LOL!!! Right before I read your post, I was sitting at my desk looking at Cointaker's website and making a list of all the LEDs I want to order for my Swords of Fury.

erak .. it's the makeup of the plastic. Not all are the same just like replacement parts. Once I find something I like I stick with that company and "brand".

As to why you can't stop putting LED's in your machines I believe it's an obsession. You should immediately seek professional help. Preferably find a "shrink"/psychiatrist that has a pinball machine in his waiting room Please don't make us pinsiders come over there and do an intervention

I think you should send me all those LED's and let me take care of them for you as I care about you. It's the least I can do.

I just got a package from cointaker and it was 140.00......so I guess I do have LED FEVER!

I have LEDs in two of my pins so far. Will put them in all of them eventually. I like Cointaker's superbrights the best in all inserts, backglass and hidden GI locations. Since they are so bright, if you have any ghosting issues, you will notice it more with the SBs.

Judging from the posts here, you are not alone in putting leds in your machine. However, I prefer pins without. It is too much light for my liking.

Ok erak .. we will have to find someone else for our new reality show "Pinball Interventions" We think maybe tatman would be a good one considering his game room. BTW LED's are on my Xmas list of items. I'd be glad to pinmail anyone my address who feels generous I need LED's for Medusa, Street Fighter II, Haunted House, and Torch. The other machines came with some/all installed. (I hope people still have a sense of sarcasm).

I've been doing a full restore of a FH and it will be the first pin Ive ever done LED's in. Put those all in last night and cant wait to see it! Its going to be a while yet but man thats going to look nice. For $179 bucks it better ! Ive seen a few and really liked them so I dont think I'll be dissapointed especially with all those inserts.

I have done all my pins in LED's and I think it looks great. I don't think I'll ever use regular lamps ever again. Not to mention there is much less chance of ever burning up my G.I connectors.

Ive seen led kits on cointaker and marco, are they the same kit or does each company use different bulbs?

I believe there the same bulbs and everything but from what I've been told Cointakers are better. I just bought my 1st kit and went with Cointaker! I plan on finishing it this weekend and I'll post some pics so you can check it out

Leds for all of my pins! Even on my first pin ever... I bought it, tore it apart and put it back together and added leds. The difference is quite dramatic. There was no turning back. Standard bulbs just look ugly to me... before I tore down my latest pin, Roadshow, it had standard bulbs. A guest that doesn't know much about pinball came over and commented on it.... "This one must be older than the rest." Funny... that is my newest pin

+1. I think they look great and it cuts down on PF and board temps.

What do you guys do with the bulbs you take out?

LEDs make every pin look better.
The added light and clearness of light helps performance of play too

I have a big ziploc bag filled with them.

I'm curious about the differences in LEDs from the different companies. I've been a Cointaker guy since day 1.

Yea with you there! I just like how they make machines look much more than regular bulbs myself.

i throw the blackened ones in the trash and the rest of them in a zip lock. when I work on my friends machines they come in handy

Just received the BOP LED kit from Chris at Cointaker, but I won't be able to install the new bulbs for a couple weeks due to work constraints. I heard that it's better to be selective with LEDs rather than just putting in the full kit, but that assumes that you know what you're doing and this will by my first rodeo. Also really looking forward to what those Dutch guys are doing to BOP. Maybe we'll start to see something amazing there next year.

the Other Skip

lol yep leds are addicting for sure

I have the Affliction - Addiction also... I've Led'd about 25 Pin's... I enjoy it and it help's the Sale when you get Ready to let it go... CoinTaker Rules !!!

So far the only pin I have seen that I was not tempted to put LED's in is my friends Motordome. It has a factory light upgrade kit. The lights are super bright and look nice. Retro's for the GI lighting are about all that will probably go into it.

Just got done LEDing the TZ. Looks great with exception to the door - the cool whites in the door doesnt look right, went with red LEDs.

Last month, LEDd out the T2. Best looking game with LEDs ever.

I think anyone that despises LEDs are thinking back 3 years ago when they werent as advanced as they are now - they have evolved pretty well.

Oh yes!

Keep changing.

Right now I have 5 different types in the countries on AFM - trying to decide the best look!

It is like doing a painting - keep changing until it looks just right

My LED bill could buy me a nice pin. But they look soooo good.

I disagree. Try them on BOP, some of the effect of the rotating lights on the inner/outer wheel is lost, and the heartbeat flashing looks terrible. The helmet lamps don't look right either. It's not a brightness thing, it's because they don't fade like a bulb does. I imagine they'd spoil Mystery Castle too, since that flickers the inserts on purpose sometimes, again it relies on the fade effect.

I think LEDs suit some games and not others, for every tasteful one theres about 10 others saturated with blue haze and blinding light, bleaching out the art on the plastics when viewed and making the whole thing look like one of those sad cars with the neon lighting and blue LEDs on the windscreen wipers. I think GI looks at least 100x better if not 300x better with proper bulbs, warm lighting is how the art was designed to be lit, not harsh whites.

