m thinking the diverter may not be positioned right. I’ll get a pic when I get home from work

Yeah I'm at work too lol. The diverter(when not active) should be completely out of the way to let the ball roll up into the borg ship. Definitely sounds like you need to loosen the set screws and adjust it.

For those who have the laser cannons like Mick sells and have the updated hand painted style, how, if at all do you attach the lasers? Or can you not use the lasers?

Huh. On mine a shot that isn't strong enough to make it to the borg ship for a lock bricks all the way back out of the ramp.

Yeah me too. My mistake.

This brick is the most frustrating one for me

Check to make sure the diverter isn’t bound up. Mine was. I just took it off the game, took it apart and cleaned it. Works perfect now.

The diverter was actually pinning the ball against the ramp, crazy, I adjusted it back about a 1/2” and it’s working how it should.

C0254EC3-A5D4-4FB8-9F76-EFA88A679641 (resized).jpeg

I installed a set of his laser canons back in 2013 and they are still working great. I highly recommend this kit.

I used his cannons w/o lasers. No problem. They actually look pretty good when painted by Matt at backalleycreations:
My Cannons

Finishing up my friends pin....Under pf I noticed what looks like a large single plastic subway. Looks like a pretty involved removal and reinstall. Is it as bad as it looks? Looks like alot has to come off to get it off. Any tips or insight?

Thx.

It’s a lot easier than it looks, remove the right vuk, I believe there’s 2 or 3 connectors to unplug, then remove the subway mounting screws and the whole thing will slide out

Yep, not nearly as bad as it looks and it is absolutely imperative you remove and thoroughly clean it otherwise all the work you've done cleaning the top side will quickly be for naught. Same goes for the ball trough, of course.

Thanks I’ll tackle it in the next day or so

I’ll clean optos too

Ok that did come out easy.

One coil question. The main diverter coil is fried. Think it’s an AE 25-1000 any others that will work? I can order one but have some odd spares if there are any you can switch out

IIRC correctly 25 is the gauge of the wire and the second number determines the strength of coil, lower the number the stronger the coil, so you’d want to replace it with a 25-xxxx, there’s a thread on here somewhere about coil compatibility

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/guidelines-for-coil-substitution

If you have a diverter coil fried, you probably have more issues that you haven’t found yet. You may also have some transistor problems on the auxiliary driver board.

Hi,
I am looking for a little help and guidance. I have a ST:TNG with two problems. The first problem is with lamps. In row #5 the light will light if any column light is lit. For example, if Column #3, Top Lane Left is lit, (Lamp #31), so will the Bonus X4 lamp. If any Column #3 light is lit, Bonus X4 will be lit. This happens with the entire Row#5. This happens during game play as well as in single lamp test mode. The voltage or Row#5 is 13.5 volts and the others are all about 18 volts. I have checked Q86 and the respective circuitry with a meter and cannot find anything obvious. Does anyone have any suggestions where I should go from here?

My second problem is with the backbox lighting. There is a series of lamps which do not light. I traced back their power to the Power Driver board, J106,1. As you can see from the drawing and voltages it doesn't make sense. If I disconnect the plug (J 106, J107) I still have 22.5VDC on the pin ! of either header pin #1. J105 has no connector but has (9.5 Volts on it.). I apologize for the mistake in my annotations on that connector. I went back and double checked everything and measured the voltage on J105 Header pin #1 and found the 9.5 Volts. Again, Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. I am a novice at Pinball machines and trying to learn my way and really appreciate the help this forum gives me.
Art

IMG_5728a (resized).jpg

IMG_5726a (resized).jpg

yeah thinking the same thing.

Not necessarily. Happened to me this week! Divertor locked on. Playfield was up so i noticed the wrapper burning. Turned it all off and let it cool down.

It wasn’t binding to I tried reseating the ribbon cable to the aux board. Problem fixed. Zero cost. Now obviously had the playfield not been up the coil would have eventually melted but somehow the transistors survived.

The aux board is a bad design. Locks on with a bad connection or a reversed ribbon cable. Saw someone do that on a TZ.

