Bobby Orr's Power Play
Bally, 1978
Gilligan's Island
Bally, 1991
Space Jam
Sega, 1996Quoted from TrainH2o:Is this the size area, that you are talking about? Otherwise, it's a pretty sizable area to repaint.
TZ Wear Spot mask.jpg 81 KB
That's what I would do.
If you don't want to paint that much, then just do the spot and put a Mylar disk over it.
Quoted from dawgs650:So I decided to remove it and try to repair what was underneath it. Well I got a bigger surprise than I had expected, and now I'm trying to figure out what is the best way to fix the wear.
That is typical MM wear.
It looks difficult, but the repair is the same as most others.
1. seal the bare wood with clear or just white primer.
2. print a black only outline of the area on clear paper to use as a guide to the missing areas.
3. paint the color sections back in again. I'd paint the entire brown of the scroll, and the entire gold stripes of the scroll, as those colors will be too hard to spot repair.
4. print the black outlines on clear decal paper and put them over the painted area.
5. clear over the repairs or even better, the entire playfield.
You could match the color and paint the scratch, then when it's almost dry, wipe off everything but the scratch.
Or
Scan the area, fix the dots in Photoshop, then print a decal on a color laser printer (ink jets seem to fade too fast).
I am have an Eight Ball playfield. Where the racked balls are someone had done poor touch ups by hand and then covered it all with Mylar. When I got it the Mylar was lifting. To my surprise when I started pulling up the mylar, it also pulled the original clear coat with it, and a lot of the original paint too. That was a surprise to me since outside of this area the playfield looks quite good. Is this normal?
It's normal.
If the game has frozen in a garage in it's lifetime, it will often lose it's paint with the Mylar.
Always scan the area before you try lifting Mylar.
Heat sometimes works a lot better than freezing on older playfields, so usually I'll try using a hair dryer on Mylar near the back of the playfield and see if can be removed.
Quoted from vid1900:That is typical MM wear.
It looks difficult, but the repair is the same as most others.
1. seal the bare wood with clear or just white primer.
2. print a black only outline of the area on clear paper to use as a guide to the missing areas.
3. paint the color sections back in again. I'd paint the entire brown of the scroll, and the entire gold stripes of the scroll, as those colors will be too hard to spot repair.
4. print the black outlines on clear decal paper and put them over the painted area.
5. clear over the repairs or even better, the entire playfield.
Thanks Vid, you have been a huge help!
Vid, my new, reported HUO TSPP playfield was scratched to shit. The balls looked and felt like 320 grit sandpaper. Some good cutting polish knocked most of it down. The remaining scratches are visible only in the right light but I can feel them with my finger nail. How would you tackle them? More polishing, sand then polish, other? I'd like to hope I can avoid a new CC, for now at least.
Thanks!
Quoted from sed6:Vid, my new, reported HUO TSPP playfield was scratched to shit. The balls looked and felt like 320 grit sandpaper. Some good cutting polish knocked most of it down. The remaining scratches are visible only in the right light but I can feel them with my finger nail. How would you tackle them? More polishing, sand then polish, other? I'd like to hope I can avoid a new CC, for now at least.
Thanks!
Wax it and leave it.
if you keep polishing, you will hit the paint, especially if the scratches can be caught with your fingernail.
One day, clear it and all the scratches will level out.
See how much material you would have to remove to bring the whole surface down to the bottom of deep scratches?
Quoted from Sijcolo:Vid I am in the process of restoring a baby pacman and part of the first layer is lifting. What is your recommendation?
I can't see the lifting on my phone in those pics.
Is it the wood, the clear, the Mylar?
Give me another pic with an arrow, or lighting from a different direction, please.
Quoted from Sijcolo:This is better. It looks like the wood is lifting.
First determine if the wood, or the clear is lifting.
If you are sure it is wood you can:
1. Inject CA glue under the lift, then glue it down. Many CA glues have the consistency of water, and will flow through a syringe.
http://www.woodcraft.com/search2/search.aspx?query=ca%20glue
2. If it is clear and it has not lifted under any painted graphics, you might just cut it out, and fill the dip with 2PAC.
Quoted from Rock914:I have a nice and flat water damaged playfield, unfortunately the diamond plate clear coat is de-bonding in areas. What would be the best plan of attack as far as removing the de-bonded areas so I won't have an issue with my clear coat? Any helpnwould be greatly appreciated.
First be sure that it is the DiamondPlate lifting and not some aftermarket Mylar.
