Hey Pinside,

I have been playing my recently repaired Night Moves game and decided it would be nice to have the high scores saved.

Earlier I had removed the original battery to prevent any leaking issues and I had an old kids toy that had a 3x AA battery tray sitting waiting to go out in the trash. So I cut the battery tray out out of the toy, soldered on some wires and removed my control board. I soldered the wires onto the board (paying attention to polarity I had originally marked) and reinstalled the board. At this point I was a little bummed because I had done this without checking if I even had AA batteries...but not as bummed as when I turned the game on to find out it was now broken!

When I turn on the game a portion of the lights come on (assume these are always on) but the game does not boot. Attract mode never starts, the display is blank and no sound of any kind and no response from the coin slot switch. The first time I powered on the game with this issue I left it on for about a minute and started to smell something "hot" and promptly powered it down before any of the electronics let their smoke out. I have since powered it on for short intervals and have been able to figure out that the 5 volt circuit is having some major problems. The two resistors that are between the main transformer and the full wave bridge rectifier (for the 5 volt power supply) are getting extremely hot, I don't know how hot they get in normal operation but I'd assume this is excessive. I have also powered the machine on with the 5V supply disconnected from the control board, without this connected the resistors are not getting hot at all...

I have also since removed the wires and visually inspected the board for any damage caused by my work and haven't been able to find any. Looking for any and all advice on where to start looking! Thanks in advance Pinside!

zacaj Yes this battery box is serial and good call on the diode, I'll get one of those wired up before actually putting batteries in the box. But first have to get this thing playable again

Black_Knight Thanks for the heads up on the Sys80 club as well as the title guidance!

zacaj I thought the same thing when I removed the board for a visual inspection and measured resistance between the 5v and ground pins coming from the 5v supply and had a 1.2k resistance reading or so...and since I didn't remember that exact value I thought I should check it again so I could write a more informative response. This time when I had the board in my hand I found a bridged solder joint halfway across the board from where I had been working, not sure what I was thinking (or not) when I was doing the work but sufficed to say it was a little sloppy.

Bridge has been solder wicked off the board and all is well now!

Next will be to get some AA batteries and re-install the battery box with a diode and get back to playing!