Hey everyone-

I've officially embarked on a pretty cool new pinball adventure, a project I'm calling Pinball '89! I currently own a Whirlwind that is about to go under restoration. As I was piecing together the remaining parts to start the rebuild, I found a complete Earthshaker playfield on eBay for a reasonable price. I've been after an Earthshaker for some time now, yet they always seem to elude me in my area. I am relocating to Boston area in the near future, so space will likely be limited (compared to my current 750sqf basement). After thinking about it for a little while, I decided to pull the trigger on the ES playfield (since its complete and in nice condition).

My plan - use the ES playfield to swap in and out of my Whirlwind cabinet as a conversion kit (when I feel like changing it up). My research indicates the main PCB's are 100% identical, system 11b with the same interconnect PCB. If my hunch is correct I will simply need to do a rom-swap and drop the new playfield in to enjoy a different game. I have secured a speaker panel plastic to swap out as well (I plan on keeping the whirlwind translite when I swap games, unless I can find a cheap ES backglass).

Of course this project is all in theory lol. If it works however, I should be left with a "Pinball 2000" style setup (RFM and SWeP1). My plan is to install WPC-95 style "bars" that run the length of the playfield on the underside of the for easy storage.

The playfield JUST arrived today. More to come as I attempt the swap!

Thanks for the pointers guys. Looks like I'll really need to analyze the interconnect board schematics and make the neccessary changes.... or just buy an Earthshaker interconnect board. Depending how drastic the changes are, I might come up with a "quick switch" solution (interchangable daughter board or something).

Also, thanks for the heads up on the double flipper switch! I overlooked that piece.

As for the overlay sound board, I was planning on just disconnecting it while running Earthshaker.

Alright- decision made.

I grabbed a mousin around interconnect board from Marco. It appears I need to change out 8 resistors/jumpers, the rest is identical. Unfortunately the Earthshaker interconnect is sold out everywhere, so I need to make-do with whats available (the PCB looks identical, just slightly different parts).

Also, the aux power supply boards are slightly different, but only in fuse location. Fuses F1 and F3 are swapped between whirlwind and earthshaker.

So its looking like to swap games I need to:
*Add a double flipper switch to the left flipper
*Swap in newly modified Interconnect board
*Swap F1 and F3 on the aux driver board
*Swap out roms on CPU and Sound board
*Disconnect sound overlay board

Sounds like a walk in the park to me! Don't think I'm missing anything, however I'm going to fine-tooth-comb the power supply assembly drawing/ parts list before I jump in feet first.

Let me know if you guys realize anything I may have missed! And thanks!