Congrats! I will say though that your shooter lane and shire look more like the 1000-1500 play range. I picked one up a few months ago with 370 original plays on it. Looked brand new out of the box. It probably has 700 (long) plays now and it still looks much cleaner that your copy. The shooter lane is still mint. All good. I just hope you didn't pay a 170 play price for it.

In the Video from your shop featuring these 2 items... you have a really cool side blades. Where can you find those?

https://pinside.com/pinball/market/shops/1073-sillyoldelf-mods/00803-lotr-lord-of-the-rings-custom-side-decals

The sillyoldelf blades are the absolute best for LOTR! I love mine.

Finally got ahold of a not too price inflated Gandalf on Shadowfax. Are there instructions somewhere on how to light up the staff? Or someone I can send the staff to that’d wire it for me?

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Not my highest score so far, but it is the furthest I've gotten in the game!:
-All modes played including 'there and back again'
-All gifts of the elves collected
-Ring destroyed once
-Fellowship of the ring almost completed, two towers completed and the return of the king almost completed

No Valinor yet.. Gotta practice some more

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Great scored

They are out of print isnt it? What a shame

@sillyoldelf, any chance you will make more?

This! I PM'd him as well... best I have ever seen.

Does anyone have Pinstadiums with mirror blades? Currently have pinstadiums and was thinking of adding the mirrors.

I've got random things firing on my machine and I'm not sure where to start with it. When I shoot up the right ramp it triggers a soul reward from path of the dead, and when I shoot either orbit something fires in the back (I cant tell if its the vuk or the post for POTD). Any ideas?

Go into the switch test and see what's triggering when you throw the ball around. Would seem you have some leafs that need adjustment. There are also times when the post is supposed to come up on an orbit shot, you're not talking about that are you?

Yeah it's not right outline or orthanc mode triggering the post. I'll check the switch test and see what's up

Right Ramp Enter is adjacent to Mini-PF Upper Left on the switch matrix. Check the diodes and wires on those two for any issues.

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I do but on my Elvira HOH not on my LOTR, and they do look awesome together.

How does it even work with mirror-/sideblades and the right ramp?
I mean.. the ball get bashed against it every time the ramp is shot, doesn't that do damage?
Would love to add them though!

Hi everyone,

I'd like to tune my LOTR a little bit, as I have two issues that I would really like to fix.

These are :
- what is the best way to adjust the Balrog switch? Currently it registers about half of the shots
- The ball very often bounce back on the Aragorn ramp, it has difficulties to perform the U-turn

Thanks for any guidance you can provide

I guess sound is kind of subjective to a certain degree. The Pinwoofer system is pretty customizable. You can independently control the sub volume and back box volume to balance it to your taste. Likewise you can adjust the bass frequency and treble to suite your taste.

You can pump up the sub and it almost feels like you have a shaker motor. Its a quality system.

The difference in speakers is obvious, but adding in the amplifier and controls is just really nice. It uses Pyle’s in the backbox and a Goldwood sub.

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Added the sword mod from pinballlife. Pretty happy with the results.

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I just recently picked up my first LOTR. Modes were starting during plunge and the Balrog wasn't lighting up due to a faulty switch. I simply bought a new cable that came complete with light socket, new switch, and a plug adapter. Easy swap and now it works great. Replacing a fork switch next and it'll be good as new.

I've tried searching through the forum with no immediate luck, maybe someone can help me quickly... I'm having issues with the ball bouncing out of the upper right shot by the upper right tower (i grabbed an image to illustrate it). I feel like I read somewhere there was a good mod/fix for that?

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Drop dead foam
https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/the-lord-of-the-rings-journey-begins-members-club?tq=Foam&tu=

Thanks DCFAN

Now I see where the question has been asked multiple times . Any idea what the best place to get it now is? Seems to be sold out at the most obvious website

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Actually, looks like this might do the trick. Now I'll pay $50 shipping for a $0.99 item.

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If you don't have any type of foam already laying around and don't need to order anything from anywhere (if you're attempting to use target foam, A: it's not going to work that well and B: that can be purchased from most pinball supply sites), just go to the local hardware store and buy some thicker density foam used to insulate doors/windows etc.. You can buy this by the foot and it'll only cost you like a buck. You can even try different densities and see what you like best for a few dollars.

Heartbreak today! I set my DTR record time over a year and a half ago (30 seconds) and haven't come close to it since. Today I hit every shot on the first try and then straight up the ramp with power, hands raised in the air...and it didn't knock the first ball through! I would have had a ~15-20 second DTR and likely a record i'd never touch again...instead took me until 57.57 seconds.

Oh well, still my furthest game towards completion - beat Fellowship, beat Two Towers, has 7 gifts, beat TABA and ended up with 220M.

my first pin 2 years ago, and still gives me that rush!

