So, it sounds like the trough board itself is registering that the opto is triggering (based on the trough board lights coming on and off correctly), it's just not communicating that to the machine?

At this point I'd swap node 9 and Node 8 boards (change the dip switches on each board to the opposite board's settings so they know their new role) and see if the problem moves to the left ramp sign and the dino, because that's what CN14 operates on Node 9. If your trough resolves, but the problem has moved, then that node board was likely damaged and will need to be repaired.

Good Afternoon PinMonk . I will pull those boards and swap them Saturday morning. A tech from Stern had me swap the cables between CN2 and CN3 on node board 8 to see if the trough problem went away, and an issue started on the leds, but there was no change so I put it back. I'll do as you suggest 1st thing Saturday morning. That was going to be my install time for my Tibetan Breeze Flipper kit, and my magnet and diverter cooling kit....

Good Afternoon @PinMonk. I found it. It was a pinched wire that was really hard to see. The pinch was on one wire, and that wire was tight up against another in the harness, covering up the pinch. Just got luck and saw a little anomaly I. The way the wires looked. Took a closer look and verified it. Cut, soldered, and heat shrunk it. All good now!

Awesome. Glad you finally tracked it down!

I had a Jurassic Park Premium for 6 months, and yesterday I found that the T-Rex Multi-ball sometimes would get registered even without my ball even close to its mouth. This happens in almost every game, but sometimes the T-Rex Multi-ball gets registered correctly. It wasn't like this before. I tested the opto sensors, and they recognize the ball when the ball triggers it. The T-Rex has no problem picking up the ball, and the magnet is working. The problem is that something is falsely triggering the T-Rex multi-ball. I also checked the setting #23 (initiate Multi-ball when ball enter ramp...), and it is off. Is this likely a software issue or a hardware issue? Anyone else experienced this? How can I fix this? Thanks!

I have 2 of the issues above, and below is how I fixed them.
1) The kinetic ball was difficult to rotate and would get stuck -- this happened 4 months after i bought the machine. Cleaning it and adding some lubrication fixed that.
3) The raptor cannot move and the tail was stuck under plate -- this happened since day 1 I got the machine new in the box. I disassemble that part of the machine 3 times and tried to fix it before it was successful. At first, I thought the plastic raptor toy was not made correctly and the angle wasn't right. It was leaning forward and to one side, causing the tail to get caught under a plate. I bought a heat gun and soften the legs on the plastic raptor, so that I can make it stand straight. It was fixed for a day, and then the next day it would lean forward and to one side again. I finally realize that this is caused by the plastic material being too soft and flexible, and it is not strong enough to hold the posture. The weight of the raptor is not balanced, and the 2 legs would bend and make the raptor lean. The only way to fix this is to support the raptor's right knee with something and make it stand tall and straight. I ended up just using a piece of transparent hot glue and support its right knee with it. Now it's working great. Hope this helps.

Covered many times in this thread. Even with setting 23 to off, the Trex MB will always initiate on ramp entry. Designed that way to enable an easy first MB. So to recap, setting 23 only applies to TREX modes AFTER the first one (TREX MB).

I've had a few people ask about my sling dino eye illumination mod, so I thought I would do another run of them.

Price is $30 for the pair of eye lights (includes US shipping). Order includes the full set of 2 eye lights with everything needed to connect them. Please PM me if interested in getting in on this run.

PLEASE PM ME IF YOU ARE INTERSTED IN PURCHASING - ORDERS WILL BE CLOSED THIS FRIDAY, 5/25 AT NOON CENTRAL.

I make the pair of lights using a special 3D printed casing (different for each side), and the lights are installed without any disassembly of the sling plastics (full instructions are provided), and work with or without plastic protectors. The bulbs I utilize are non-ghosting, and are connected via alligator clips (i.e. non-destructive and easily removable) under the playfield to the lower sling LED socket. This way the eyes will flash when the sling flashes and be solid when the sling lighting is solid.
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Firm cutoff at noon central tomorrow if you are interested in purchases my sling dino eye mod.

If you've not already PM'd me regarding your interest, please do so as soon as possible.

Sling dino eye light mod ordering is closed. Thank you to everyone who purchased. I will order components today and should be able to ship in two weeks or less.

I'm proud to be an official member of the club. My premium just arrived and the box is perfect. Now the fun begins!

Resist the urge to spend all your time adding mods to it, and really have fun PLAYING the machine!!! (The main exceptions are listed below) It's pretty amazing and you'll grow to love and/or hate the various shots and strategies involved in such a deep game. Almost all the other mods are cosmetic.

