If not registering and therefore going into ball search, then it's the switch. Bend or replace.

If the VUK "can't get it up," then you need to clean, check, etc the VUK coil/assembly.

From your description, it sounds like you have both problems.

Bending it upwards or downwards?

I'll give it a shot before replacing.

Thanks

Those are the figures that come with that commercially sold mod. They are recasts of the original figures, plus one Nazgul figure. I too replaced the mod figures with original Army of the Dead figures, but there are only 3 original designs. To make a 4th, I modified the look of an extra original, cutting his cape and giving him a different weapon and pose. So now it looks like 4 separate ghosts. I already sold my extra two original figures, which you could do also to recoup cost of a 2nd set. See my post 3972 on page 80 for a pic.

Get a replacement on order. Even if it does fix it, it will only be temporary. I've replaced both in my 2 years of ownership.

I used needle nose pliers and bent the switch so it points up - bent it about 75% of the way back and it helps the switch make better contact. This fixed my Shire and Gimli VUK switches, both of which were acting up

Something im working on to replace those plastics.

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Wood as a medium, kudos to you. You don't see that too much anymore. Looking forward too seeing it finished.

Upwards. If you can trigger it with your finger then the problem is the metal fork not triggering the switch when the ball lands there. So bend the fork up to get it to work better, but you'll need to replace it eventually.

Also making path of the dead pieces. I can do it without figure mounts as well. One with a river path etched in and one without. Buddys helping me on these and the sword

Thanks looking to paint it

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NICE!! if you make those available you have a buyer on both of those with me!

The path of the dead is available 35.00 and sword needs painted and fit test

You can add me to the list as well for both mods.

I'll take both mods too!

I'll take both mods when ready! Are you cutting the clear plastic yourself or just buying already cut and modifying with the artwork?

Hi There LOTR Club
Second post here on Pinside !!

Picked up a undocumented HUO LOTR maybe a year ago but finally got around to shopping it out adding ..

NVRAM
EBay Vender ..updated code
New Rubbers with the exception of bolrog ( Got to look into how to dismantle him ) Help?
PinBits Plastic protectors
LerMods Gandalf staff
and a Coin Taker etched acrylic over the left out lane ( Very Classy)

Wiped everything down with Novis 1 and or 2
Replaced a few bulbs and Replaced the fuse (3A To 4A) associated to the Ring Magnet ( Stopped Working )

What and improvement !!

I do have a full set of Cliffy Protectors Yet to install ... ( Not sure if i will Install all or any ) Opinions?
A few additional Pinbits plastics ( Not sure if ill install ) Opinions?
Additional decals on the way for the stand up targets and shire (again unsure what i will install ) Opinions ?

Was thinking of a Path of the dead Mod and how to go about assembling
I see parts here and there including this post here above mine (Interested..)Options? Opinions?

? Flipperv Fidelity Or PinballPro ? Or Sub On The Floor...?

And I am on the list for the Palantir Mod (Woo Hoo!)

Anything I'm Missing ?
Any must haves ?

Finally a straight up question ..
Now that my Ring Magnet is working again it grabs the ball ..
But then it wavers a bit and sometimes falls out the front of the ring rather then getting pulled back

Any thoughts on this ?
I figure that it should always pull it back and through to the rail ?
The game is level .. ?

Thanks so much to Pinside
and all its members for all the info and help

Wiggling some in the ring is normal. This is dependent on pitch, not level. You might try adjusting the pitch. Also, what ROMs are you running. On the latest(10.01?) if you press both flippers while the ball is in the ring it will fall out of the front intentionally.

Only mod I'd add is a colorDMD, that is the only thing missing from mine, hopefully add one in 2019 some time. Less is more on LOTR imo, mine came with the plantir mod and it is pretty cool, guests always point it out and like it. Plastic protecting the Arwin plastic is a must, other than that I've been considering cliffy's too with my undocumented HUO machine but haven't bit the bullet. One day.

Cutting my own. Has zip tie holes and slots to give you more adjustments. At this time im Only selling the plate. Figures are getting harder to find and i dont wanna search for hours per unit to find sets

Please add me to the list buying a of a "River etched" Path of the Dead. I just like the fact of seeing the pinball through the top, not adding the figures and lighting.

Thank you for doing this!

Mine came with cliffy protectors on the Shire and Gimli shots and they don't affect gameplay at all, so no reason not to.

Pinstadiums. They make anything look like a whole new game. People say they're too expensive and that you can make the same thing for a fraction of the price, but most people can't. Most mods are simply window dressing and personalization but the Pinstadiums will literally make you go "Wow!" when you turn the game on after installation. Then when they turn off with the GI to highlight various modes and areas around the playfield it makes it even more effective. They are awesome.

The above post is correct. 90 percent of time is you bend it will get you a little more time but most likely just replace.

This is version 1. Handle is a little wide. Gonna narrow it and play with heights to ensure the ball clears

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Version 2.0

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I'm guessing that when the Dark Tower leans over it's normal for the buzzing sound to occur?
Or is there something that needs to be done with the solenoid or bracket?

Thanks!

BobC

Mine has anyways done this and so have all the ones I've played on location. Buzzes on the shots that award something (3rd, 7th, etc... With my settings anyway). Annoying, but normal.

Iv got 10.00 in there
I thought 10.01 is for the LE?
Did not know about the option to drop it from the front .. so it’s not that I was holding the flippers ..causing the drop

Looks like my bubble is right on but maybe I tiny bit low in front

Some people (like me) have 10.01 in their regular for the shaker... although it's almost indiscernible when you have a powered sub as well. Whenever I get a wild hair, I may try to figure out how to get it to shake closer to a modern stern pin.

