Learning where the sweet spot is to plunge is not new.
For decades pins have had a gauge on the shooter lane for just this reason and TNA is not knew as to how important the plunge shot can be.
Competition players learn to find the spot on each individual pin.

I guess I'm saying learn to play better
And yes I'm crap at the plunge shot too.
Alough I plunge and try for the secret skill shot and have a 70% hit rate on achieving it each plunge.

Plunge shot on TNA seems to be harder than most games. I was thinking a different tensile strength spring might make it a bit easier for those that would like it easier. More in line with some other games. You don't have to change it if you don't want to. I was just asking if anybody explored it. Might make it a bit more achievable for guests or casual players like myself.

You are correct shooter gauges have been on pins for ages. I kinda knew that. Not that it's new news to me.

I'm not a competition player. A new replacement spring of a different tensile strength might make the plunge shot more achievable.

I am familiar with the philosophy of Steve Ritchie. Thanks though.

I’ve got the plunger shot down fairly well By feel and hit the hands free skill shot about 15% of the time .

Still want the mod that twhtalm made at some point though .

I did a swap and don't recall having to desolder anything. The pop bumper comes out in one piece which is awesome.

Cool thanks for the info. Why did you have to do a swap?

I had some art chipping around several posts.

Do you happen to have any pics or documentation of the swap saved?

No, I don't, sorry. It's pretty straightforward as swaps go. Probably the most time intensive part was transferring all the LEDs!

Be sure to note that the back scoop has a plastic piece on the bottom of the playfield and longer mounting screws to account for it. I mention that because I accidentally drove a longer screw through the top of the playfield from the bottom!

Luckily, I was able to tap it down and touch it up so you wouldn't notice it unless I pointed it out.

I just got this game today and now see 2 issues. On the bonus lamp lights, the 2x lamp stays lit all the time even during tests, and none of the other bonus lights work at all, including during tests.
2nd issue is very loud hum from left flipper, holding flipper makes the 2x light flicker slightly. Any ideas?

Edit: the 2k light is the only one on, not the 2x light

Also, the ball save display is not working

I would be very surprised if it didn’t , at least a few components

Check the connectors under the playfield for the lights and the display. Usually it's just reseating them. There's a lot of hot glue underneath, but sometimes the connectors work themselves loose.

The connectors all seemed snug, I did see that the “cap” of one of the IDC connectors on the lamp board was missing, and found it laying in the cabinet. I put it back on and inspected the ribbon cable cap connection, seems fine. I see that those 2 cables run from the lamp board on the ball save display so am assuming it’s either something with the cable or the board.

give KingPinGames or SpookyCharlie a shout. They should be able to help you out further. Like you're saying, since there are several lights out and a display not working, I would imagine it's a connection, cable, or board problem.

Tried new cables, issue is still there. I am guessing it is the LED PCB now, but do not see replacements available anywhere. Sent an email to spooky support (Charlie?)

Ok I think I may have found the issue, but will need a fellow owner’s help.
I followed the daisy chain of power cables from board to board, and from what I can tell the 2 gray cables on the PD-LED attached to the bonus lamp board may be in opposite positions (the in cable is in serial out and vice versa). The only thing I can base this off of is the 1 under playfield image in the pinside gallery, which shows the cables cross-crossed.
Can someone verify for me? Pic attached of the current and what I think is the incorrect config.

Also, if I need to change these, I need to take that PD-LED off of the lamp board, is it soldered on or is it just snapped/plugged in? Tried pulling slightly and it didn’t budge
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Your pic doesn't show where the other ends of the ribbon cables go so I'm not sure I can help.
However here is a pic of mine plus a pic of the bottom board with the top board removed.
Excuse my squiggly yellow lines but the yellow is showing where the tracks from each ribbon plug are connected to the sockets that hold the top board.

The ribbon cables are just pushed on held in place with hot glue.