1. Consider adding some kind of a shooter lane protector has that lane wood takes a beating.
2. You might find yourself having to grind down the left tower flap screw if it contacts the ball as it interferes with the tower shot otherwise.
3. Most people find the shaker add-on to be almost essential since it it SO tightly coordinated with the playfield action.

There are a ton of other cosmetic mods, some amazing (like Stern's amber lighted shooter, ULEK's control room plastic, WizBlades 'blue' side blades, custom Apron cards or Mezel's Tower replacement and raptor pit), and some less amazing (a hundred kitchy mods to choose from)! But modding is the realm of art, so enjoy the ride and splash on a hint of your own personality if you like! 8-)

Thanks for the tips. I've already installed the shaker motor and will be installing the amber shooter rod and art blades in the coming days. That's it. I prefer to keep my games factory. Cliffys on order. Def. turned down the trough eject and can probably turn it down more. Now to dig into the rules and learn the shots and modes.

A batch of these is shipping to folks like me; so please be patient with us new owners.

New owners, check the key posts. There's lots of good stuff in there, particularly around dealing with the TRex and Raptor gate.

I have my trough eject on the minimum setting and it still has more than enough power to kick out the ball - possibly worth dropping yours all the way (if it won't kick out in test you can up the power until you find the point at which kick outs are consistent).

My new build had 0 glass issues, so I'm not sure what the variable is that's causing some folks to have such challenges; that said, it's definitely not every game.

T-Rex has been pretty good so far, but it's very noisy when it moves. Is that normal?

Raptor gate got stuck mid-up/down once, but I managed to reset it.

Typical ball launch inconsistencies.

Where I AM having an issue is with the "C" shot. I get tons of rejects and rattles on what feel like clean shots. Even if It triggers the C, it's not clean. Maybe "Play better" is the answer, but that is definitely the 2nd hardest shot on my game to hit consistently aside from "O".

Imperfect build so far, but 98% of the game seems to be working great.

T Rex noise is normal. C lane is tough and slight changes to pitch and flipper power can help dial it in a bit. But it’s still tough.

Joined the club a couple days ago. Great game! Glass slide is perfect. No complaints about my build. Pinball machines always need a little tlc tweaking here and there. This game is no different. Nothing unusual so far except how fun it is. What a terrific design. So many excellent and challenging shots!

Ditto on the t-rex noise—curious if that’s normal and just something one can’t hear in an arcade.

As to the C shot—I had the same issue. I lifted the playfield and bent the switches toward each other a little from underneath. It’s now registering every time.

I’m also having a ton of shots jump off the t-rex ramp. Is this just a matter of 6.5 degrees not being steep enough on an Elwin game?

My C shot registers when hit, but anything but a perfect shot rattles out just short of the target. I'll tweak the pitch a bit, but turning down the flippers a smidge has definitely helped other things.

Try turning down the flipper power or as you mentioned increase the pitch

Have you checked that the control room up-post sits flush with the PF? If not flush it can cause the ball to deviate and reduces the ball’s momentum - this might be contributing to your issue

Hi All,

I'm new to the club as of last week when my prem arrived! In the anticipation of my game arriving I've been a long time lurker and have greatly appreciated the tips that have been shared. I have a slight issue that I haven't seen anyone post on and wonder if I'm alone in this. I added the amber shooter rod but it seems that the power of the rod isn't there to get the ball to the upper level in lane ramp, maybe 1 out of 10 will it get up there. I know the original shooter rod did much better.

thinking maybe the spring was too weak I swapped out he spring from the original to the amber with no change. Has anyone else experienced this? Any corrective suggestions?

In the Pro thread a lot of people have had this issue. I ended up getting a red spring and problem solved.

Is there a way to disable having the action button act as another start button? We keep accidentally starting games leaning on it. I looked in the manual but couldn’t find a setting for this.

Yes. It's in the settings. I did this all the time as well and it's annoying. You can disable. Sorry I don't have the exact setting number and menu in memory.

I’ve been modding my JP Premium lately.

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Looks great! I like it.

I think there's one worker that really likes to tighten those side rail screws down extra good. After loosening the 2 middle screws on both sides, my glass went from nearly impossible to get off, even with suction cups, to just a little tight. It won't slide out on its own, but I can easily get it off and on now.

Not enough trees. j/k.

Found it. Game adjustment #60

After just a few days of being in the club, my Trex has stopped working entirely. I’m also having trouble even testing it in the diagnostics due to crappy menu buttons on the coin door.

When the menu buttons do work, it seems like the horizontal test goes okay, but the vertical test does absolutely nothing.

I emailed Stern, but thought I’d ask here too in hopes that someone here has run into this and could offer some advice.