You need to remove any loose material.
Get an Xacto knife and a good magnifier lamp and cut out all loose clear.
lightly sand and feather with #800. If anything else is even thinking of letting loose, the sanding will get it started.
Spray a light coat of 2PAC and let it dry a month. That way the tension of the new clear will pull up anything (if there is anything to pull up).
If nothing terrible happens after than month, do you paint touch ups and final clear.
Quoted from vid1900:First be sure that it is the DiamondPlate lifting and not some aftermarket Mylar.
I have two of those playfields with the factory mylar, and the mylar it doesn't cover the kicker holes or the outlanes. Just the open area in the middle of the playfield.
From the photos, I'm not seeing any mylar at all, since the edge would be running over the owl and ghost.
Any advice on how to handle this on my newly acquired AFM? I have no artistic ability and have virtually no tools/parts. Should I just mylar over, find a local pinball/artist to do a touch-up, put a decal over it?
Quoted from MiamiRedSkin:Any advice on how to handle this on my newly acquired AFM? I have no artistic ability and have virtually no tools/parts. Should I just mylar over, find a local pinball/artist to do a touch-up, put a decal over it?
unnamed (2).jpg 39 KB
Just put a dot of Mylar over it and enjoy the game.
I've given up trying to find replacement clear rectangular inserts for my Taxi playfield, so I guess I'm going to just sand them off and put them back in. The problem is that they're all kind of cloudy. The cloudiness mostly goes away when they get wet, so will a thin layer of clear before applying decals have the same effect?
Quoted from UvulaBob:I've given up trying to find replacement clear rectangular inserts for my Taxi playfield, so I guess I'm going to just sand them off and put them back in.
Try not to sand them, that will make them thinner.
Just take a sharp chisel and scrape the ink off the face.
Quoted from UvulaBob:The problem is that they're all kind of cloudy. The cloudiness mostly goes away when they get wet, so will a thin layer of clear before applying decals have the same effect?
It will look even better than water.
You want a coat of clear under and above the decals.
Finished up my Whirlwind playfield this weekend and wanted to say thanks to Vid for all his invaluable advice. There are a few touch-ups that aren't perfect and some dust in the clear in spots. Is it perfect, no, but for my first playfield restoration I'm happy with it. IF I attempt another one in the future it will go much faster and better.
This Whirlwind didn't appear to be in bad shape, but when I got the mylar off I a lot of the paint came off with it over the inserts. I pulled most of the inserts and made my own waterslide decals to replace the lost artwork. When I was wet sanding the clear I found some inserts that weren't flush and got into the replacement artwork. That's when I discovered my clear wasn't adhering like it should, and ended up scraping off 75% of it with a razor blade and regluing the inserts flush and having to rework some areas. I think it got too cold overnight in my garage when I applied the clear.
I'm sure once I get the playfield repopulated with nice new plastics and clean parts it'll look great and play great!
Quoted from vid1900:I'd probably make up the decals too.
Frisket would not be a disaster, but a lot of time for sure.
I got myself an HP 4600, and I've prepared some decals to go over the clear inserts on my Taxi. If I print these up on clear decal paper, will the color underneath them on areas outside of the decal show up through the color? For instance, will the blue color behind Marylin bleed through the yellow of her hair? If so, then I have a few options.
I can lay white down around the border, trace around with frisket and then lay down the surrounding color. This seems OK. Or, I can print on white decals and then cut the clear parts out before or after applying them. This seems harder. If we want to get truly ridiculous, I can print two copies (one on white and one on clear) and figure out how to combine the two so the clear one's in the middle with the white one surrounding it. Like doing some kind of weird decal gut replacement on Santa.
I know earlier, I said that tracing frisket around art is kind of a pain, but I might have to make an exception here for these five decals.
But speaking of decals, it's also time to confront this issue of what to do about the art on the grey roads. Do I shoot grey over the whole thing and use decals, or do I trace around every little thing on the road and then touch those things up later?
I've heard that doing it the decal way runs the risk of it never looking right, no matter what I do. I've asked the guy who said that to elaborate on why he thinks so. In the meantime, I'm wondering if you can offer a bit more advice on why you think the decal route might be a good idea.
Basically, I have one chance at this and need to know what I'm getting into when I finally make my choice.
Quoted from vid1900:Most hobby shops can print water slide decals with white, gold and silver inks.