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Sorry, I didn’t explain the cables well. It wasn’t the ribbon cables I wanted to see, but the round gray cables. Your picture shows what I assumed to be correct, mine are indeed backwards. I will swap those. Thanks for the pics!

Well I was able to get the board off and put the round gray daisy chain cables in the correct serial in/out positions, but the issue remains.

Wanted to update here as well on the shooter gauge mod. I just installed it and man, it looks so good! It looks like it came stock from the factory. A really awesome mod and completely worth it!

Fantastic - that's what we were all expecting to hear! Definitely looking forward to this mod....

It really is a nice finishing touch to the game. The colors and light pattern blend in with the playfield so well that it looks like it should have always been there.

There were a few things that I'll put out there for everyone installing this kit. The first one is that it comes with a ring that you put reflective tape on and install over the shooter tip. With the ring over the tip, it is VERY difficult to push the shooter tip on the rod (physics, I dont know why). I ended up just wrapping the tape around the shooter tip itself.

Second, be very careful you dont crank on the trim pot too hard. If it doesnt turn easily, that's as far as it'll go! Dont force it, as its probably already set to full sensitivity. I ended up tearing the knob clean off. Thankfully you can connect the 2 legs of the trim pot to achieve the same effect, but I have more pots on the way. I may or may not replace it.

And lastly, install the board onto the mount, first, then install the mount onto the playfield. The board requires a little finagling to fit onto the mount. It is much easier to do it detached from the playfield.

All in all, a very clean and elegant design! Kudos to Tom for making this kit!

Thank you Fatpanda for the posts last night, all of the preorder slots are now full! Several kits should ship today followed by many more over the weekend. The tape instructions have been updated on the install page and works really well as long as you don't need to replace the tip.

I'm just excited to have such an awesome mod on my game. It's a small detail, but it really finishes the game off on the topside. All of the modmakers have really made a great game even better! From the speaker light kit with ring diffuser, to the target decals, and now the shooter gauge kit, it all works so well together for a complete package.

I attached some pics of the install.

The first is the second power supply on the splitter with the block to the amp.

The second is a picture of the gauge light attached to the shooter gauge and the bracket for the board mounted, and the third is the same with the board mounted (before I tore off the trim pot knob )

The last picture is the shooter tip with the ring and reflective tape installed. It was super tight, so I ended up taking the tape off and putting it directly onto the shooter tip.

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Well, I am still having the issue of both the ball save display and the bonus lamps not working. 2K light stays green the entire time the game is on.
I have reset each cable that goes to the PD-LED, pulled the PD-LED off of the lamp board and put it back, swapped the ribbon cables that run from the lamp board to the ball save display, and the issue is still there.
Spooky and multimorphic both say that the PD-LED has almost no fail rate, but that board runs hot when the game is on, shouldn’t be hot right?
Does the lamp board have any actual “brains” or is it just a way to keep all these LEDs together?
Like I said, ball save display isn’t working either, but unless the bonus lamp board is actively controlling that instead of just passing current to it, i wouldn’t think the lamp board is the problem.

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The board is properly addressed with the dip switch right?

I don’t know?
Here’s pics of the p-roc and the other 2 boards.
P-roc has 7 + 8 on
Top pcb has 2,3 + 8 on
Bottom pcb has 1+3 on

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From what I can see, it looks like there is a dead short somewhere on your bonus matrix board (black board) that is overheating the PD-LED (green board). Did this work when you bought the game? Does there look to be bad board work on the bonus matrix board? A dead short on the black bonus matrix board should not damage the PD-LED (green attached board). I would start by looking for a short, or just buy a new bonus matrix board. If the lights do not function properly after that, the PD-LED board could have been damaged from overheating. If you buy a new one of those, you must make sure it is addressed (using the dip switches on the PD-LED board) the same as the one that was in there before you snap them together, otherwise it will not work and all the lights will remain white.

