Oh my god. A more certain business failure has never been devised.

OMG can you just IMAGINE.....

That would be really cool... and fun !

I've been doing more and more of these. All are local as it costs too much to ship the game.

$1500 plus parts and it will come back looking brand new.

More reproduction of spare parts. I've turned down buying pins because of 1 or 2 broken, non-existing spareparts (like certain plastic ramps) and so on. I won't buy a pin if I know I can't get it back into top shape because of no availability of parts.

LOL

good deal. that is about what Mike used to charge.

I would LOVE a kit! I miss Heathkits.

Really. I've sold 5 in the past 5 year and 0 have shown up at my house and not purchased. Do others have this same issue?

I was thinking the same thing...I've sold 60~ in the last 10 years and I don't recall anyone ever actually coming to my house and not leaving with the pin. I feel like pricing and an accurate ad takes care of that issue naturally, but maybe I've just been lucky.

This will continue to be a need. I have met several collectors that have very little clue how to repair their game; some don't even care to learn.
I bet distributors spend a fair amount of time with service after the sale. Perhaps they need a service department, like a car dealership?

Mike (homepin) looked in to this. insurance is the biggest hurdle

There is absolutely ZERO probability that I would ever purchase a brand new pin that was assembled by anyone other than the OEM.

I can't believe this is even an idea.

LOL. No worries - seller will probably include box of parts left over from the build that he doesn't know where they go.

There are a lot of people who like to build things and put things together as a hobby. Some people who aren't designers/artists who might not want to design and build a game *completely* from scratch might just enjoy putting a pre-designed game together.

This has been brought up in the past. Shades of the old Heathkit Pinball days.

Only thing I would add is you do your own tech support too.

LTG : )
Disclaimer : I'm still hoping for a self cleaning playfield.

Some of us are more than qualified to assembly a game from parts and troubleshoot. I like the kit idea because I can get the bare playfield clear coated before assembly. The quality control would be in my hands and not some line worker at Stern.

Insurance for what ?

I agree.

Unfortunately what I deal with daily in tech support. The mere thought of it gives me the willies. I believe the qualified are too few in numbers.

LTG : )
Disclaimer : I hope the person doing this doesn't mix up the "y" and "e" in the instructions.

When someone builds their game. Plugs it in. And burns their house down. Their home owners insurance will be looking to the manufacturer of this kit to get their money back after they build a new house.

LTG : )

a pinball machine deals with Mains power, not a battery pack

So why would that require an insurance ? One of my side hobby is to build high end audio equipment from kits, some of them are pretty big power amplifers and I don't think they come with any kind of insurance.

They, the kits don't come with insurance.

The manufacturer carries it in case someone builds their kit and bad things happen and the manufacturer gets sued into the ground.

LTG : )

Sorry let me rephrase. Given the (very) cheap price of these hifi kits and since I doubt they sell more than pinballs, I dont see how they would fit an insurance cost in it.

I mean did Ikea ever got sued for a shelf that would collapse and break someone leg ?

Side note : I am new to the US so the joyful concept of American liability is still very hard to get.

Something more along the lines of the Bally/Stern tester in a box. I know many guys have machines on a board or small one off jigs but you would think the plans for those testers would become available for something similar to be built.

For those who are new-ish to the hobby like me, but are quickly learning and want to keep learning, I would love to see something like video chat consultations with experienced techs. Most things I've been able to solve with the help of people on Pinside, which has been great and a tremendous learning experience. But, sometimes you want to cut to the chase, show someone exactly what is going on live and have them talk you through things to try without trying to interpret what they are typing. If there were highly experienced techs who would be willing to Skype for 30-60 minutes for a consultation fee, it might be a nice option. And, they could teach as you went along. The best way of learning is sometimes one-on-one hands on instruction.

Since you asked...
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https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/22/business/ikea-settlement-dresser-tip-over.html

This reminds me of the fake holiday gift boxes I used years ago. I thought they were hilarious.

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What about tool rental?

I’d rather pay $50 to rent a WPC warning silkscreen than to buy one and use it once for $250.

I imagine there are other specialty tools or boards people would be willing to rent or test drive before plunking down big $ for something they’d rarely use or might not need.

Insurance on kits? How did Heath/Heathkit stay in b'ness so long? I guess folks were less litigious back then? So the necessary insurance was more reasonable? I dunno. I only know I built 3 of their TV's plus many other kits, and it was great. Never burned the house down either.

Honestly tho, Heathkits were not cheap. With all the instructions, packaging, idiot-proofing, etc., it cost a lot to produce a kit. Still, enjoyed doing it.

As I said, the concept of liability in America is very new to me, and very different to how it works in France, so the insurance on a pinball kit (or a shelf) definitely did not hit my mind.

There WERE vendors that used to do this until Stern their "we'll fuck the free market with mandatory pricing" bullshit.