I would suspect a bad, missing or shorted diode on one of the lamps in column three, if you have LEDs in those sockets it can also short out.

The backbox lighting is completely wrong, I don't have my manual in front of me nor time to go look it up but those voltages are all for coils or flashers, no GI bulb can handle 22+VDC. There are three strings of GIs in the game, each with it's own brightness control and IIRC fuse. Double check the schematic and fuses for the three GI circuits.

Good luck!

EDIT: See page 3-9 of your manual for GI circuit theory of operation / schematic. Also the GI connectors on this game burnt out A LOT because the wiring is too small, look for burnt connectors on the PDB.

Any chance you are taking your reading on pin 5 and thinking its pin1? I ask this as 22V is good for your backbox flashers and J106-5 is your power connection for the flasher string going to the backbox. These lamps are normally not lit, but should come on in flasher test IF you have your HV interlock cheated as this voltage is disabled with the coin door open.

J105-1 is one leg your 50V transformer tap going to the fliptronics board to power your flippers, lets just leave this circuit alone for now.

pasted_image (resized).png

Hi,
Lets get started right.
A. Im a knucklehead.
B. I need to pay more attention to detail and investigate more thoroughly.
C. Above all, Thanks to both bobukcat & Pin_Guy.

The problem with the row #5 light was caused by a Neutral Zone Light I added. I connected it to a playfield lamp instead of a GI like I should have. I found this while looking at the individual diodes and decided to disconnect each light set and continue to test the others. When I got to the one with the mod I disconnected it as well.

The problem with the back box lamps was a non problem. First they are flashers like Pin_Guy stated and could not be GI, at that voltage like bobukcat stated. So the 22VDC is correct and they do indeed work like they are supposed to, as flashers.

I apologize for the stupid questions but I am learning from each misstep and your expert help.

Thanks

Art

Finally bought this tape and added it to the neutral zone cliffy. Hasn't budged....thank you!

I'm glad you got it all ironed out; there's no such thing as a stupid question and nothing to apologize for; everyone on here was a beginner at some point and I'm more than willing to offer assistance to assistance and advice to whomever wants it.

I do have to admit I spend a little more time in this thread than any other as STTNG is a phenomenal machine and it pains me when one of them isn't functioning properly.

Yes, it is a great machine. I love it, Playing and fixing. My kids bought it for me for Christmas. They know I like to fix things. My day job is high end x-ray machines. But it has been a long time since it was relays, coils and mechanical switches. Sometimes I cannot see the forest for the trees. I appreciate your help.

Maybe you should start exraying pinball parts.
Anyway; welcome to the club! Enjoy your stay.

Welcome aboard!

My drop target with the broken Frame & Eyelet Assy (discussed above) seems to be working correctly with my foam workaround, but now I frequently hear three rapid coil clicks up there, as though the game knows something is wrong and is firing a coil a few extra times to ensure the target is in the right position. Anybody have insights on this behavior?

Seems like the repair options are to buy a whole new assembly from Marco for $100, or a $10 part from Mr. Pinball in Australia with $20 shipping.

Ususally does that when the switch that detects the drop being down doesn't work (I had that myself last week).

I ended up getting this and didn't need the whole assembly:

https://www.pinballlife.com/drop-target-knockdown-assembly-left.html

It has more than you need, but better than $100.

Pinwoofer is having a 20% off sale until 2/16. I’m about to pull the trigger and wanted to share the sale info before it expires with the rest of the STTNG club.

Coupon code:PW2020

He has a video of an STTNG on his site and it sounds really good.

Hi,
I have a ST:TNG. When I purchased the machine the Enterprise ship lights were inoperable. I looked into it and found the wires hanging loosed under the play field. Do these get connected to the G.I. circuit, Flasher, or some other location? I cannot find any information in the manual. Thanks
Art

There’s flashers and GI. Page 2’s solenoid table has the information on connector locations and wire colors.
7D067956-B8EE-4DF5-8641-8DA7FC988600 (resized).jpeg