smart guy, but his collection is going to die (get sold off) when he passes on because he refuses to train someone to replace him.

No, certainly lots of people can fix pinball machines. But some of those oddball machines don't exactly have manuals. Perhaps it's Tim's ego that won't let anyone else touch them, and when he passes someone WILL take over (hell, if nothing else that place is a cash cow)

Because Tim bought every low production pinball he could get his hands on for under $50 and purposely stashed them away because he knew they'd go up in value. Tim isn't that far from Gene Cunningham

I know I either heard it on a podcast or a news article that said he maintains 90% of the games. And while Tim isn't near death, anyone can die at any moment.

I commend Tim for what's he's been able to create, but when a LOT of stuff isn't working because he can't keep up with it ($750k/year = lots of wear), it's time to allow others to help out more.

That's good to hear. When I was there a few years back (and this was a wednesday, so it was hardly crowded, and they had a couple days to recover from the weekend), MOST of the pins at the PHOF worked, maybe 10 of them off. Riviera extension was a joke. Freddy display wasn't legible, WPT and CSI DMD starting to go bad, a gottlieb right flipper didn't work at all (and the ball went directly into the right flipper so you had no chance of saving it), the left flipper on cue ball wizard was cracked in half, and sadly Tim was there while I was playing all of these, and he was just collecting the money (didn't have any tools for fixing machines).

I don't want to bash him, he can do what he wants, it's his money and his machines. But if you're truly passionate wouldn't you want everything working so others can enjoy that experience. Like it's been said on here (and many other posts), if you don't maintain pins on location, people who aren't pinball players are going to get a bad impression of what pinball is and never want to play again, and then the hobby dies. In a way, pinball routers are ambassadors.

"Oh, that's one of those machines that's always broke, not sure why people play those things".

Impressive, yes. Do they need to work for free? no. Every non-profit has expenses, you couldn't possibly expect anything to run without money. I think most people are saying they shouldn't run it on a shoestring budget. I know it's about charity, and they donate PLENTY of money every year (not sure who they're donating to now that the salvation army has changed their structure). Seems most people are just saying spend a "little" more money if they can't keep up with servicing, or god forbid put some warm colored LED's in the EM machines so they don't look like glowing crap with the super brights. Get real leg protectors instead of jamming cardboard behind the leg bolts. And perhaps sell legal fresh popcorn instead of the 2nd day used movie popcorn he's been rumored to sell by many people I've talked.

I'm sure I'll get flamed for this, but to keep bringing up the "people work for free" mentality is retarded. If a group of car enthusiasts decided to be charitable and open up a free oil change place, and take all the donations in and give them to charity, but let's say every 1 out of 50 cars leaked all the oil because someone didn't get the drain plug all the way back in, could you then say "Hey, I did that oil change for free, what are you complaining about?" Imagine one of those guys came to your door and said "hey, give $25 to this charity and we'll give you 8 weeks of newspapers.. then the newspapers never came and you complain, and the salesguy goes "hey, I'm volunteering, don't complain to me". People are feeding quarters into pinball for a service, they should all work, not to mention some people specifically fly from out of state JUST to go to PHOF and nothing else in vegas.

I forgot about that

"so it now costs us just 12 dollars a year in fees to open our doors"

Sooo, where'd the $722,955 go? Couldn't have all gone to electricity and parts.

Ok I'll steer back on topic. American restoration has also restored an arm wrestling game for Tim, and then Tim helped them redo all the wiring on a "shoot the bear" EM game.
Shoot-The-Bear[1].jpg

I'm pretty sure whatever pricetag he throws out on the show, the customers either get a REALLY good deal (payment for being on the show), or they get the worked 100% comped. No way Tim would spend $8k restoring an arm wrestling game.

No, Tim brought in an arm wrestling game. I think american restoration quoted him $8k to restore it.

History_American-Restoration_304_Strong-Arm_reLF_HD_still_624x352[1].jpg

He mentioned it on that episode. also raved about putting an LED bulb to replace the incandescent bulb

I almost walked up to tim while he was emptying quarters at the now closed riviera, glad I didnt. I don't want that image of him being a dick to me or my wife, I likely wouldn't go back.
Clay: you are remarkably approachable at your vfwpinball show considering the chaos.

me too. I mean I've heard interviews before, but for some reason you really get a feel for the kind of person he is more in that interview. Especially when he talks about how hes' been doing this for 7 days a week for 25-30 years and getting burned out (and never having time for TV or movies). It's a thankless job, and it's not so much his skill, but his personality type that can only run a place like that.

I don't think anyone is suggesting it be changed from non-profit to for-profit (clearly it's tough to make money when you have to pay for local and federal taxes). Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe you can be non-profit and still have paid workers. Museums are technically non-profit, but the workers aren't there because they love history, they have to eat too.

Clearly having a giant collection of pinballs from multiple decades can be considered a museum. If that isn't history, I don't know what is. If it takes a section of the building to build a showcase (glass cases with photos of how pinball developed from bagatelle to modern pinball), so be it.

You sure?
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/apr/12/pinball-machine-hall-of-fame-las-vegas-job-hiring