There should be a gate at the top of the shooter lane. I think you’re missing it

I think the factory gate is a one way gate. I’ve never seen a FP without that.

This is Firepower 2 we're talking about...

I see on the Pinside FP2 playfield detail photos that there is a gate clearly visible on a single photo.
It looks like the wire is black and may not be original.

Gotta go to IPDB.org and check to see if there are photos there.

Assuming that a gate was there...how do I get the right replacement?
Who would be the best supplier for something like that?

Looking a photos on ipdb.org...it looks like it may have come with one originally. Might be worth a look to make sure I'm not seeing things.

There are two holes in the bracket...found what seems to be hundreds of configurations at Marco...now I need to figure out which one goes there...

There is a 1 way gate for sure, will have to pull the glass later and I can take a look and measurements to try and match up with whats available.

Okay here are pics I took that show the wire gate better...and a link the wire gate which I am fairly certain is the correct one you need.

https://www.marcospecialties.com/pinball-parts/12-6511

The small wire tab that sits on the inside bracket arm is bent "up" slightly from the main loop allowing it to stop just in front of the rubber ring behind it.

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Hi, just picked up a FirepowerII and it’s our first pin. Couple of questions I hope someone may be able to help with.

The upper rollover lights flicker during gameplay (and then go solid after a rollover) much like the FIREPOWER insert lights. I’ve not seen this on others so I’m not sure what’s going on there. The scoring function and multiplier bonus all work as expected, but the flickering makes telling what is and isn’t lit harder than it needs to be. Possibly related, the ‘60’ insert seems to light randomly during gameplay and the special lights on the out-lanes are almost always lit or flickering.

One other thing I noticed, in both of the center 3 target banks there appears to be a spot for another star post under the plastic... should there really be one there? It would not be visible but I suppose it would be extra support for the star post that is front and center and taking all the beating.

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Mine has the third star post where you are missing yours. They have no rubber ring on them nor do I see any use/reason for them whatsoever.

As for the blinking inserts I have no clue... are they incandescent bulbs ot LEDs??

incandescent bulbs

I'd burnish the light sockets and make sure they aren't loose. I have an intermittent flicker in the upper left hand corner--off the playfield. It is a socket issue for me.
You may want to check the bulbs also.
You might want to check the pins and connectors on the wire harnesses also. You may want to consider replacement of the sockets.

What have you done to the boards? Anything?
If you service/rebuild the boards and rebuild the power supply, I think you will find that you will have fewer problems in the long run.
Add NVRAM!
Add the bridge rectifier!
Do LEDs!

Just picked it up, but the previous owner added a new CPU to Driver Board Interconnecter and Recapped the Sound Board and Power Supply Board.

It does still have batteries (no corrosion damage though).

I'd check the connections on the sockets, take out and wipe the bulbs and burnish the sockets.
If that doesn't work, I'd replace the sockets with new ones.

And get NVRAM and the bridge rectifier!

How are your plastics? Are they broken or do you have a full set?
(the plastics on FP2 are hard to get. No aftermarket ones exist. You may want to add some protectors).

I just added a Firepower II Club...makes sense...different systems, etc...

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/the-firepower-ii-loungemembers-and-fans-#post-5122097

Thank you...much more reasonable response than the apparent eye-rolls I was getting otherwise for making the suggestion.

Richard

Show of hands, who likes Firepower II ?

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Question about my spinner on FP.
It works and scores fine on 100 points, but when I light the 1000 point light, the sound makes the awesome cool change, but it scores zero pints when lit for 1000!?
I checked the switch and looks fine there...what do I need to do to get the 1000 points rippin again?

When lit, the spinner doesn’t add the points till it’s done spinning.

Really!?
Thanks!!
Going to try it tonight... I had no idea!

Nail the lit spinner good while that upper saucer flashes so you can lock the ball and then watch how it works.

Yep! I see how the lit spinner scores now. Thanks!

Now remove the upper left gate to give yourself a skill shot of sorts and make the game much, much harder!

That would work exactly the opposite in the case of Oliver Kaegi's home ROM where the spinner is temporarily lit after launch as a skill shot.

Richard

I wasn't a big fan of the washed out style of the drop target decals I have seen, so I made some custom ones. Let me know if you are interested in a set.

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I finally got my favourite machine from my childhood and would love to join the club. It was stored for 30 years (or so I was told) and they left the good ol Eveready batteries in it all those years! The playfields nice but the backglass needs sealing with some paint shrinkage. Cabinet's solid too. When I switched it on after doing all the checks the lights came on but that's all. Lots of learning to do but looking forward to bringing Firepower back to life.
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Based on what I see of those batteries, you will need to replace the battery holder, and likely repair some damage caused by the leaking batteries.

Since you will have the board out, I suggest you go with NVRam to get rid of the need for batteries, and then change out the 40 pin board header, and plan to do the same thing to the MPU pins. Lots of solder work ahead of you to make this more reliable. Good machine!

I remember that style of Eveready batteries form the 80s, so, 30 plus years would be correct. Pretty rare to find a game these days that has been stored for that long, most have been unearthed by now.

The container Gorgar from Germany I bought in 2009 had apparently been in storage since 1985, batteries were out, but with the amount of settled dust, no playfield wear with original shiny factory playfield laquer, original flipper coils & how tight it played seemed consistant with only just a few years of play.

If you want to replace the Backglass at some point, the repros from planetary pinball are excellent.