A local guy had the horizontal controller board die, if you're getting no vertical movement in test mode (or game mode) then potentially the vertical controller board could be the issue. I know the horizontal board has diag LEDs on the board, so guessing the vertical one has as well - check if you have any LEDs on?

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Nice! Great machine!!

I checked the horizontal and vertical boards. Like you said, the horizontal board has two red diagnostic leds. Both leds on the horizontal boards are fine.

There appears to be two similar leds on the vertical board. Neither of those are lit.

Another question: I noticed that I can easily and freely move the trex side to side by hand, but it won’t budge vertically. Is that normal?

Eddie at Stern solved this for me. Just needed to reseat a connector. Here’s the full explanation:

“You should be able to move the assembly by hand horizontally, but not vertically.

Reseat the CN5 connector on lamp board 9A. From 9A, it goes to the serial motor driver board, this controls the vertical movement.
The horizontal movement is controlled by the stepper motor driver board.”

Great, prompt help from Eddie!

Time to get intimate with my Trex! The lower jaw just flew off mid-game. Judging by the holes in the jaw, I’m on the hunt for three screws somewhere in my game. If/when I find the screws, how do I access the underside of the jaw to put it back together?

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Finding the screws was easy. No wonder they came loose! They only stick through the lower jaw by about 1/16th of an inch. Wondering if I should get some slightly longer screws or use locktite and cross my fingers.

Well that was easy. Hopefully it stays put. I put some blue locktite on each of the screws and got the screws back in with my trusty offset Phillips screwdriver that I bought over 30 ago. I originally bought it to remove the lock hasp from the Art Department roof at my college. My friends and I would go up there on hot summer nights and take in the night, always being careful to cover our tracks and put the lock back on when we were done.

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Can I get a couple pics of people's wire guide protecting the raptor mechs in the "C" shot?

JP SIDE ARMOR FOR SALE.
Not cheap.
I bought 3 and paid alot for all three.
If you would like to investigate please message me.

Stern will replace that coin door button block for the menu/diagnostics. They've had a lot of crappy ones that barely work or that you have to play with to make the buttons work make it out of QA into the field. No excuse for it. If you're under warranty ask for a new service button block.

I had the same problem with my new Godzilla. The coin door buttons were not working properly.
They sent me a new service box block under warranty, I just need to install it now.

Raptor gate motor issue:

Gate stops halfway on the way up. (The times it's up, it gets down no problem.) Maybe 2% of the time it goes up all the way, otherwise I can hear the motor but nothing happens.

I managed to get it down and disable it, so game is playable while waiting for fix. (It's under warranty, and all I know from Stern is they will send me the part when it arrives, and they'll pay for the repair.)

QUESTION: The schematics say that motor should be part 041-5111-00. The actual motor in my game has a sticker identifying it as 041-5132-00. Motor 5132 seems to be used for the T-Rex head. Did they put the wrong motor on my game at the factory; or are the schematics wrong; or are the motors interchangeable? (Or is the motor a 5111 with a 5132 sticker on it?) Does anybody know what's going on, and/or how to fix it such that I'm not waiting for a part from Stern that (per tech support) "is currently showing no stock... and an ETA on when they will become available is not showing."

Thanks!

There’s been recent posts regarding the gate stopping halfway - iirc it’s not during a game and can be reset. If you search the thread/topic for “gate” and scroll to the bottom, you’ll find posts discussing it in more detail.

I did see that and go through the suggested fixes, but none of it worked.

I installed the Precision Pinball Aluminum Flippers on my JP Premium over the weekend. I saw these and I loved the look -I really appreciate precision-crafted mods so I figured I’d give them a try.

https://pinside.com/pinball/market/shops/1341-precision-pinball-prod/06654-precision-flip-flipper-system

They really simplify installation and adjustment of the flippers very much. You don’t have to line up the flipper with the hole when installing. Just run the shaft through the holes in the playfield and the flipper assembly and then tighten. The fine tuning adjustments are made from the top after the shaft is tight in the assembly. I had to adjust the upper flipper slightly after play testing and it was simple. No need to raise the playfield at all. And they play just like the regular flippers. I really love the precision look of the machined aluminium in my pin. Buy with confidence!

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Did a “Key Post” search - found nothing.

Does anyone make an off the shelf truck mod?? All the screws are falling out of mine and won’t stay put. I would like a more permanent solution.

Tia

I’ve not seen/heard of a complete truck mod kit being sold, although someone was selling a mounting plate to make it easier to mount a model Jeep. There are also plenty of detailed DIY instructions posted but again you need to source the Jeep