I can tell you the exact breakpoint for Williams... System 7 games (black knight, pharaoh, jungle lord) all lift off. System 9 games (Sorcerer, Comet, Space Shuttle) fold down BUT still have the black/white super connectors so you can take the heads off with only disconnecting about four cables.

[System 8 doesn't count.]

That's a standard Bally hinge. I've seen (the rest of) that hinge on both -35s and 6803s. No idea if it's still available new, or what it's called, though.

You just described what Williams did with the system 3-7 white-black plugs. Two giant plugs that carried *almost* everything from the head to the body. (There are two other smaller plugs that also need to be connected, IIRC.)

Causes absolute hell when someone mixes them up. Pretty much blows every board in the game to some extent.

Also, having everything on one plug is a bad idea for maintenance. You need to be able to disconnect parts of the game without disconnecting everything.

You keep confusing me as to whether you're agreeing our disagreeing with me, Phoebs!

It should be noted that Phoebs' comments apply to old Stern, not new SPI machines.