.

.

Ok, got it.........see what I can do.

Vid, have a great Holidays, you're a damn nice guy to post all this help and deal with the myriad of problems all of us throw your way!!

Merry Christmas -

Nate

No, it's not!!! *($*# I'm not even doing a full-resto, just trying to spruce it up so I can finally PLAY the damn thing!

Was going to go the Playfield Protector route, but even THOSE are sold-out for my game. Yeah, no more "fixer uppers for me!"

F*!KING A! LOL. Exactly. This is great advice!

Is that the same one from the yard sale in Forest Grove this past summer? Pretty sure I looked at the same game.

No, I bought it before last summer in Salem.
Was a total disaster, but a good learning experience. Have WAY more into it than it will ever be worth.

Vid,
I have a quick (i hope)question. I have applied my first layer of clear before applying decals and airbrushing and have sanded with 800 grit to knock down the shine and look for low spots. I have the following and was wondering if I keep sanding till these shiny spots are gone or do I fill with clear( either another spray coat or spot coats on the playfield? any suggestions would be great.
Thanks
Mike
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Greetings, Vid-

Posted here on the forum per your request, photos now included!

I have a Williams Indiana Jones that I am restoring, the cabinet is complete and I have re-installed the playfield.

Originally, I only had one issue with the playfield, and that was where I had removed the semi-circular piece of mylar from around the left-hand side kicker where I screwed up and lifted the "2X" ink off of the insert. Here are some photos of that:

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I can't really remember at this point since it happened so long ago, whether or not I removed the clear coat on the "2X" insert by scoring the perimeter of the insert with an X-acto knife, but it feels like it, since the top of the insert has no clear on it that I can tell, and the entire insert feels sunken.

Now after having the PF out of the machine for several years, when I run my hand over the PF it feels like all the inserts have sunk. And in so doing, I am removing ink around the periphery of the inserts, as shown by the photos below. The black flakes are ink from around the inserts.

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Most of the inserts on the playfield have sunk during the time the playfield was out of the game during the cabinet restoration, see some photos below.

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I would like to know your thoughts on what to do, and what you recommend for my Indiana Jones PF, based on my prerequisites.

Prerequisites: #1 I don't really want to strip entire playfield and send it out for leveling/clear coating, but I will if that is my only choice. I don't have the skills (or the time) to perform this kind of detailed cosmetic surgery.

I hate to think about having to strip the entire playfield and sending it out, but I guess I will have to if that is what you (and knowledgeable others) recommend.

What do you think would be best thing to do for the playfield and it's longevity?

I have a Who Dunnit playfield that had a similar problem, but the inserts were RAISED instead of sunken, and I wet sanded the surface of the playfield with Novus 2 and 1200 grit wet/dry which did a pretty good job of evening everything out, although I suspect the clearcoat is EXTRA thin now.

Unfortunately, this won't work as a problem solver for sunken inserts. Here are some detail photos of some of the inserts that are affected:

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I certainly need some help on deciding what to do. All help and positive comments are welcome.

Thanks for your consideration, and hope that you, and ALL Pinsiders have a GREAT Christmas and a prosperous New Year.

Greg

Vid-

Thanks for your tips and recommendations. Playfield decals? Never even considered 'em, no way, out of the question, no worries there.

After all the time spent so far on the machine, 5+ years (I work slow), I'm not going to go half-assed at this.

I don't trust myself to do the work, and don't have the time, don't even have the resources to make a waterslide decal.

What I DO have is money. And since the machine has been apart for so long, I'll just do what I've been dreading but knowing in the back of my mind I would probably end up doing anyway, and that's disassemble the entire playfield, strip it down, and send it off to be restored.

That's the best route for me, because I would just screw things up if I even tried to level one insert, let alone mixing and spraying catalyzed clear.

Thanks again for your valuable input. You helped me decide.

Greg

Vid,

I have a quick question if I may. I recently had to pull the mylar on my Earthshaker because it was peeling and causing all sorts of ball hangs. I removed it just fine, and removed the residue. I also ordered mylared decals as I have one insert I have to fix.

Question is, do I need to install new mylar to protect the area around the pops? Or can I just leave it uncovered? This is a home environment and the game will not be on route.

