Inspired by the recent uptick in Sorcerer chatter, I gave mine some extra attention tonight. I cleaned the rubbers, wiped down the playfield, cleaned the glass, and put on a fresh coat of carnauba. I also put a slight touch of Hoppes No. 9 on the spinners. I'm here to report that ball times are significantly shorter, and I may have achieved the shortest 2 ball multiball in pinball history ("everybody out of the pool!")

I' missing a 2 3/4" wire ball guide on my Sorcerer, just thought I'd post my request here too in case someone's got a spare (or has the tools and skills to whip me up one and sell it to me)!

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/wanted-williams-2-34-wire-ball-guide

http://bayareaamusements.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Store_Code=baa&Screen=PROD&Product_Code=MX-6466-11

Thanks, unfortunately they and Marco are both out of stock

Does anyone know off the top what the GI bulb count is for Sorcerer, and any recommendations on what LEDs to go with for the GI and backglass (I'm considering Comet Retro Frosted Warm Whites, http://www.cometpinball.com/product-p/1retroled.htm)

Also, any recommendations on which LEDs to use in the pop bumpers?

I would suggest sticking with incandescents for gi. I tested a few leds in the gi and it looked bad.

You can run LEDs in the GI, but I would recommend modifying the GI power to DC, if it's all LED you can use a cheap chinese switching power supply found on feebay. Otherwise standby for disco-strobe.

I have the comet frosted retro bulbs in my sorcerer, they look great. non ghosting bulbs though.

Here is a pic of my back box with LEDs for reference.

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Do you have these LEDs in the GI or just the inserts? I am a little worried about ghosting (GI bulbs staying on or partially on when the GI lights black out before multiball and at the end of the game).

Is GI strobing a particular issue with Sorcerer or is this something you notice with any LEDs (unless you're using GI OCD)? I wonder if Comet's "No Flix" equivalent (http://www.cometpinball.com/category-s/1837.htm) would do better with strobing. Of course those are significantly brighter than the retro bulbs I was looking at. My goal ultimately is to come close to maintain as much of an incandescent feel as possible while sparing the boards and plastics from incandescent heat.

Not sure I'm up for modifying the GI power to permanently forego incandescents, but if I wanted to try is there a thread you'd recommend reading describing the procedure?

I have retro frosted in the GI, look very nice, no ghosting whatsoever.

My Sorcerer is about to get an upgrade from my office to my main home game room. The game is too good just to sit around unplayed for weeks at a time.

If you OCD, you don't need to worry about ghosting or seizure inducing light shows. I don't see how sys 9/11 games can ghost the GI, since it's switched on or off by relay.
The strobing is for any GI in general because of the AC power.. if they're just a single diode led, you'll get 60hz flicker which is pretty bad.. If it's an AC LED (you don't need to reverse 555 bulbs of this kind) you'll get 120hz, which some claim is ok.. You can mod this to DC, it's fairly simple. The cheapo switching power supplies you can get from ebay are powered by regular line voltage, tap in off the main power switch (add a fuse if you like), then you need to get the right molex plug coming off your transformer. Typically these are the bunch of yellow wires, I can't recall for system 9 (and maybe it's more of a permanent mod if there's no plug), but on system 11 this is a 4 pin plug and you can make it easily reversible. look carefully at the plug, i have seen different keyed (squared) pins on sys 11 games even tho the plug as a whole looks the same. one set of the yellow wires should have some kind of stripe on them.. pick one to be your negative & positive and wire the plug accordingly.

A quick update on LEDs in the GI:

I poked through my bag of LEDs and turns out I ordered a few Comet "Retro Frosted" and "Comfort Frosted" in warm white. I tried both in the GI, along with Comet Warm White 1SMD 50/50s.

I observed no strobing with any of the LED bulbs (though I understand that different people have different levels of sensitivity to this). They all seemed to perform similarly to the incandescents when the GI flashes on and off in attract mode and during gameplay. So I wouldn't let concerns about strobing/flashing put you off of trying LEDs in the GI. That said, as many people have observed in this thread already, even warm white does not have the same warm glow as incandescent, and that look just really seems to match this game. So I'm going to stick with the old bulbs in GI for now.

On my system 11 games the power saving function will make the GI bulbs strobe something terrible, once that is turned off I haven't seen the flicker effect from the AC power like you are talking about. The bulbs I am using are AC, so that may be why I am not noticing the issue. I originally had cool white bulbs in Sorcerer and it did look terrible. The retro warm whites seem to look very nice in my opinion.

So Sorcerer sure seems to be getting a lot of positive buzz. I woke up to an offer to buy mine this morning.

While I certainly appreciate all offers, my Sorcerer is not for sale at the moment or any time soon.

It is a great game, working on my Taxi playfield swap right now so that I can tackle the new playfield for my Sorcerer.