Replacement parts are available here:

Bonus Matrix Board: https://www.pinballlife.com/total-nuclear-annihilation-bonus-matrix-lamp-board-assembly.html
PD-LED: https://www.pinballlife.com/multimorphic-pd-led-v2.html

I would try and fix it before just shotgun replacing though. Did you reach out to Spooky Support?

--Scott

Hey Scott, love the game.
I am the second owner of the machine, so do not have many details, they didn’t tell me about the issue when they sold it to me. I can tell that they tried to solve the issue or work on these parts though as the hot glue from those connectors is missing, and I can see they recrimped one of the ribbon cables.
The LED board doesn’t show any work done though, not to me at least.
Unfortunately I am not sure how the DIPs should be addressed, but have the DIP configurations of the boards in the backbox in my comment above.
I have contacted spooky and they are helpful, they thought it sounded like a loose cable, but I have checked the connections.

EDIT: I see you said DIP switch in the PD-LED now, i didnt know about that, that DIP switch has pins 1+2 set to on, not sure what the proper way to address this is.

Got mine in today! It's a really cool, well made mod. I'm grateful for hobbiests like Tom that put all this time in and sell mods so cheap. There could have been a much higher markup here. Looks awesome!

Just got the shirt from a good friend...Now I need Spooky to do a new run of machines!!

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Number 550 is being auctioned off tomorrow for JDRF .

I have had this game for a year now and it is just amazing. I don't get tired of it. I don't get it when people say it doesn't do well in a small collection or isn't fun playing solo. Just a well designed, really fun game.

Is there a dip switch chart for this anywhere? It isn’t in the manual and a search comes up short

Reach out to Spooky support and they can get that info for you. I don't have it on me at the moment.
--Scott

He's lying. The dip-switches are tattooed on his right arm, right below the Dr. Dude tattoo.

Posted previously on the forum:
https://images.pinside.com/7/f1/97/7f19776d6555bf6d86815750651d6ebeabc859d8.pdf

There's no getting around losing high scores when updating software, correct?

Correct. I chose not to put effort into this feature because I was constantly tweaking the scoring.

Yeah, makes sense for that reason. I think I'll upgrade today after I get my neon protectors from PBL today! I'll just have to put up some new scores.

Here is my contribution to the greater TNA community: a Headphone Station.

After searching for a while I found a cheap unit that is a great fit. Its a volume knob and headphone switch all in one. a single button on top switches between your headphones and a pass through back out to the games amp (volume knob still works.) There exists a version of this unit without the microphone jack (and only 2 cables) but I couldn't find a US source and didn't want to wait a month for it to arrive. Check Ebay if that matters to you.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07QRFS5TQ/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o05_s00

I just removed one of the coin mechs and ran the cables through the return slot so I didn't have to drill any holes. I considered drilling and installing a desk cable pass through but decided on this instead.

I modeled up a leg mount with Headphone hook and uploaded to Thingiverse so you can 3Dprint your own.
https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:3935500

You can attach the unit to the mount however you want. I used screws, but it has enough surface area that you could glue or double side tape it on.

Releasing this mod for free. Hope you guys enjoy it. I am no longer banned from playing TNA after the wife goes to bed!
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Hello All, any suggestions regarding a fix for a Core Sling that contiuously fires? Thanks

Did you check that the switch is gapped properly?

No I didn't. Ran a bunch of tests and did a burn in but still malfunctioning. Any pointers you could offer regarding how to gap the switch would be greatly appreciated. Thanks

A typical leaf switch gap is 3/16". Tighter if you want it to be more sensitive. Too right and it'll continuously fire. Get one of these if you dont have one.

https://www.pinballlife.com/ultimate-leaf-adjuster-tool.html

Always have the machine OFF when adjusting switches.

Hello all, does anyone have insight on the production runs and production numbers of TNA? I ordered number 500 NIB, seller told me it was the last one built, but I guess this might not be the truth..

I believe 550 was the total production run, but 500 is a cool number to have!