Vid,

I am restoring a 1980 Black knight and need to replace all of the wording on the inserts with new decals ( BAA has the unlaminated ones) and I will be clearcoating the entire playfield . What's the best way to remove the existing worn wording on the inserts
before applying the new ones? And where can you buy the decal set solution you mentioned? I have never seen this.

thanks for all the great tips!

I found it on Amazon.com

Vid,
Wanted to drop a line and tell you thanks for this great tutorial! I have been working on my Firepower II for the past 3 weeks and am about done with all my repairs. One thing that I did try was replacing the thrust on 2 of the space ships which had off white planking and serious black speckling on the edges that I decided not to air brush them but apply decals over the damage. Here are a couple pics, one before20150101_115020.jpg and one after20150101_115903.jpg. Since I used a white decal, I had to touch up the edges with transparent air brush black paint(not shown in the after picture). I know there is some smaller planking on the ships, but I did not want a full "Right from the Factory look" and this is my first attempt and wanted to build my confidence so I will tackle future restorations. I think it came out nice and will now apply 2 light dustings of clear and then seal it for final sanding and polishing.
Thanks again!
Mike

Vid,

I just had a professional automotive painter clear my Dr. Dude playfield. To prep, I deglossed it, chiseled out the inserts' original clear, and did pretty much everything I thought needed to be done. I asked him to do a thin layer. It was done in a professional both, temp controlled, using the Omni + Fast Hardener.

Well...this pic is the result. Most of the playfield is like this. We're both puzzled. He did the bare wood part at the front of the machine with a brush just to see and oddly that came out much better with no bubbling. I know I've got to sand this down pretty much back to it's original form (prob using 600 so it doesn't take forever), but I can't figure out what went wrong. Any thoughts?

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If I had a guess, the coat was too thin and did not pull itself flat. As thin as possible is not always better. If you read back through, this is a fairly common problem. I am not sure you need to sand it all the way down. You may be able to sand it to give it some tooth and put a thicker coat over it.

Looks like fish eyes. i.e impurities on the pf when the clear was applied.

Hi,
still working on that Bobby Orr playfield. Again, it's really beat up and planked, but for my first time I didn't mind having to work too hard as I figured I'd learn a couple of things. Another thing is that it's cold here in the winter so I decided to go ahead and do the airbrush before I'd clearcoat.
Now I have the reds and blues done, still have the whites and blacks to go.

I'm wondering though, first thing - will the clear fill the planking so that it doesn't show up anymore or will I have to do one layer, then repaint, then some more clear to seal it all in?

Same question for the wear hole - should I have filled that in with putty to make it flush first? Should I try to sand the edges to make the transition smoother? Maybe I should try to paint it with a brush and then sand it somewhat flush?
Thanks!

Planking
Planking
Wear hole

Hey vid, just a heads up about the Createx paint - it definitely dries DARKER than the original mix.

I just spent a couple hours touching-up my playfield, exact color matches were drying darker. It was a pain to watch exact color mixed paint turn dark when dried!!!

You'll need to mix the color a noticeable shade lighter and then apply and watch for the correct match once it dries on the pf.

Have a great New Year -

Nate

I ran into this as well just a month ago. I've started to mix, apply, dry, acrylic clear, dry, judge the color and remove just to find the correct mix.

Yeah, sorry to hear that the paint doesn't "dry as applied" - I had read about people experiencing that problem earlier in this thread, so just thought I would update the thread with this helpful bit of information after tyring it out myself.........maybe someone can discover a similar quality paint that will dry as applied....??

Best, Nate

Hey Vid,

I am looking for some help with fixing these inserts. It looks like the clear coat is peeling due to heat from the insert? Thoughts? Or is it best to just leave them alone.

Thanks

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Hi Vid, I'm attempting my first restoration with a Williams Gay 90s. I've removed the old inserts and sanded the new ones as per your guide. How tight should inserts be? If I put them in the holes they'll go to about 2mm above the playfield. At that point I'd have to force or tap them in with a block to flush. Expected or are they too tight?