The CPR repro playfield plastics which now include the Proto version drop target plastics look great! Now looks right with drops.

Above pic is the original prototype plastics (image from ipdb) which are smaller without the blue overhang (that was added for the regular standup targets)

Below pic is mine with the CPR proto plastics.

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I would find your local pinhead board tech and have him rebuild what you have, if possible.
Your boards will be good for 20+ years then.
I also suggest adding NVRAM...will cost you about $20 USD and you'll never need to change batteries again and you'll have no acid leakage risk to your boards.

Thanks for the comments guys. What a shame they left the batteries in. I wasn't sure if I should repair the boards or replace. I don't know anyone local but it's definitely missing the speech board which I might have to source from the US. I printed out lots of info but I couldn't find a manual online. Are all the parts for the Mpu and driver boards still available?

I replaced mine with this. There are other boards also but this one seems to work great.
https://ksarcade.net/rottendog-mpu-driver-combo-mpu327.html

The beautiful thing about having one of the most-produced pinball machines of all time is that parts are always available.

here's a link with a misleading name that has useful info:
http://blackknightpinball.co.uk/wp/

also the go-to:
https://www.ipdb.org/machine.cgi?id=856

On the batteries, is there any green fuzz on the the batteries, their holder or nearby on the boards? Those look like carbon-zinc old school batteries, I can see rust, which is very typical on C-Zn batteries. Check that before sending out the board. No fuzz means no alkali corrosion.

Don C.

I was looking at that board. I think they're out of stock right now but that's probably what I'll do. What are your thoughts on the speech /sound combo board?

I love those sites. I pretty much used up all my printer ink on all the material on the blackknight site! Yes it is great to finally have a game with loads of available parts...even backglasses! Even though I just sealed mine and am going to touch up a few areas and hope for the best.

There was a little green fuzz on the battery holder terminals. I was going to stick the boards in the dishwasher...is that something people still do to get rid of any residual gunk?

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I'm still using the factory ones so I cant say much about that but I did replace all the display boards with the Rottondog and they also work good. The only thing about the displays were they seem to let some light in the gap between the back glass and the front of the display. It's a touchy area with mine because ALL the blue is flacking on my glass so nothing fill the gap and touch the back of the glass. So I had to get creative but that's the fun of working on these old machines. Firepower is a great game.

Does anyone have a page showing what size playfield rubbers and where they go? If anyone has the actual manual that would be good.

Yes, but before the dishwasher I would remove the battery holder (use an off-board holder) and scrub the area around where the holder was with vinegar and a toothbrush. Be generous, scrub a large area or the whole board. Rinse with isopropyl alcohol. Repeat those steps a couple times. This is actually the most important part of the cleaning, as the vinegar (an acid) neutralizes the corrosion from the alkaline in the batteries. Check that the board is still working properly. I don't think the dishwasher is necessary unless the board is covered in crud, but it's your choice.

Before starting anything, read the many Pinside threads on battery corrosion (often called battery acid, it's actually an alkaline, but 'acid' may be a good search term).

Don C.

manual: http://blackknightpinball.co.uk/wp/manuals-instructions/instruction-booklet
rubber list: http://blackknightpinball.co.uk/wp/manuals-instructions/playfield-parts-list

Just picked up my third FP. Stab in the dark, anyone have a CPR playfield?

Sorry, they are making firepower hardtops when they start taking orders again though.

http://www.pinballgifts.com/hardtop-faq.html

Very helpful info, thanks Don.
At the moment when I switch the machine on, I just get static lights in the backbox and playfield.

Thanks. I got that instruction booklet with my game; but isn't there another manual for Firepower?

What type of info are you looking for ? between this booklet and all the diagrams, layouts and schematics on the website, you should be pretty much covered... You can also read the "bulletproofing Williams System 6" thread, it will give you a good view of what usually needs to be fixed on these machines.
https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/vids-guide-to-bulletproofing-williams-system-6#post-581542

At this point I will have to defer to the Pinsiders who are board experts.

Here is a thread on System 6: https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/vids-guide-to-bulletproofing-williams-system-6#post-581542

Can somebody point towards a diagnostic guide?

Don C.

Search the web for "Clay's Guides" (not sure where those are mirrored now, and I have lousy connection myself ATM). "Mark's pinball repair pages" also helped out a few years ago, distilling Clay's into something a little less overwhelming. Pinwiki mugh also have a troubleshooting flow procedure.

Essentially you need to find out why the MPU is not booting up. "Flashing lights", attract mode, displays, etc all come from the program in the Game ROM so if the board won't boot, the ROM program won't be read, therefore you only get GI.

All sorts of reasons this can happen, and Williams games of the era are notorious for lack of any meaningful diagnostics. "your problem" might be relatively simple, or much more difficult.

Clay's Guides are as good a starting point as any. There's not really a one-size walk through given so many potential failure modes, but if you read those resources a time or two, you should be able to start narrowing things down, and other resources might even make more sense too.

Does anyone run the Home ROM version? I would live to see some video of the "missions". Especially the strobing targets.

I managed to get the game to start but only after restoring factory settings and turning the game off and on. The game doesn't go into attract mode on startup automatically. Straight away the left kicker locked on. Initially, in the solenoid test it wasn't firing and I found a wire off the coil which I repaired.I also replaced the diode and now I'm thinking the problem might be on the driver board but I'm not sure.