Lolol, maybe I'll beat it up enough to hardtop it. I doubt it, because it's overall fairly nice -- a good survivor, if you will -- but yeah.

Well you are right. If you are going to hardtop it then you can treat it like a farm truck because you are just going to sand it off anyway.

I probably won't do much of anything with it, at least in the short run. I doubt it gets too hammered from the minimal play I put into my hands. But someday...maybe...I'd love for her to be mint again. The cab is gorgeous....except for the front. Bleh.

Question, according to the manual fuses F4 - F6 on the Aux power board are supposed to be 2A fuses. The previous owner of my machine put 4A fuses in these positions.

Is that a problem I should address? I know two of those fuses control the flippers, I am not sure what the other one is for.

Absolutely replace those with correct value fuses IMMEDIATELY and consider yourself extremely lucky nothing spiked that apparently should have popped them. Doubling fuse values is very, very bad, just universally speaking.

I switched the left flipper to a 2A slow blow (I only have the one, I will need to order more.) and it didn't last a full game before it blew and the flipper stopped working. Something must be wrong with it... probably why the 4s are in there. Instead of fixing whatever the electrical problem is, he just put bigger fuses in.

I'm looking at mine right now and it's...Interesting...as well. There are several that don't match what the card inside says.

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Hmm. Yeah it's 4, 5 and 6 in my machine.

What fuses do you have in those positions.

I pulled out some weeeeird fuses from mine. 5A, 3-2/10, 2-8/10... replaced with a set of 2.5A which according to my chart is right for F4 but overfused by .5A for F5 and F6.. so I'll need to order some 2A. No issues with gameplay with the 2.5A on F4.

https://www.pinballlife.com/1-14-slow-blow-fuses.html

Luckily I was building an order already. I'll just tack on a bunch from the list. Guess I should go through all my machines and make sure they're not screwed up, rather than trust that the last guy had a clue

Yeah I ordered some more myself. I am also going to check my other two machines.

Though, if those fuses only power coils, I guess the worst thing that can happen is you burn out a coil?

I assume you could blow out aux board components and have to repair transistors and whatnot. Not a fan of that, lol..I've actually never soldered on a PCB in any way I just shop that work out to my board repair guy.

I'm a little bit confused by the the really weird fuses mine had. 3.2A? 2.8A? What kind of random grab-bag nonsense is that?

Yeah those are kinda weird numbers.

Guess if you're an operator back in the 90s you just threw whatever you could find in...better than a bullet I guess?

And the prophecy has come to pass... I have fried the left flipper coil, lol. :p

EOS all out of whack?

IDK, the flipper was sticking a little, compared to the other one. If I actuate it by hand it does open the gap on the EOS, and I think the previous owner must have rebuilt the flippers. The metal is all shiny and new, and I can practically see my reflection on the EOS contacts. He just didn't replace the coils, for some reason. Seems kinda silly to me... to go through all the trouble to rebuild the flippers and you don't replace the coils.

I can tell just by looking at it that this is a very old coil. And I do have a too big to fail fuse on it. It has that nice burning electrical smell and the sleeve is firmly stuck in the coil body. I am guessing the last over-amp spike was one too many. Well, I knew I was playing with fire.

I am going to replace them both. I am also going to put all the correct fuses in. I should get all the parts I need next week. Then if the machine is still blowing fuses I will have to start troubleshooting whatever electrical issue it has.

Generally speaking you shouldn't have to replace coils simply due to age. More commonly you'll see them having gotten to hot at one point and the sleeve will be stuck. That or actual physical damage would be a reason to change it out. I definitely don't replace them by default when I do flipper rebuilds. Thats not to say you *can't* if you want to! Personally, I'd save any off to the side that don't have stuck sleeves. They might come in handy someday.

I'd make really certain the EOS is right. Maybe go through your symptoms a bit more and see exactly WHEN you're blowing that fuse (is it immediate on flipper press or if you hold it for a second? Etc) and you might look at buying a breaker so you don't kill a bunch of fuses while you research. Just an idea!

Yeah, I will definitely look at the EOS. ATM, this flippers coil is shot. The sleeve is stuck and I am getting 160 ohms resistance and you could smell something burning coming from it. The flipper was stuck in the up position. I will see about some breakers, I know I have seen others on here use them, sounds like a good idea for troubleshooting.

When the fuse was going it was just happening in normal play, I don't think I was doing anything unusual to the flipper, the button would just stop working.

I haven't really looked too much at the other flipper, but it has a different, newer coil. I bought two new ones and I figure I will swap them both out so they are the same coil and then I will save the working one as a spare.

My Taxi was blowing flipper fuses. Turned out to be EOS not opening. Easy fix.

Sounds like the approach I'd take. Almost willing to bet it's the EOS. My flippers sometimes 'stick' up (don't think it's coil/sleeve related but I'll probably just resleeve to be sure) but other than that, all gravy...well, besides the spinout I'm going to be fighting until I'm dead.

I got the red spring which helped a lot and then replaced the sleeve. That made it much worse. The plunger hardly moves through it. I went through my pile o' plungers and found one that traveled through it easily. But its a 1/4" shorter and hardly gets the ball TO the spinout much less around it. Went back to the original plunger and coated it with dry film silicone. That helped a ton and I can now plunge it to four spins. The biggest problem I can see at this point is that the plunger is hitting well above the center of the ball. I lifted the play field slightly with shims and it shot like nobody's business. Sadly it was just enough that the lockbar won't lock down. I'll mess with it more after I get my somewhere-in-the-mail LED display to replace my gassed out one.

