Did you check the band of the diode on your coil. Is there even a diode mounted on it?

Gregory at Comet has been extremely helpful on this issue. He said non ghosting have a 4V resistor that keeps them from illuminating until they get 4V. Regular LEDs will illuminate at less than that. So my issue is likely that I'm not getting 4V to the playfield light sockets.

Yes. Must be something like that. Are regular incandescents dull in those sockets?

rd

I haven't noticed them being dull but I guess it's sort of hard for me to tell. I don't recall the ones I pulled from the back box being noticeably brighter, although I wasn't specifically looking for that.

Last night I was playing a game and the center ramp drop target would pulse but not raise between balls until a plunge. I found a burnt GI connector on the power supply board. I'm wondering if the low voltage to the playfield lamp sockets and the intermittent drop target reset failure are because of this faulty connector? Is there anything else I should be looking for?

Road Kings eh?

GI volts is 6v AC - goes in and out of the power supply so nope, not related. But you wanna fix that connector anyway.

I’d be checking all the voltages out of the power supply.

And all the connectors.

If you haven’t read it, read Clays guides. They’re the bible …

He pulled them ages ago … but someone in Europe has them up for your reading and repairing pleasure.

https://techniek.flipperwinkel.nl/wms11/index1.htm

rd

Thanks rd, this guide has some really good stuff in it. Looks like most likely a bad capacitor or two according to the guide. Its also humming a bit which I read elsewhere could be caused by bad capacitors as well. Is there a way to test voltages with the board still in the game? All the videos I can find are bench testing. I tried pulling the GI connector and testing the pins with my MM but I couldn't get a reliable reading.

How’s the power supply board looking? Post a picture.

There are voltage test spots on there.

Meter set to AC? GI is 6.3v AC .. everything else is DC.

If the connectors there are burnt you’d want to remove the board anyway and replace the header pins. Reflow the header pins at the minimum.

Maybe check Pinwiki for the test points on the power board. Should have some pics up there.

rd

Here is a picture of the board. Pinwiki has high voltage test points, I couldn't find any others.

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Here is 4 test points. Also I circled you GI connector that is burnt and needs to be replaced.

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Here’s the schematic

The top circle is +5v
The other circle is +12v / GND / -12v

If you are not getting the correct voltage I would take the board out and inspect it see if you can find any spots that look burnt out.

I generally swap out all the electrolytic caps for fresh ones. C1,3,5,7,8,9,10,12

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I tested the 4 spots in the circles of your picture Grumpy. The top left was 4.95. The lower 3 were 12.03, 0, -13.77. This is quite a bit different than 5, 12, 0, -12 that they are supposed to be.

I pulled the board and inspected. It has had some work done for sure.

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These are all aceptable numbers. Now retest these again, but switch the meter to AC instead of DC and report back those numbers.

I ran the test again with the meter to AC and got 9.9, 25, 0, 0.

The 9.9 an 25 are too high of an AC signal on the DC voltage. This means you need new electrolytic caps on the power supply.

Okay, thanks again Grumpy. I'll replace caps C1,3,5,7,8,9,10,12 as recommended by Dr. Spidey, replace the GI header pins, and replace the GI connector. I don't have a way of bench testing the board once these repairs are made. Can I mess anything up by testing in the machine?

Yes, so when you want to test the power supply test points you leave the 2 top connectors off of the power supply. Turn on the game. Do your testing. If with in specs, turn off game and reconnect the 2 connectors. Enjoy your hard work.

Taxi purgatory!

Game currently boots to:
* A single startup ding
* sizzling transformer
* No life to the displays
* No coils at boot
* GI appears ok

I immediately shut the game off and unplugged the transformer to cabinet/playfield connections. The transformer seems to settle back down. I check the fuse values and there are lots of substitutions vs the manual (1/2A instead of 3/8A, 6a instead of 7a, etc).

This game was a project in pieces when I tore into it, so I wasn't able to do any testing beforehand (not best practice, I know). The game had several oddities/hacks. One that stands out is some speaker wire on one of the flippers connected to weird black box. I rewired that, but not sure if it was a bandaid for something or what. I double checked the harness connections, everything looks correct, though I had to rebuild 2 scorched connectors that had already been rebuilt once (1 to the MPU & 1 to the interconnect, male & female). I'll check my work again on those tonight, and will run back through the coil connections on the playfield.

I'm planning on replacing the fuses with the correct values, unplugging the power to the MPU, and checking voltages on the PSU & Aux PSU before I plug the MPU back in. Am I on the right track?

Taxi might be one of the games where the bridges are not fused. I would make sure they are fused if they are not already. If you don't know what I mean, I can post a pic.

Thank you! I've heard the term in regards to System 11 pins, but not sure what that looks like. A pic would be great if you have one.

These are the bridges. Someone fused these before I got it. 1 wire from each bridge should have a fuse.

