Just a general heads up for LOTR owners: The Whitestar CPU/Audio board in LOTR is out of stock everywhere and the few used sources want extortionist rates ($300-$600 offers for my want ad! Rightfully so, I might venture due to scarcity). The CPU can fail in many ways, and there are proprietary chips that make some issues tough to repair. I'm sorting through this right now and it's not fun. I hope Stern or Rottendog or someone steps up, or LOTRs are going to be increasingly difficult and pricey to maintain.

PM sent. Thanks!

On mine a big chunk of the glass on the side of the glass flasher bulb blew out (I just got this pin...pre-existing damage).
It's amazing how much damage it caused...not just to the flasher dome but the plastic that holds it

Bob C

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Will give that a shot, thanks!

How did you make out? Do you have the schematic?

Pretty sure I just found the problem.
The Destroy The Ring flasher socket has a loose connection.
I pulled the bulb out, which releases the spring pressure and sandwiches the connector, and everything is working fine now.
Tested the socket, no short.
Going to repair/replace the socket and see if the fuse blows again.
Thanks everyone for all the great advice!

Looks like meat's back on the menu, boys!! (back in the club again - this time HUO)

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Congrats!

More pics! I never tire of seeing nice pics of good looking LOTR pins.

Here is a video of LOTR with the Pin Stadium kit installed using the UV+Glow flasher option triggered by Balrog. This is in a completely dark room with no overhead lighting on. Also the GI integration module is in this so that LOTR gains control of the Pin Stadium lighting kit. I figure you guys would appreciate it this on this forum post, thanks!

Experimenting with TekWrap on the posts as part of a LOTR playfield preservation.

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Duplicate - please delete

Finally got my brass armor

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Nice, where'd ya get it?

Looks nice...wondering where u had it done, how long it took, and how much it cost u?

Anyone in the group have or know of someone looking to get rid of a LOTR coin door? Maybe someone that brassed out their game? That or I would even take a standard Stern coin door and I could have the coin door sticker reproed. Just thought I would post here since I thought of it. Let me know if you can help. Thanks.

Cheers! I went through a fellow pinsider Woody, but he recently sold his business to Chris (also on here) from pinball plating. They both work with the same plating shop. It took a few months, but it all depends on what you're looking to get done. I think if you went with lolipop rails it would be much quicker, the standard stern rails are tricky to source apparently... but since my side art was in good shape I didn't want to cover it

www.pinballplating.com

I'm now an official pinside member, just picked up my first pinball, a nice huo lotr. Shipping terminal said earliest delivery was in 7 days, So I just drove my truck the last 50 miles and picked it up. Put my first mod in it on night one, the excellent habitrail mod to get rid of that ugly plastic from ryan1234, works great. Unfortunately day 3 and my gimli hole has stopped registering. Had to figure out how to open up the machine and then undid the switch and played with it a bit and it seems to work a little better but may have to replace it. Need to get a soldering iron. Other issue is some of the bulbs will work one day but not the next. Right now the Fotr is out, but yesterday it was the Merry red arrow and war of the ents. Bought some bulbs for those but today they are working. Anyone else have this issue where lights will work one time and not the next? I'm guessing some faulty wires...looks like it may be out of my league to shoot those.

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Welcome to the world of pinball maintenance. First off those switches are often flaky, swap it out and done. Pinball Life will be your new friend soon. lol Also, the bulbs are a Good reason most swap over to LED's. You will never stay find a day when every bulb is working. Only thing I would say is IF you go LED, 1 do Not buy those kits. Save your money and hit Comet Pinball and save $$$$ buying in bags. 2 LOTR with LED's Needs the LED OCD upgrade unless you want it to look like a seizure light display. Good Luck!

Any for a trade with a Indiana Jones?

Replace the Gimli switch with one as in Stern Star Trek. The "Y" switches are hard to find and expensive. I went through 3 in a short amount of time and now have a flawless switch like that in ST. Part is 180-5209-00 from Pinball Life. LOTR is still my favorite!

Just got a LOTR today! Very happy!!!

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Replaced the fluorescent tube in my backbox with an LED backboard using 3528 60 leds/m cool white & yellow LEDs, wired to the 12VDC accessory circuit near the coin box. Backbox looks so much better, more natural and even!!! My iPhone makes it much more blue looking than it is.

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Thanks for the advice. Woke up this morning and all the lights are working. Must be because I my shipment in of spare bulbs arrived today too. Unfortunately gimli switch was giving me fits so I bought a soldering iron, a battery powered pos I might add, spent a few hours trying to teach myself how to use it and two shitty solders later the replacement switch works marginally better. I will definitely order a few of those Star Trek switches as these y fork switches are frustrating me. Did have my best game of the week, one shot away from first destroy the ring, 52 mil...starting to get the hang of it.

Looking at AUKraut's pictures above I couldn't help myself and had to order a speaker light kit, just looks so cool. Think I will stick with the incandescent bulbs for a while, and maybe slowly convert to led. I just really like the warm lighting of the incandescents. To each his own.