Looking Sweet!

Hi-

Multi part question:

(1) I'm replacing rubbers and cleaning up as much as I can without a full playfield teardown. I note that the plastic behind the Gandalf switch, under the ring ramp, is bent upwards (see photo attached). Was it like that from the factory, in order to make ball mostly go towards pop bumpers and Barad Dur when it falls forward out of the ring magnet or off the top of the ramp on a weak shot? Or did a previous owner "mod" this in order to perform the aforementioned tasks?

I found some good playfield restoration pictures, but have not seen (or may have missed) a photo that shows how this plastic is supposed to go.

(2) The OCD part of me wants to just continue taking off all parts in order to do a really good cleaning. However, the practical part of me wants to take off just enough to get all new rubbers on, clean playfield surface and plastics/metals as best I can with naptha, use Novus 2 as best I can on available surface, wax, and put back together.

It looks like a challenging and time consuming task to remove enough to do a good playfield cleaning (and I've read that also on Pinside). Plus, I'd like to put LEDs in inserts sometime, and have not purchased LED OCD or researched in detail what bulbs to get, so it won't happen now.

My wife loves this game best of all, and I kind of want to minimize time down while we wait for her Willy Wonka LE. I've pretty much decided to let full teardown go, unless someone can advise otherwise...

Thanks,

-Adam
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Yep the plastic is supposed to be angled like that to kick the ball towards the pops/tower.

Thanks PapaKilo !

Also, I went ahead and took off enough to do a decent cleaning and replace a few incandescent lights with new for now!!! Looks OK to put back together after cleaning...

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How is the inner orbit supposed to shoot? When I hit mine, there is a 90% chance it hits the rubbers above the pop bumpers and bounces into the pops. Is it supposed to clear the pops and roll into the outer orbit?

Hi Adam,

Your plastic behind Gandalf looks good, however it looks like you might be missing another plastic protector (unless you removed it).

Here are a couple photos.

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Don't know how many of you have Gimli VUK bounce backs, but if you do, here's a simple solution that worked for me.

I used a zip tie to bind the wireform to the scoop that's connected to the pop plastic. This effectively removes most of the "bounce" in the wireform that causes the ball to bounce out.

Gimli bounce backs totally destroy the flow of the game...especially since it can sometimes take 3-4 tries. Sigh.

Since using the zip tie, I haven't had 1 bounce back

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Thanks, snaroff that photo helps. I have the plastic in question and had already taken it off. It was not really affixed properly, so now I know how it's supposed to go.

Mine used to bounce back about as long as I would let it. My solution was similar but instead of the zip tie I loosened the applicable hardware and bent the ramp down in the same direction. It took a few tries but now a bounceback happens very rarely.

Interesting. I think I fiddled with bending a bit and didn't have much luck. This problem also seemed to get worse over the years (I'm the original owner...purchased NIB in 2004). Another tidbit is I raised the angled bracket by placing some washers between the pop plastic and bracket. Raising it helps cradle the ball from falling out. For awhile I lowered the solenoid power from "normal" to "soft", but this is no longer necessary on my example.

Repost for the night crowd. Any input?

On mine, it clears the pops and continues into the outer orbit most of the time. I'd say 80-90%? Hard to say exactly.

I assume your flippers are strong? If so, then maybe the Gandalf gate isn't aligned properly?

If you want to post a photo of your upper PF, I can compare it with mine and see if I notice anything...

Just joined the club today! I've been looking for one for a while, finally pulled the trigger. Happy Days!

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I put in Flipper Fidelity speakers. I can now clearly hear all the dialog. Great improvement.

Color DMD is cool but I prefer the original Orange ..I think it complements the colors of the game
I do have the Arwin plastic protection .. and since iv cleaned it up and replaced rubbers ..the game plays fast and i'm loving it..
Must have played 50 games over the weekend .. and now i'm thinking i probably should install those cliffy's.. maybe not all of them though ..

i have seen pictures but I think id have to see it in person to pull the trigger on those .. i like the dark look of the game but i can definitely see the appeal

There are so many animations that you miss with the standard DMD. I have owned this game since I bought it new in 2004 and have played it tons. As soon as I put in the color dmd, I was amazed by the details I never noticed.

Mine returns down the right orbit pretty reliably. Maybe you need to adjust the inner orbit ball guide.

It could be an alignment issue. See the following post I made on this thread several years ago...

Very interesting! Thanks for pointing this out...I'll take a look. The zip tie solution isn't a big deal, but I've always been curious about the ideal "fix". I pinged George Gomez about it years ago, and he didn't have any ideas for why it was bouncing out.

The post in the photos below came off the left front of the sword ramp (player's perspective). It holds the right side of the Gimli VUK wire frame. See photo in post 4235 above https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/the-lord-of-the-rings-journey-begins-members-club/page/85#post-4989412 ). Note that the washer on my post does not come off - the top of the post has some metal flared out.

The manual shows no part like this. It shows 8 posts with 10-32 thread on the bottom and 6-32 thread on top (item 14 on page 69 of my manual). None of the other posts have the washer stuck on like this.

Can I just file off the top so I can remove the washer, then easily slip on the new Titan post sleeve? Or has somebody modded this because there are problems if the washer on top can go over the top of the post? To re-assemble, it is post with sleeve->washer->Gimli VUK wire form->washer->nylon lock nut.

I though that I had to get the post sleeve on as described here:
https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/how-to-replace-rubber-posts-on-lotr

But even with further guidance from LTG I cannot get the post sleeve on.

Thanks for any further guidance.

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Looks like that post has seen better days. The washer isn't supposed to be trapped on there by that lip. File the lip off and remove the washer, slip the sleeve on and you should be good to go.