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If yours is not fuses, you need to fuse either one of AC lines from each bridge. I believe it is an 8A fuse that is recommended, but there are many posts about the specifics if you search.

Also, I do not like the way this one is fused in my pic. I would desolder the spade plug and install a fuse holder. Then make a new wire to go from the holder to the bridge.

As a follow up note, Taxi is 11b. Would the fuse mod still apply? Pulled this image off the web to show what my backbox looks like. I believe there are 2 on the aux board, 1 off the boards, and 1 on the PSU board. The PSU rectifier appears to have been replaced at one point, and one of the contacts on the off board rectifier looks toasted. Wonder if I should also suspect 1 or more of the rectifiers are bad as well?

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Ok, sorry. I believe anything with that aux board are fused. Not sure when they corrected the issue but it was during one of the sys11 games.

No worries, thanks for jumping in.

Just picked up a Swords of Fury. The diabolical laugh cracks me up every time. On the hunt for more 11s!

I need to replace the two position connector wired to switches which allows you to disconnect the switch to remove ramps etc. Is this considered a .093 or .062 molex ?

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Ramps are usually .062 round and higher power draw loads such as the knocker and mechs with motors and such use the .093.

This is getting painted this weekend. Maybe glued into the cab sometime midweek!

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I have owned WW and Taxi and now have a chance at Pinbot or Diner. In my limited playing experience, Diner wins on flow and gameplay, Pinbot on theme/ sound. For you all who own both, how do they rank for you?

Diner is DEFINITELY a better designed machine. I’ve had both… Which one would I rather own? Very hard decision on those two. I’d probably never be able to answer and would just buy something else. If I had to choose only one for free, suppose I’d pick Diner and install the nerfed jackpot roms.

Exactly like you stated. Diner is the better player, shooting and rules wise, but Pinbot has a great soundtrack.

I changed the flipper mechs on our Diner to WPC and the left flipper does a slight bounce when it returns to the normal resting position.

Flippers were recently rebuilt, new bushings, new rubber grommets and new return springs.

I would say that I'd not have noticed if both flippers did it but the left one noticably bounces.

I can't think what would cause this, especially as I got new springs using the correct part number
Is there a way to put the springs on wrong that would influence the tension and way they behave?

What else could it be?

FYI, you can order a set of “no-hop” flipper return rails for Diner from Cliffy Pinball https://www.passionforpinball.com/FlipFrames.htm. That will solve your hop problems if standard adjustments don’t. You can just shoot him an email and he will send you an invoice. Takes a couple week to usually fill since he mostly makes the parts as you order them. It’s the best product he makes IMHO.

I think DaveTheTrain is talking about the actual flipper bouncing rather than the ball hopping as it transitions from frame to flipper. I've noticed this on older Ballys but never on Williams, I am not sure what the cause is. I installed cliffy return frames on two of my machines and still get ball hop. I have thought about redrilling the frame holes but fear I would cause playfield damage.

Maybe? post pics of your flipper mechs and lets have a look.

Ok, now I see what he described is not hop. It sounds like the flipper arm is rebounding off the rubber grommet. I would remove the grommet as a test to see if that is causing the bounce. If it is, you can slightly bend the metal outward or, shave the grommet a little with a dremel and reinstall it. I had to do this on a Tommy I recently rebuilt. I suppose your return springs could be too tight as well.

Strange, your ball hop on your two machines must be caused by something else. Maybe there is a large air gap? My league and local pinball community swears by the no-hop frames.

The second of my System 11 games now has a ball saver. There's PEMBOT and now here's The Cat's Meow:

Apologies for the spam (and the poor quality of the 19-seconds video), but I just wanted to advertise a Pinside Home ROM Development thread for Bad Cats for those who may have missed the announcement.

Here are the two problematic transitions. I can't think of anything other than re-drilling.

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The Road Kings is way wrong. All I can tell you is that's not how it's supposed to be aligned. Not certain why it's like that though. Maybe it was drilled like that from the factory.

Also, those look like the standard replacement ones, not the “enhanced” ones shown here…
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I'll probably have to be filling and drilling soon, its really annoying how it is, particularly on Road Kings. They are the enhanced frames, I just checked my invoice to make sure.

Great work! All system 11's need a ball save feature. At least when I'm playing. LOL

Chris

I second this!
I used to be a fan of keeping games true to their original programming but a ball save option on Sys11 games would be very welcomed in my home! My Mousin Around plays brutally fast and drainy. Put Soren’s new code in my Mousin for the center ramp and love it!

Can anyone confirm my Police Force diverter wiring is correct? Specifically for the coil.

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Verified wiring is correct thank you!

Call me paranoid but I’d wrap some insulation tape around that tab on the left, in case the coil moves and shorts on that metal bracket. Dunno if that’s possible or not .. but just in case …

rd

What I would do is look at that coil and confirm that the banded side of the diode is on the side of the YELLOW/PURPLE wires. You can't guarantee the wires are correct unless you actually look at the diode!