It's not so much that I need white printed (although, now that I think about it, Santa has a lot of white in his outfit). It's more that, unless I'm wrong, the color underneath a the color on a clear decal will bleed through. If I put marylin's yellow hair over the blue background she sits on, it may come out green. Unless the colors on a waterslide decal are pretty opaque.
Quoted from vid1900:This means that you have to sand between each coat if you want a totally flat playfield.
Read the above sentence again.
I am a little confused about the finish/end process.
So I spray - wait 24 hours to dry - sand it flat and spray again wait 24 hours to dry and repeat this until it is flat and has the desired amount of clear right?
But what about the finish/last step? Should the last step be sanding or clearing? I don't know if you stop by sanding and then polishing it to gloss? Or you spray as the last thing and then polish it?
I have successfully added my first layer of clear so hope you can help me so I can finish it 
Quoted from UvulaBob:It's not so much that I need white printed (although, now that I think about it, Santa has a lot of white in his outfit). It's more that, unless I'm wrong, the color underneath a the color on a clear decal will bleed through. If I put marylin's yellow hair over the blue background she sits on, it may come out green. Unless the colors on a waterslide decal are pretty opaque.
If you are worried about bleed, then spot white underneath those sections with frisket.
If your color laser is a good one, you may not have to spot white.
Like always, test before you get too carried away.
Quoted from tezting:But what about the finish/last step? Should the last step be sanding or clearing? I don't know if you stop by sanding and then polishing it to gloss? Or you spray as the last thing and then polish it?
The last step is often just a thin layer of clear that you buff out.
But if any trash fell into the final clear, you will spot sand, then buff out.
And every once in a while, your final clear lays out so well that it needs no sanding or buffing. This does not happen too often (and I've got a pro down-draft finishing booth), but when it does, you end up smiling for the rest of the day.
Quoted from vid1900:The last step is often just a thin layer of clear that you buff out.
But if any trash fell into the final clear, you will spot sand, then buff out.
And every once in a while, your final clear lays out so well that it needs no sanding or buffing. This does not happen too often (and I've got a pro down-draft finishing booth), but when it does, you end up smiling for the rest of the day.
Thank you very much for the answer.
I have now sanded for the first time and gave it another layer of clear.
Right now it seems like the clear has a little "texture" maybe slight "orange peel" nothing major. I guess this will be better the more times I sand it? But what about the finished layer, should it be flat like a mirror or is it normal to have a little texture in the clear? (When looking from the side)
The "texture" that looks like an orange peel usually means that you were a little light on your spray.
Usually it "lays out" flat and smooth when you lay down enough clear.
Humidity, air pressure, and many other variables can give that "orange peel" texture, but it's no big deal. Sand it flat and shoot your next coat.
"Texture" that is just little hills around openings in the playfield is normal.
Quoted from vid1900:The "texture" usually means that you were a little light on your spray.
Usually it "lays out" flat and smooth when you lay down enough clear.
Humidity, air pressure, and many other variables can give that "orange peel" texture, but it's no big deal. Sand it flat and shoot your next coat.
Thank you very much. Super info! I think I am moving my hand to fast, will try and do it a little slower to get more clear on and see if it helps.
Quoted from tezting:Thank you very much. Super info! I think I am moving my hand to fast, will try and do it a little slower to get more clear on and see if it helps.
Start spraying, then look back at your work 30 seconds latter and see if it "glossed over" like glass.
If not, hit it with a little more clear.
Quoted from vid1900:Start spraying, then look back at your work 30 seconds latter and see if it "glossed over" like glass.
If not, hit it with a little more clear.
Everything was going as planned and the new coat was much better.
Then on my final coat, a bug decides to take a bath in my clear! 
What should I do? Should I wait until 24 hours is passed? Do something now while it is "wet" ?
Billede 04-10-14 13.58.14.jpgQuoted from tezting:Then on my final coat, a bug decides to take a bath in my clear!
What should I do? Should I wait until 24 hours is passed? Do something now while it is "wet" ?
I'd pull it out while it's wet.
Clean out any fragments, and fill the hole with a drop of clear.
Hi there! First of all, thanks for an amazing guide!
I am doing a restoration of a bride of pinbot and I have now gotten to the playfield fixing. Need to repair some areas where the paint has worn off and also fix some yellowed areas that were outside the Mylar. Also some inserts with uneven edges. So I have removed the Mylar and all the glue and wiped it off with ME and alcohol trying to clean some areas. Done some sanding to level screw holes etc.