Nice work! We have a version with RGBs and a flasher in the eye so that it goes off when the flasher in the tower goes off. The tube in the back is cheap crap, adding custom. LEDs makes the translight really pop. Lots of labor involved!

Thanks, the speaker lights and 3D ring does look great.

As for the LEDs, do them all at once. Either buy some serious non-ghosting premium LEDs or use regular LEDs with an LED OCD board. Regular LEDs by themselves in a LOTR will give one some serious headaches.....

Thanks, it did take most of a Saturday to complete, and the difference is dramatic in person!

I am having an issue with my LOTR. While playing a game the screen (ColorDMD) will not show the correct graphics, which flicker back to the stern Logo graphic and then kick back in to where I am in the game. Almost like it is resetting? Then after a while the flipper won't respond and the ball drains. I replaced the driver board with a Rottendog just to rule out the driver board, same result. Any thoughts on what else it could be? Thx

Display driver board or ribbon cables. It's surprising the number of issues they cause. Even if they are hot glued down, remove them. Then look for discolored pins.

Thought I'd pat myself on the back here - just got a new DTR record 1:10.02. Pretty excited to still be breaking (personal) records after five years of home use

Nice job!! The first time I completed DTR, everything came together perfectly and I'm not sure I'll ever beat that time. At this point I'm still just trying to clear my sons gc score (easier since he left for college) or make it to valinor.

This switch replacement works 100% of the time in your VUKs? That's huge -- the Y switches are way outta stock or in the $10 region where remaining. You can move a Y metal actuator to a new switch base if you need. Anyway, photos or additional pointers on this replacement are welcome

I would like installing LEDs in my army of the dead figures and connecting them with the green path of the dead lamps so that the LEDs will light together with the respective green lamp.

How do I connect the LEDs with the green lamp? The green lamps are connected with each other, which makes it even more difficult for me.

Has anybody installed this already? Any feedback is highly appreciated.

Regards

This will give you an idea on how the connections to the lights are achieved.

https://www.pinballbulbs.com/installs/lord-rings-army-dead-install

I bought 4 or 5 of the "Y" Cherry switches and have used a couple that failed quickly. Then I tried the ST switch. It has been months and lots of plays and works 100%. The ST is wider and beefier than the "Y". I think I had to slightly modify the mount to use the ST switch. The VUK comes out making mod easy. You may also have to bend the tip so it does not go past the plunger. The "Y" in my Shire VUK has been in since I got LOTR and is still working though! Must be the way the ball gets on the switch. The Gimli gets a lot more action.

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Nice! I didn't realize it bent down into the saucer, weird. Glad it works.

Thanks. I have a second ST switch ready to go in the Shire VUK when that does fail.

Just completed DTR for the first time! I knew it was going to be a show, but didn't read any spoilers to find out what actually happened. Family came running in from the other room! Good times...

It will be sent out today. Thanks for the order.

One thing I would recommend when mounting the LotR acrylic designs is to at least try mounting it with the acrylic designs in the front and the original speaker grill mounted BEHIND THE LIGHT FRAME. This keeps the grill from being between the design and the light source. This makes it so the etched detail in the design is more visible and it also lights the grill in the back instead of the speaker. This gives it a smoother and less cluttered appearance in my opinion. If you look over the pics in this thread you can see examples of them mounted this way. They are pretty easy to spot as you only see the grill in the back area and not the speaker cone.

Usually the more etched detail a design has, the more important it is to get the grill from being right behind the design. As with any designs, you can always try out different mounting orders to see what you think looks best for each design. Here is a thread that explains the different mounting orders and how they can effect the look of the Speaker Light Kit designs.

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/speaker-lights-acrylic-inserts-show-your-configs-here#post-3910278

Doug (SpeakerLightKits.com)

Doug, thanks for the advise, will try mounting as you suggest it and post some pics. Looking forward to it.

Hobbits are suppose to be dirty but not That dirty! Looks good!

Great work!! I'd like to do this to all my Sterns games. Could you show wear the wires are attached too on the driverboard. Thanks!

Thanks! Actually did not pull power from the driver board, I'm pulling it from a splitter board that the 12V/5V connector to the right of the coin box is connected to. I do have a terminal strip and fuse holder installed as well, as the LED strips on the light board are pulling about 1.7 amps. I've installed a 3A FB fuse. I do have the Eye of Sauron flasher kit from PBL installed and that runs to the driverboard as designed.

I just got a LOTR and installing a speaker kit. Does anyone know where to buy the ring design that attaches to the speaker grill. The one ring design in each grill. Not the 2 rings looped together.

http://www.speakerlightkits.com/Acrylic-Designs.html

Thank you, I was looking all over for that.

What's the full name and identification number for this switch. I need to get a couple too.

I am not sure but suspect he was referring to this one:

http://www.pinballlife.com/index.php?p=product&id=2946

Are LOTR playfields around at Stern distros or are they getting scarce? I'd like to pick one up with better color registration at some point... Not sure what my options are, but I figure it's a relatively recent, popular game so Stern had to make a bunch of PFs.