Diner-Taxi-Sorcerer is a great combo shot.
-mof

80s Mark Ritchie collection

Had to post the ass-kickin' high score I just made on my Sorcerer.......9,121,250......holy CRAP that was fun!! Had multiball going with the 5x playfield multiplier for a good long while.

I bought this never having played it before and it has become one of my favorites, great sound and cool theme, fast and addicting gameplay. Love it.

I will be joining the Sorcerer club soon! I just put a down payment for a full restored Sorecer from TNT Amusements. Should be done end of Jan, beginning of Feb I'm guessing.

Excellent choice. I saw a glimpse of a Sorcerer in a recent TNT video and wondered when we were going to get to see it. I'm interested in what he does with the playfield. Backglass too, since there's supposed to be a repro coming out from PPS.

Do you recall which vid? I'd like to take a look- I was told "Full TNT treatment" so I'm sure it will be nice!

We just now have Sorcerer Silkscreened w/Mirror Backglass 31-1316-532 in stock - original wms artwork, look great!

http://www.planetarypinball.com/mm5/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Product_Code=PPS-31-1316-532&Store_Code=PP

It was in a recent one. Maybe between 1088 and 1091. Just a brief glimpse of the side art on cabinet and head. Literally one second. Looked like they just had it out getting ready to work on it. They didn't mention it.

Great news Rick.
-mof

I'll be ordering one of these very soon. Mine is flaking pretty badly. Now if John could just get my playfield done I will be set. Its been a long bumpy ride with my playfield. Someday maybe.

Got a glimpse of it in #1086 when Todd talks about the Star Trek.

Hoping the group might help me track down a problem on a friend's Sorcerer. The drop target mechanism is acting flaky. Sometimes you can play 2 or three games on the machine and the drops work fine. Then they will not trigger the solenoid to reset and the game keeps scoring kits to the three drops while the targets never reset. I looked at all the wires and everything seems to be ok. No bad wiring solder joints after check continuity. Any ideas where else to look?

I ordered a few sets of repro center plastics and protectors. I'll post pictures of the fit and color compare in a week or 2 when I get them. If anyone else is interested in some sets, just let me know...

I'm bumping this question as the machine at issue is sadly mine. Any ideas that might help Jodester and me get my wonderful machine fully functional? Thanks!

my 2 cents: did you try disassemble and rebuild the drop target assembly? sounds like a mechanical problem resetting the drops. the assembly is easy to access, comes right off with 4 screws.
good luck finding the error!

I'm interested in a set.

just got my sorcerer a few weeks ago. first pin btw. i'm enjoying. couple quickies:

my coin door is black, but i see some chrome/polilshed metal doors. which is the original?

bought mine without a backglass, and i've since found one. excited to install it. regarding the trim pieces, what's the preferred bottom and why: metal, plastic?

Congratulations on your first pin. Sorcerer is a blast.

The early production machines had the stainless coin door. Later in the run they switched to black. There are also some playfield color variations. IPDB has more details.

The bottom lift channel is chrome, with plastic trim on the other three sides of the backglass.

Speaking of the lift channel, and in preparation for receiving my PPS backglass, anybody got advice on how to remove the channel from the original backglass?

Ever consider putting a new one on there?
-mof

I posted pictures of the repro backglass packing as well as pictures and videos of it lit up in this thread.

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/sorcerer-backglass-in-the-queue#post-2895279

I'd just get a new one from Gatecrasher, but if the old is perfect, then you can hang it upsidedown 1/8" above a carpeted floor. Gravity will slide it out over the next few days.

We did not. We will give it a try.

i finally have a backglass! like a whole new game.
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Ah ha! Thank you!

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/gatecrashers-hardware-vids-review

What is the frequency of the attract mode sound? My game did it once, now the lights flash but no taunt is happening. Does it do it every time the lights flash in attract mode or only once in a while?

The voice effects work fine during actual gameplay.

I recall somewhere that the two volume controls must be tuned a certain way for it work not sure where.

Assembly is clean. Drops seem to go up and down like they should. Maybe they are getting hung up somewhere in the mech. This was all pulled off and cleaned when the playfield got cleared...

did you check the microswitches for the three drops? does the coil fire and the targets simply can't come up or do the drops stay down for good?
also check the switch wiring.
good luck!

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Steven working on it at 26:42 in 1103!! I may be as anxious as you are to see it!

EDIT: Whoa, I paused too soon! There it is!

Thanks for the heads up! Been wanting to see how it for awhile now, I've been checking the background of his videos for weeks and have only seen shots of the sides. Cool to see the playfield a bit-

just installed these:

http://www.actionpinball.com/parts.php?item=PDG086

question: are these 3-piece, meaning is there a clear top piece i should take off? i see a clear piece coming up already on my fixed targets from sideways contact.

The drops stay down for good once they are down. The game will play normal for a few games before this problem manifests. Once the problem manifests the drops don't come up and the score just keeps shooting up as if they keep scoring.