As was mentioned here a few pages back, I put a couple of washers between the underside of the playfield and the brackets that hold the playfield to the cabinet under the lockdown bar. That lifts the playfield without getting in the way of the lockdown bar. Works like a charm now, and I'd been fighting that spinout lane for the last 5 years.

My spinout is super annoying but I'm hitting 75K..100K if I'm lucky. I put an MRS switch in the bowl but haven't removed the old switch yet to see if that gets me that last little oomph I need. It's close.... very frustrating. I tried shims, different rods, different sleeves, springs, etc. It's frustrating me to the point of just dealing with it at this point.

Hey Jordan - Yes, be sure to remove the old Cherry switch - the pinball hitting that lever will indeed slow things down....from there, simply watch how the pinball spins and you can place the MRS at the best location in the bowl to register the most 'hits'.....that may be right where the original switch is....

Matt
M&M Creations

dumb question, what exactly is an MRS switch?

Magnetic Reed Switch. It registers the hit via magnetism when the ball rolls past, rather than with leafs or microswitches.

And it allows the ball to register more spins because of it's contactless nature....MRS' can be used in a variety of pins - from your collection - Pinbot would be another - we just supplied 2 to a PinBot customer to replace the back ramp switches as he bought a new ramp and didn't want to bother with all of the leaf switches and riveting...so all he'll need to do is plug, stick and play!

Matt
M&M Creations

Very cool! I recently concocted a homebrew opto sensor with an adruino to replace the missing center ramp switch on my Space Shuttle (the proprietary switch/gate mechanism under the shuttle toy was missing). Had I knows about these MRS's I could have used this instead and it would've been 100x easier. I may still swap in one of these in the future to simplify the setup.

We provide many MRS' for the homebrew crowd - just sent out 4 of our ramp switches the other day for a homebrew project. So we are here to help if interested! These MRS' are pretty universal solutions....

Matt
M&M Creations

Welp. Just turned my backglass into a 600 million piece puzzle. Three questions:

1) How in the fresh hell do I get all this shattered garbage off the bottom of the translite, where the lift trim was? It feels......glued on. I tried using a hair dryer and that seemed to help a little, but I'm just not getting very far considering how many pieces it's in...

2) Is there a mirrored replacement available? I only saw the Marilyn version. I'm assuming there's not..and won't ever be....meh.

3) What size tempered glass do I need cut, assuming I can actually see some kind of success from #1? I'm sure I can just easily look this up if I don't get an answer..just figured I'd add it to the post.

The artwork is 31-1357-553. Looks like Lola isn't easy to come by but there is one on E-Bay ebay.com link: Williams Taxi Pinball Machine Lola Translite 31 1357 553 NOS Free Shipping

I have a Lola table with a Marylin back-glass myself...

The mirror is part 20-9583, but I don't see it anywhere.

The glass is 27x19 1/8th thick
https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/size-of-system-11-backglass

Finally got all the remnants off. Any way to remove this adhesive? I assume there are small particles still stuck to that and I don't want to damage the new glass.

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Should I lay down a new piece of double sided tape maybe?

Funny story, that seller actually has me blocked it would appear. I had to cancel an accidental purchase once and when I tried to cart the translite it wouldn't let me. Oh well lmao

Very pleased to announce that my machine is working again. Coil replaced, also put new titan rubber on everything and I replaced all the fuses with the proper ones.

Excellent! My 96 million new fuses came from PBL today so I'll be reviewing mine also. Ordered the new glass from a local glass shop so we'll see how badly that goes... for now I'm playing with no art in the back box... the glare!

I'm also waiting for a new piece of glass being done locally. For now the translite sits in there fine with a small piece of tape on either side to hold the middle back. Works great.

Yeah I was thinking about doing the same in the interim. No idea how quickly these guys work. Didn't ask a price, either, so here's hoping its not a fortune. It shouldn't be..

They're charging me like 80 and change for the backglass and a 3" by 5" piece of real mirror. Should be in on the 19th. There is no where here that can do tempered glass. It gets done in San Antonio and when they have enough orders they make it and bring it down.

Wow! No one there does tempered glass? Wonder if the place i called is doing the same thing. I just assumed they'd do it in house.

Takes a special oven.

Makes sense, just didn't figure it was that big of a deal. Hopefully it doesn't take too terribly long, my tape isn't holding worth a damn.

Any way to increase the amount of time the carry passengers target remains lit? That target (and bottom Pinbot drop target) seems nearly impossible to hit without blind luck.

Mine isn't remotely backhandable. Can hit it off a really perfect forehand but still not reliable

I'm going to be practicing that backhand shot like crazy now

Any tips to hit that bottom Pinbot drop target? Seems like the right slingshot is in the way relative to the position of the left flipper, regardless if the ball is caught on the flipper or has full momentum down the flipper inlane. I usually focus on another passenger until the bottom drop target is randomly hit, then I go in the for the kill on the rest of the drop target bank... That or try to nab Pinbot on the spinout. Either way, I've never liked the idea of intentionally designed "chance" targets that can only be hit by luck rather than skill. Not sure if that applies here, maybe I'm just not that good haha.

With two passengers lit at once, the first jackpot isn't too bad. But after that, if I get stuck on Pin*bot I often shift gears and go for the airport million.

someone here was looking for the gorbie gate, right? https://www.facebook.com/groups/630406413802349/permalink/1837727589736886/

Joined the taxi club today

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Welcome. That one looks good. Is it restored?