Mine turned 25 yesterday. I celebrated by allowing it to kick my rear end in numerous plays.

Maybe mine is going through a mid-life crises.

In either case - think about this.. 25 years old? A quarter of a century. Not bad.

Talking about the age of these games makes me feel old. I was in college when TZ was new and doesn't seem that long ago. I get the frustrations with TZ. I've only owned my game for around 4 months and had the glass off more than on. I don't even put the keys away like I do the others. I always leave it on my desk right next to the game. I hate seeing credit dots and TZ loves to throw one every few games or so even though game seems to be playing well. Still love TZ, though. Best game ever!

Exactly what I was thinking! To get 25 years out of a very complex mechanical/electronic device such as this is astounding. Sure, we have to do all of these maintainence issues and fix things as they crop up, but don't you do that with everything? In my mind, sometimes, fixing and repairing is part of the fun. Plus, how many can say they get that much time out of a major appliance these days? (As an aside, I also have antique telephones through my house; all of them function, including a Western Electric candlestick that is over 100 years old. They sure don't make them like they used to...)

To follow up on this post..

I swear that my game is aware. After finishing work, I went downstairs to fix the eject. (It's a temporary fix, as I believe I put the wrong spring on it when reassembling. Why it is acting up *now* and not the 600+ games since rebuilding it I have no idea..)

Started a game, and had the best game to date. 2.8 billion, LITZ once, LITZ Champion. Was 3 door panels from getting LITZ a second time. I swaer, the game must have seen me post that I wanted to get rid of it, and decided it would 'play nice'. The last multiball, though, the eject arm started to stick again, so..

I'll order a new spring for it. But this just proves that these games have some kind of consciousness.

what are you guys doing with this battery. i am thinking of just cutting it and doing a remote battery box, i was reading about nvram but i am not keen on risking the board by doing a poor soldering job, or would you just replace this battery?

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That is a weird ass looking battery!

Looks like some sort of capacitor or recharable battery.. but this game wouldn't have a charging circuit... so not sure what the thinking is there.

For TZ because the clock is so central, I'd suggest cutting it off, and just mounting a remote battery holder with lithium batteries. Mount the batter holder on the side of the head.

I second this. use Lithium.

why lithium do they need to be rechargeable?

Lithium last about 100 times longer and don’t leak. I don’t believe they are rechargeable, however

This is not very encouraging...I'll be replacing my playfield this summer...

Do the 2032 button battery mod. Takes ten minutes. Batteries are cheap, don't leak and last for two years. See this post for great pictures. Scroll down.

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/wpc-cr2032-mpu-install#post-2882072

I have lithium in all my older pins. They have been in for 5 years now. I just tested them all and only had to replace 3 in one pin.

some do.

IMG_1704 (resized).JPG

Never heard of a single instance of one leaking in a pin and causing damage. All of the new pins have them installed over the last decade without a problem. What is the context of that picture? Batteries should not leak without being in circuit. Looks/sounds fishy. "Gone fishing. Leave a message."

Edit: if you look at your pic, the cardboard has clearly been wet before. So unless you're going to play your TZ in your pool, the mod will be perfectly safe.

Lithium AAs are far less prone to leaking, and last 7 or 8 years. Not sure how CR2032s are superior; they certainly can leak and only last 2 years.

I never argued that they are superior. I argued that the mod is commonly done, the batteries are cheaper and do not leak. There is a reason all current manufacturers use them.

Word. And that reason is: they are cheaper!

I have lithium batteries in a remote battery holder. Battery holder was like $20 and no modifications necessary. Battery holder sits where the coin box sits so easy access and far from boards. I don't really care about cost of batteries. Any battery should last a long while so it's not like you change them out often. Better to just get what works best. Nvram would be ideal but I do like the clock feature showing the correct time.

Make sure to mount it high enough to leave room for GI-OCD board if you ever plan on installing one in the future.

ALSO: If you have a Sample/Prototype game, I believe the 8-driver expansion board is here as well on TZ

(Image courtesy of LED-OCD)

GIOCD-loc (resized).jpg

Don't the GI OCD instructions talk about it being mounted at the bottom (along with the LED OCD one) ?

Yes but if you don't have a Sample TZ (which has that extra board in the space depicted in the photo), this is a better location, out of the way. the GIOCD board is a little larger than the LEDOCD so it's helpful to keep it out of the way

$20 for a battery holder!? I buy them 5 for $10 usually.

I like the clock feature too.

You mean like this?
tz-batt (resized).png

The GI board uses a board and an interconnect. The big board is best on the side, the interconnect is on the bottom of the head.

tz-gi (resized).png

You can see my install here -

- ocd (mini) is on the right side..

ok having problems with the extra ball button not working. when i examined it, the push button is not hitting the switch, when i examine it further the white housing which holds the switch is not secure in the black housing of the button. see video, i cant tell if the white housing is just suppose to snap in, see video below, i am guessing something has broken on the white housing, so do i need to replace the whole button or just get the white housing?

Yes.
It pushes in with a snap. May require a lot of force.

yes it took alot of force to snap it in, and then 5 minutes more to figure out how to take it out after realizing i hadnt put it through the cabinet!

thanks

Hateful things, a really bad design. I've got the same problem with a Funhouse that I was installing LEDs on, so thanks for the video which shows the exact same problem & clarifying that it just needs an immense amount of force, far more than seems logical or safe.