Oh my, that's when I realized that my skills at playing this game is abysmal... I would definitely like to see a video of you getting to DTR in less than one minute, if I undertsood correctly, I'm assuming you voluntarily do not complete the multiballs ?

He is talking about completing DTR ( 4 shots,put ball in ring and then knock it through) not the amount of time it takes to qualify DTR

I'm sure this has been discussed over the thousands of posts in here, but what's the best-practice solution ya'll have come up with for the flipper fade on long games? Has someone come up with an easy to DIY solution for this?

Yes, it has. Get the medium strength coils available here in the marketplace or on Ebay. The search function will take you right to the posts for more specific insight on this or other popular LOTR topics.

Is this the best solution that people are doing? It seems like cheating to use a more powerful coil than factory.....is there a cooling solution people have come up with or is that what pretty much everyone is doing, buying the stronger coil?

Someone has suggested using 5V cpu fans pointed at the coils for many modern Stern games. Do some searching and they’ll come up - here’s one:

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/the-lord-of-the-rings-journey-begins-members-club/page/2#post-2325129

As someone who's had his LOTR since new in 2003 and tried a bunch of stuff, just put the med coils in and never think about it again. Do NOT use the PBL high power coils

The game was not designed to strategically have the flippers fade an hour into playing by the designer. You're not cheating anything.

After contemplating for almost a year about wether or not to add an led ocd board to my LOTR, and if the cost was worth it, I bit the bullet. The install is super easy, and with running the settings stock, the difference is even better than I had hoped for. I feel a video doesn’t quite capture the whole effect, but when I put a before and after video side by side I can’t believe I played the game like that for so long. If you’re on the fence as I was, go for it.

See, the root cause of your issue was LED's in a LOTR. Would have been even cheaper just to yank those suckeres out and put back in incandescent bulbs.

Does anyone know where to get the side rails with elf writing on them?

Does anyone have an Arwen plastic they could sell me. I've looked at a couple sites but they are out of stock on it. Maybe someone knows where someone has it in stock. Thanks

Speaking of plastics - due to a break this week, I’m in need of the lower left pop bumper cap (plastic # 26) if anyone has one to sell

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I could use a #08 plastic as well if there’s an extra floating around for sale.

Tonight felt like it was going the be the big night with LOTR...

Finished everything, still had 2 EBs, and started DTR for Valinor... Literally, the first shot hit the ramp post and bounced back faster than I've ever seen in this game right into the centre drain.

It was heartbreaking. I just stood there shaking my head.

Tonight wasn't the night

Are you talking about the one that has the flame effects LED lighting in them? If so that is an expensive mod for it comes from two different people (one for the rails and the other for the lighting) and then you have to carve into the cabinet sides to recess the lighting and wires etc..

I thought about it but then was just happy with what I have

After going back and forth between getting better coils or installing fans, I'm going the fan route. The posts in this group talk about using PC fans but don't go into how to connect them? What kind of PC fans are you using, 4 pin small connector? Is there an adapter needed or do these plug right in somewhere?

Oh man, gutted for you. Take a break and try again some day
Doubt I will ever get there but you just never know!

Yeah, not the worst disappoint I've had on this table... I once had it down to the final ring shot, and the flipper just didn't have the juice to make it. After that, I didn't play pinball for at least a month haha.

It's still my favorite game though. If I had to sell everything, and keep one pin, it would be LOTR without any consideration required. To me, it is the perfect pinball machine.

New games like Jurassic and Avengers are awesome, but they just don't make me as happy to play.

Anyhow, adding to the topic of pinball coils and flippers. I have a set of the APB coils, but honestly, aside from the late game fade, I like how the stock ones feel and I don't want to change it at all. Does Pinkmonk make a fan set? I know he does for a bunch of games.

At this point just bite the bullet and get the APB coils. I really don’t believe the game was designed for such flipper fade that you cannot make a shot due to playing the game for a long time.
I got those coils after many frustrating games with eventual weak flippers. I’ll never go back. I do like the fan idea but just wonder how effective they will be.

My best game so far

5 Elf Gifts
6 across the bridge
TTT completed
ROTK we won't talk about..
Missed the 2nd ball on DTR (twice).

Stupid question though - how do you start TABA? Still have never seen it. I played all 6 modes but when I hit the ring shot again it just gave me a generic ring award. Do you have to collect the 3 elf rings again to light mode start or is there another way?

God I love this game. It's not leaving until I get back to back Valinor games (read: never).

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Once you play all 6 modes, the center shot does not award a ring. You have to collect it via a lit ring shot only. Get 3 of those, and then shoot the center ramp to start TABA.

Happy NYE!

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Go with the APB medium strength coils. Just installed mine yesterday after years of flipper strength fade and they're fantastic, no more fade and I'm able to make the ring shot all the time. You won't regret it.