Bwhahahahahaha. When I did AFM, which is probably one of the easiest swaps there is, that took me a good 50 hours to get from disassembling the original PF to installing the new PF with everything 100% dialed in, and that was with nearly zero problems/issues/uh-ohs/while-I'm-in-there things coming up. That was a straight up swap with replacing minimal components and not doing any ultra sonic or tumbling work or new rivets or anything.

If someone can write checks for their $10K NIB games, get ready to pay up, or learn how to do it yourself. Someone offers me $500 to do a PF swap and acts like they're overpaying while I see every Stern, JJP, AP, Spooky game since 2016 in their line-up...I'd remind them that their PF ain't going to fix itself with them being cheap....

HFS, $600 + parts is such a bargain. Some people in this community are SERIOUSLY some cheap-ass motherfuckers.

Yeah, 1000 min is what I would do. Just too much work that takes times and super patience. I enjoy the work but not sure I would do it for someone else for less than that.

Paint formulas for pinball cabinets.

I agree with better/EASIER CB testing equip for novice techs. Especially audio boards. It took me 90 days to repair a system 11 cpu, with a test rom. It wasnt even able to find my issue. Finally got it working and now the audio board is not working. (Speech from mpu works but no audio board sounds) New ribbon cable, Shotgunning socketed IC chips and ROMs did not get the sound board to work. Ordered RAM and socket for audio board, fingers crossed thats the issue. So as I said, it would be nice to have better CB testing tools.

A legal service that would expose all the false patents, rights, and phony C&D letters. I have a strong feeling, a lot of these people really don't have the rights, or their rights are expired, and nobody is challenging them. Imagine all the parts that would be available to us if this would happen.

I think the ability to buy a game in kit form would be amazing, as long as it cut the cost of the game considerably.

I should have been more clear....I have only had a couple of people in my home to purchase and they were terrific, so batting 1000. Just saying a transaction with a known entity ( trusted distributor) every time, is worth something.

I think a service where one arrives at a show with their games, backs up to the door, and someone unloads the games, checks them in, unpacks, and sets them up for you would be neat. At the end of the show, they pack them up, you back up to the door again, and they load the game for you. Moving games around can be a real pia.

I've seen this attempted before for a first year show, though not followed up on. It's a great idea though... even if the owner is responsible for packaging and unpackaging of their games.

Third Coast Pinball is starting to do some of the 80's Bally's

someone to produce replacement Stern node boards as in the future there will be a good market for these as doubt Stern will keep a stock of these

There’s a company not to far from here that will reverse engineer boards. The current problem is copyright by stern, but if the boards are no longer produced or supported by stern, then I think it’s open game to rework them. You could send a board to China to have this done, but I’d be concerned about that, vs a local Canadian company

If I ever need a node board, I’ll be looking into getting it done.

THAT is freakin’ amazing.

Not a service but I've always thought a pinball housing community would be cool. Kind of like a golf course community but with just the club house that each neighbor would set up and maintain a few machines that everyone could enjoy. Also a series of sidewalks connecting the homes where people could move their machines for sale, trade or temporary loans to each home collection.

Not likely to happen but fun to consider.

There are a few pinball co-ops/clubs throughout the northeast with a central location for people to bring and setup games.

A walk-in basement in every home!

I came across one of these co-ops when I was searching for a place to play while on vacation. When I emailed them, they asked me to fill out a questionnaire (How long have you been in the hobby? What games do you own? What tournaments have you competed in? etc.). After that, I was granted a phone interview (which went pretty well) but we couldn't schedule a time for an in-person vetting while I was in town. It was an amusing experience.

https://www.thirdcoastpinballandgraphics.com/store/c5/Pinball_Products.html

Are people -really- paying 800+parts for a PF swap?

I may SERIOUSLY have to reconsider offering my services out to our local groups if that's the case. At that point, it's definitely worth MY time, and if people can be considerate of delivery timeframe....psh. Bring me your game, I'll do the swap in my living room. I think you guys are talking more about like restoration than just a straight up swap at those prices, yeah? You're talking about crazy talk stuff like washing the bloody harness and re-wrapping coils that don't even have toasty wrappers to start with, and making dimple templates. That's not something I'd normally do on my own games.

A PF swap by my book isn't a full shop job, but lots of that stuff IS easier to do with the PF pulled out and parts off the board, and I naturally do things that make sense like cleaning guide rails, rebuilding pop bumpers, replacing star posts.. I've done it both ways with my games. Crescendo got a full rebuild of damn near everything during the swap... so did Space Shuttle (including resoldering every...bloody....wire. Oops.)....but Jackbot, not so much. PF swap was done in the cabinet and everything was dropped in the cabinet connected to the harness, and put back on in the cabinet working from the bottom up.

My number of 1000 is what it would take for me to do someone else's playfield. My time is too valuable for my own projects.