Bizarrely the button on the Funhouse just pretty much fell out when pulled, no force was required at all, so I figured I was doing something wrong when it just wouldn't go back in with the same effort.

I guess it's best to remove the spade connectors before doing this?

i did mine with the connectors on. my button just fell out apparently for no reason, but after i put it back in the first time it was immensely difficult to push the metal tabs and pull it out, not sure how or why it just fell out?

A couple questions on the production of these games:

- On export games, would they have still put the standard serial number tag on listing it as a 100v 50hz game? Would they have converted power by adding a second ginormous transformer?

- I know they added the holes for extra posts in the pops at some point, but was there a point where they stopped as well?

No - serial number decals would have said 240v, 50Hz. There's even a picture of one somewhere in this thread, if I recall correctly?
No extra transformer is needed. The plug that plugs into the main transformer would just need a few wire/jumper changes, and the game would support 240v. (Plus, the little varistor in the power supply would have to be changed. My brain is friend, for some reason I can't recall the name of that darn thing. Anyone?)

The pop bumper posts were there, not there, there again, ad nausea during production. No way to really know *for sure*.

Cool, thanks that explains the post holes for sure (I have a mid/late run game without holes - it doesn’t turn 25 until the end of July).

The giant extra transformer (which appears factory... or extremely neatly done) was probably just for a DBA then.

For some reason I thought the US was the only one that supported 100V 50hz power but I guess not. Mine is labeled 100V 50hz but it also has a “For Export Only not FCC verified for 100v 50hz operation sticker.”

That's Japan. Likely the second transformer is an Isolation transformer - I know Canada required them, it's possible Japan did too. (Isolation transformer did just that - 'isolated' the game. Depending on the size of it, you could make a pretty penny getting rid of it.

Edit: Keep in mind, without pics, I'm just guessing based on what I've seen.

Cool, that will play well with the inlaws. Here is a photo of the transformer...

74BBD2C2-0200-4B37-A5AD-E3556F6C6713 (resized).jpeg

The varister, fuse size, service outlet, and transformer plug jumpers vary for the export games. And yes, like you posted, the isolation transfer was country specific requirement. And the mpu jumpers toofor language

I have a standard US service outlet... of course that could have been swapped out.

Sheesh, what a strange hack. The isolation transformers I've seen are simple plug. That may *not* be an isolation.
The plug coming out of it with the molex connector with the blue wires, that looks like it would connect to the other molex plug there, that then goes to the power switch. The power switch then returns to the molex plug that's plugged into the OEM transformer with black jumper wires.

I would look at the WPC Schematics, 1st page, and compare jumper wires for the plug that *is currently* plugged into the OEM WPC Transformer. If it's set to 120v, then you can safely take that other trans outta there. Double-check though. I don't want you to fry anything..!

Ok I took a closer look, unclipping some ties in the harness to better follow the wires... the one connector does plug into the line from the main switch. That then goes over to an enclosed interconnect at the coin door that would have completely cut power with the door open. From there it goes back to the transformer and from there plugs into the standard transformer.

Will have to check wpc schematics to see what voltage that connector is set for out of curiosity.... but it does seem to be an isolation transformer.

Removed, here’s the whole setup...

BD4F5740-FA98-43DE-B203-3FC80EF6C642 (resized).jpeg

Now this hack is a bit more hacky and will be slightly more difficult to remove.

C55CE834-B317-4C22-B0E8-BBF09A6D9DF2 (resized).jpeg

That transformer looks more like a converter, 240 to 120 or 120 to 240v, probably because it has a center tap (unused).

I made a thing!

JcuSXOD (resized).jpg

Cool. What does it do?

Don't know yet.

No, seriously, it's a combination board of the Ticket Expansion board, and the Serial Printer board. The serial uses a USB connection now (lower right in the board); I'm waiting on my 8251A chip to come back to me to plug into the empty socket. The bottom left and top section handles the 4 ticket outputs and 4 ticket inputs.

Having been unable to find documentation for the ticket expansion board, I don't know why there is 4 of each (normal ticket machine only needs 1 output to drive the motor - 2 if the game is going to activate the ticket meter; but ticket meters can be directly connected to the ticket mech, so..). If nothing else, once I get a power wiring harness done up, I can watch the outputs (ia the LEDs on the board) and see what the game tries to do.

The next revision will have an FPGA to avoid the address chips and the NLA 8251 UART. I may even use a DigiConnect module for connecting Ethernet up to it.

So, planning on selling these? Terminally pingeek perhaps but often thought it would be cool to have the printer option for having hardcopies of the game audits. (yes, even just in the gameroom!) But maybe that's just me.

I wasn't planning on it, honestly. There'sd probably only 5 people out there that would think it would be cool to connect a COM program up and watch the game print out bookeepings. (If I get the DigiConnect module, you could plug an ethernet cable in, and open a telnet session to your game to get readings.)

But the down side is cost. Even getting 5 of them made would cost about $125 a board. The ethernet addition would *add* over $60 because of the cost of that module. So, you'd have to be some kinda real geek to pay that much to get printouts of statistics and histograms.

6

Keeping it short, since this is kinda off-topic, but found an error in my logic on the Ticket side, which *may* explain why, after connecting it up, I couldn't get the game to activate any outputs. With a jumper that I'll solder into place tonight, we'll see if that helps. Still can't test the serial part until i get my 8251A UART. So that will be a little ways off still.