Argh I guess I'll have to redo the whole thing. Lessons learned: go ahead and do it right with a coat of clear first so that you know where you stand with the planking.
Mix big batches of paint! Color matching is hard so better have too much and waste a couple of bucks worth of paint than a couple of hours of your time.
Createx dries darker, and I also have to disagree with the single coat being enough thing... The good thing is that it dries very quickly so by the time you're done spraying a big area you're ready to start the next coat.

Here's an interesting article about paint mixing basics:
http://m.wikihow.com/Mix-Colors

Vid-
First off, Happy New Year! Hope your holidays were peaceful and happy.
I followed your previous advice and took a straightedge (steel ruler) and laid it edgewise over the inserts on my Williams Indiana Jones to determine if the inserts had sunk and/or if the inserts had edge wear, and while shining a bright flashlight on one side of the straightedge pointing at the intersection where the straightedge met the insert, I did NOT see any light (aside from the insert illumination) from the flashlight shining through, which to me, would indicate there is no gap between the straightedge and the insert. My question then is, why is the ink flaking away from the keylining around the insert if the insert hasn't sunk? Should I wet sand the playfield to see if I can level it out where I believed the inserts to be sinking? It didn't appear that the inserts were proud of the playfield either, so I'm not sure what is going on.
Greg

This looks to me as if the playfield was not prepped/cleaned properly instead of the painters gun not being clean.

And of course, Createx would change their stuff right as I'm waiting for my first order to come in....thankfully I'm going to be repainting whole colors at once, not doing spot touch up so color matching exactly isn't as much of an issue for me.. oy.

So, I have kind of a stupid question. I don't recall it being mentioned anywhere, but since their paints are water based and airbrush ready and don't need thinners, do you really need the "airbrush cleaner" they sell? Is there some big reason it would be preferable to just using water to spray out between colors or to clean out the tool? I didn't really think too much about it when I put in my order, but there's a local hobby shop that carries the stuff if I do actually need it.

id get the cleaner, though you can also get some liquidex cleaner or you can use some windex. A good cleaner will help keep it clean and save you time plus it will allow you to keep a nice even flow while shooting.

Buddy of mine said he'd been using windex, actually.

I'm planning on shooting one color at a time for the whole playfield, so will be fairly large sections on this specific game, and likely a good chunk of downtime between colors. Definitely don't want it to get jammed up with anything.

I'm not so sure anything has changed. I wanted to ask the poster who said Createx was "drying darker" : What are they spraying on and letting dry for the color match? A "White" material? Something LIGHTER than the playfield color? I think the base color underneath the createx affects how the final color turns out. At least for me it does. I try to lay my test color down on top of an identical shade of what I'm actually going to paint. It gives me a "truer" color - if this makes sense.

Hi Vid. I just received my IJ back after a lengthy restoration and unfortunately the company that did the playfield did not realize the insert decals were really bad. They are translucent and so faded in places that you can not even read the text on them. The decals came from Classic Arcade. The problem is that they clearcoated overtop and did put a nice thick layer on. What do you recommend can be done to fix the insert decals. The rest of the playfield is great and the clearcoat is nice. Its just that these inserts look terrible. First pick below is before restoration (good decals with some problems around the black) Second pick is after the restoration with a shot of the worst insert (choose wisely). Thanks so much in advance for any advice you can give and if you can include approximate time/cost to have a professional do the work that would be great too.

original inserts 3 wisely.jpg

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Personally I was planning on doing test colors over the color where it's going anyways. Maybe that person is mixing and testing on white paper, like say printer paper or something, then it looks darker when it goes on the actual playfield. I agree that substrate color probably makes a difference, despite the paint being "opaque", as does the colors adjacent that are in eyesight. I'm sure either way I will make it work, just was kind of a Murphy's Law kind of deal.

Thanks vid. Yeah I wish I could go back and demand that the decals not be replaced... However I can only try to get them to fix it (or someone else to fix). What do you suggest can be done to repair now? Does the playfield need to be completely stripped, sanded, decals redone and cleared again or can just the area where the decals are be stripped, sanded, fixed, cleared?

What is the proper method for cleaning the playfield before clearcoating it?

No, no I'm applying directly to the color on the playfield that I'm matching, I wouldn't post a comment about the paint drying darker than mixed unless I had absolute proof from playfield results. It DOES dry darker. Just a heads up......

-Nate