Twilight Zone
Bally, 1993While I am waiting on parts I thought I would post my restoration photos, and costs associated with a full restore to a Twilight Zone. I picked up the machine from an operator in Ohio for $3,300 last friday and this is the progress so far. Here are the pictures when I picked it up.
Next up is to remove all old decals which I do with a heat gun and putty knife, this time after decals were removed I used orange power from Home Depot to remove the adhesive left from the decals. I would say that this reduced sanding time by over 4 hours just not having to sand the adhesive off. After that all holes and gouges are filled sanded smooth, and 3 coats of varathane are used on the cabinet, then sanded smooth with 120,150, then 220 grit. the inside of the cabinet is sanded with a detail sander to remove all of the black on the inside. Also dont forget to sand the underside of the cabinet as it will look good as new as well.
New decals installed TZ looks like a whole different cabinet with no fading on it.
The playfield was so nice that I did a 3M automotive polishing system with buffer and some wet sanding, I wanted to send out to get cleared but did not want to wait 4 months to reassemble, and after polishing and buffing the pf turned out great. Also at this time I sand the underside of the plafyedl with 220 grit then 400 grit to make it look new again.
Now just waiting on parts that should be here by this friday, I will be on vacation the following week and should be able to finish it. This game is getting, coin door, rails, hinges, LD, and legs chromed by Mike chesnut. New clear ramp, and new playfield plastics, all new switches, coil sleeves, coil wrappers, pop assemblies, CT led's, PBpro HE speakers, and a few mods nothing crazy in case anyone wants to know the parts bill alone is $2,800 but that should be all of it. I thnk I will still be fine at $6,100 in this machine it will look like new. I will post reassembly photos but for now I will start cleaning and scrubbing everythin that is going back in. This is only my second full restore so any comments or tips let me know.
correct no wear spots I just releveled the inserts most of them were fine, then its a little bit of wet sanding and 4 polishing steps to go through with a high speed buffer, keep in mind if you dont know how to used a high speed you can burn right through the original clear.
Never know I just thought this deserved a full restoration, it might be for sale because I have a AFM that I have been looking at so maybe but I have never played it we will see
The one thats never going to be for sale (again never know) is this one http://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/indiana-jones-high-end-restoration-thread-my-high-end
It actually is not that hard to do its the fact that whatever you think its going to cost, double it because it adds up quickly. For anyone that thinks a HEP, or other restorers cost is high most of it is parts, I have almost $3,000 in parts for the TZ and over $5,000 in the IJ in the thread above. I Don't know even after all the work if I could even sell TZ for $7,000 or IJ for $9,000 and thats dead cost with about 200 hours a piece in labor for $0
You ain't kiddin. I think I put this in your IJ thread but I recently did a full high end restoration on my TZ and I can't even count the hours, but it was all worth it in the end. Mine took me almost three months to finish for me. I actually enjoyed each part of the process too.....well except for all that freakin sanding!
Quoted from McCune:Sanding is my favorite part !
Jim
With that handy dandy Festool, sure 
Quoted from stephenshane237:It actually is not that hard to do its the fact that whatever you think its going to cost, double it because it adds up quickly. For anyone that thinks a HEP, or other restorers cost is high most of it is parts, I have almost $3,000 in parts for the TZ and over $5,000 in the IJ in the thread above. I Don't know even after all the work if I could even sell TZ for $7,000 or IJ for $9,000 and thats dead cost with about 200 hours a piece in labor for $0
I saw your other post about the IJ you are doing. The game is going to be nice I'm sure but its too bad you couldn't sell that nice original IJ cabinet and get a faded cab to decal. I saw someone else posted on that thread that they thought you had a sample TZ since it appeared to have a white door, I'm glad to see it was just faded
I hear you on the parts cost. I am still buying parts for my TZ and one of these days I will get mine done. Mine has been apart much longer than 20 days though!
Now onto the mini playfield I know there is alot of wiring issues here. Look at the magnet wires burnt through amazing they still worked, also all wires going to switches are exposed by ball strikes leaving wires open to short out. I am installing the new mini pf switch kit from GPE.
Next mini pf buffed with 3M process, and pics of the mini playfield switch kit. I found the side switches to be almost impossible to solder correctly so drill out the rivets, solder wire, and use 1/8 pop rivets to reinstall the boards. They have pop rivets already anyways, bought new NOS plastics so I got to use my rivet press from pinrestore for the first time.
Quoted from stephenshane237:The playfield was so nice that I did a 3M automotive polishing system with buffer and some wet sanding, I wanted to send out to get cleared but did not want to wait 4 months to reassemble, and after polishing and buffing the pf turned out great. Also at this time I sand the underside of the plafyedl with 220 grit then 400 grit to make it look new again.
I see there is a five part system on 3M's website. Did you also buy the 3M polishing pads or are any decent foam pads for a buffer acceptable? The finish you did looks better than the clear I did on my FH.
Decent foam pads are fine, I only use 4 steps of there system step 1 heavy cut compound, step 2 heavy polishing compound, step 3 fine cut compound, step 4 machine glaze, the first 2 steps I use a foam pad, the last two use a wool buffing pad. Should come out looking great the wet sanding is pretty useless on a Pf because of the dimples.
Quoted from stephenshane237:Decent foam pads are fine, I only use 4 steps of there system step 1 heavy cut compound, step 2 heavy polishing compound, step 3 fine cut compound, step 4 machine glaze, the first 2 steps I use a foam pad, the last two use a wool buffing pad. Should come out looking great the wet sanding is pretty useless on a Pf because of the dimples.
Most people would use a wool pad in the first steps, not the last. Wool is more efficient at cutting than foam.
Keep up the good work.
Quoted from Toasterdog:Damn, nice work man. Wish I had the guts to try something like that
+1
I'd love to do this to all my machines, but in my mind it's just so damn daunting. Maybe if I had the playfield rotisserie I'd consider it, but couldn't imagine doing this with my current situation.
Looks great!! Love those inside decals for the cabinet.
Quoted from stephenshane237:Decent foam pads are fine, I only use 4 steps of there system step 1 heavy cut compound, step 2 heavy polishing compound, step 3 fine cut compound, step 4 machine glaze, the first 2 steps I use a foam pad, the last two use a wool buffing pad. Should come out looking great the wet sanding is pretty useless on a Pf because of the dimples.
Thats about it I remove the mylar but you dont have to and again high speed buffers can burn quickly if you dont know how to use one. I will get the exact name of each compound for you and post it
Quoted from starbase:Looking amazing, I mean it looks like you just pulled it out of the box.
I'm not sure they even looked that good coming from the factory. My hat is off to you sir.
Time to rebuild under playfield hardware here are the pop bumpers, new springs, fibers, sleeves and coil wrappers. All pieces cleaned with bleche white and then reassembled. The third picture the one in the middle is not done yet look at the difference plus they will play lke new.
Wanna join the discussion? Please sign in to reply to this topic.
Great to see you're enjoying Pinside! Did you know Pinside is able to run without any 3rd-party banners or ads, thanks to the support from our visitors? Please consider a donation to Pinside and get anext to your username to show for it! Or better yet, subscribe to Pinside+!
This page was printed from https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/tz-full-restoration-in-20-days and we tried optimising it for printing. Some page elements may have been deliberately hidden.
Scan the QR code on the left to jump to the URL this document was printed from.
Medina, OH