My question is how to prep the PF before painting. I have read the guide (but will do it again before starting) but I cant really find out if I should just paint now or if I should first clear a thin layer of 2PAC over the whole thing to settle everything? Also, should I go over everything gently with ME and alcohol to remove any old wax and things?
Thanks again, Andy
Edit: From what i understand by looking a little closer it goes like:
1. Remove mylar
2. Clean with Magic Eraser + alcohol + fix uneven screw holes, shooter lane etc.
3. Lay down a thin layer of clear to lock down the wood and prevent existing paint from lifting when the frisket is applied. (could be done in just the area that needs repainting?).
4. Do the painting and decaling
5. Clear coat it all
Sorry for taking up the time.
Post edited by TheRingMaster: My bad, did not read well enough =)
Quoted from vid1900:Sometimes you hear someone tell you to just use a piece of wood with a hammer and bash the inserts back down level with the playfiield. Often they say "go ahead, you won't hurt them".
The problem is that although they will stay down for awhile, whatever forces that were in the wood that ejected them in the first place are still there, and they tend to pop up again.
You can heat inserts with a heat gun and press them down with the 12" C-clamp - this tends to last longer than just hitting them, but still they tend to pop back up.
Once you have a nice clear coat on the playfield, you don't want to ever mess with the inserts again, so just reglue them the correct way.
Hey Vid, am getting ready to work on some raised inserts and was wondering if you heat the inserts from underneath the playfield or on top of the playfield? I plan on using a hairdryer (as per your suggestion for beginners.) How much heat should I apply? Does it just take a little to get the glue to soften or do I need to get it mildly hot?
Thanks!
I know I'm not the first person around here to have difficulty finding 3M Plastic Primer, so I was hoping we could settle the question of where to actually find it at a consumer-level price once and for all.
3M's website has a document that goes over all of their Adhesion Promoter/Primer products.
http://multimedia.3m.com/mws/mediawebserver?66666UuZjcFSLXTtNxf2LXf_EVuQEcuZgVs6EVs6E666666--
They have a listing for Plastic Primer P591 and Adhesion Promoter AP596. The Plastic Primer is listed as being black in color, but the picture of Vid applying the primer all the way back on Page 1 of the thread shows him applying something clear.
The Adhesion Promoter is listed as having a water thin viscosity, but the Plastic Primer says 12 - 15 seconds (Ford Cup), whatever that means.
Finally, the Adhesion Promoter is listed as working best with a wider variety of materials than the Plastic Primer, though they both have a "Best" rating with PVC and PMMA. What are inserts usually made out of?
Vid, can you comment on the specific material you use when you refer to 3m Plastic Primer? I want to make sure I get the right stuff. Thanks!
Quoted from Prosedsp:Hey Vid, am getting ready to work on some raised inserts and was wondering if you heat the inserts from underneath the playfield or on top of the playfield?
Warm the top and bottom.
Not too hot, but pretty hot; you will feel the glue soften just by pressing on it.
Quoted from UvulaBob:Vid, can you comment on the specific material you use when you refer to 3m Plastic Primer?
I steal it from a client's 55 gallon drum, so I'd have to look next time, if you want the exact product #.
You don't have to use 3M, you can use Loctite, Dow, Prism or any other brand of clear, water viscosity, adhesion promoter.
I'm on my phone, so I can't seem to find it, but earlier in the thread someone listed the product # from Grainger
Quoted from vid1900:You don't have to use 3M, you can use Loctite, Dow, Prism or any other brand of clear, water viscosity, adhesion promoter.
I was hoping for this answer, but I wanted to make sure. Thanks!
Quoted from bam10:You should be able to get plastic primer from any automotive paint store.
None of it seems to be in a paint-on form, though. It's all spray-can based. In fact, I can't find paint-on plastic primer anywhere. I'm not convinced that Grainger actually stocks it. Their photo is a stock item, and it's marked all over their website as discontinued.
I couldn't just spray the spray-can stuff into a puddle in a glass container and then paint out of there, could I?
I'm not saying you HAVE to buy the giant bottle of Loctite, I'm just saying that Grainger, Mcmasters, AIN and a ton of places have it.
16oz of the stuff might be a little overkill, LOL.... you might call a rep from Loctite and ask for a free sample.
Quoted from vid1900:I think you have the idea!
No two playfields are ever restored exactly the same way.
Just make sure you sand any shiny parts of the playfield so the new clear can stick.
Good good! Fingers crossed I won't screw it but I think it will probably be alright. Hardest part seem to be the inserts since there is so much paint on them.
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Sana'a
Jonesboro, GA
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