However - I have to be practical - I like it that people fill their games with LEDs, because if i buy one it means I can easily put it back to standard and sell those LEDs for decent cash to buy parts and supplies with

I am looking to put LED's in my IJ. But i have one question. Is there different brands of LED's you can buy? Do different companies make them. If so, which is the best to buy. This may be a stupid question but i am new at buying LED's and don't want to make a expensive mistake. Thanks!

No-flix - The plus' versions stop flicker. Good variety.
Cointaker - Largest selection. Love the superbrites.
Ablaze - The Ghostbuster version stops ghosting.

These are probably the best of the brands that I am aware of. There are a couple of others. Marcos also sells some too but not sure who makes them.

Well, you've got a Williams WPC machine. I don't recall, but does IJ do a lot of dimming on the GI circuit? Almost every LED out there has a nasty flicker when the dimming circuit kicks in. The ones that perform best in that situation are the Noflix PLUS, but they are spendy spendy. I just ordered a full set of those for the GI in my White Water. Cost me $160 shipped, and that's JUST the GI lighting. Standard LED's usually cost about half that or less, but the trade off is that damned flickering on WPC machines.

For the controlled inserts there's a few options. You can use really any LED in there, but you'll get ghosting with most of the standard ones out there. There's a software patch that helps considerably with that if you can track down the unapproved code for it, and then I say go with the cointaker 90 degree or the ablaze 1led at around $0.70 each or less depending on brand. Or you can get the Ablaze "ghost busters" which are pretty much right where you want on the brightness, and you won't need the software upgrade, but run around $1.30 each.

-Hans

If you do a full LED conversion, you definitely need to turn off the GI powersaver mode.

Oh definitely, you need to get rid of that powersave mode in attract mode.

But some games also dim sections of the GI during play too, such as White Water right before you get 3 ball multiball. With the LH-6 ROM set it really uses the dimming quite a lot. Looks like ass with regular LED's in the GI.

-Hans

LEDs look great in same games, not so much in others. I have 6 games and LEDs in 2. The worst looking game for LEDs in IJ. In my opinion it just ruins the look and feel of the game. Same for WH20. I bought a few LEDs, installed them, and it just didn't add anything. I took them out that day.

My Family Guy has has LEDs and I think it looks great, along with Congo. For some reason, Congo looks particularly good with LEDs.

With my "White water" I really can't wait to get the LED's into it. The translight looks fine when the machine is off or if I shine a flashlight on it, but powered up I can't help but call the game "piss water" because of the yellowish tinge the incandescent bulbs give both the playfield and the translight.

I think people go way overboard with the blues though on wh20, where cool whites would look much nicer.

I put cointakers in my SM and LOTR (just the inserts) and it had the flickering/ghosting problem so I went with the Ghostbusters from Pinball Life and they look fantastic. Out of my machines I have full insert LEDs in SM, LOTRs and I have a few in the inserts of TZ & T2. I have a color changing LED from Pinball Life in my MB for the record insert in the lower middle and one in my T2 in the Timer Insert by the T2 Head. I really like the board mounted LEDs on the Tron LEs. Those look sharp with being overly bright.

I heard back from Melissa @ cointaker yesterday. their ghostbusting / no flicker (whatever the term is) superbright leds have been tested and approved for bally Williams machines. They are on order but not in stock. You can pre order via phone or email and they run 1.50 a pop.

I did spend some time yesterday researching the NoFlix Plus leds. The biggest complaint I hear about LED's (beisdes ghosting) is the abrupt on-off. They have video on their site of the NoFlix plus and their bulbs behave a lot like a regular bulb... they actually dim out instead of an instant off. I was pretty impressed and ended up buying 50 of their "Old white" 44's to try out on my JM. Since that pin has a lot of dimming effects I thought it would be a good candidate to try those out on. They are really expensive though and time will tell how fast the shipping is from overseas.

I guess I just disagree. TZ especially, and certainly WH20. The games have a certain look, and installing LEDs changes how the games look. I think TZ looks great with LEDs behind the back glass, but if I purchased a TZ with LEDs anywhere besides the back box I'd take the LEDs out before I even turned the game on.

I had a couple noflix plus to test out a while back, and was also very happy with how well they worked on the dimming circuit. I just ordered about 75 of the things, superfluxes for the backbox and frosted domes for the playfield.

Interesting to hear about the cointaker new lineup, but I really wish they didn't do it in the superbrights. They've been way too bright in just about every location I've tried them. The only spot I've found that I like how they work is behind white inserts. I'll have to get hold of those new ones though to put on the lux rig and rip apart.

-Hans

Did they happen to mention if there will be a flexible version available?

@gweempose- no, nothing that specific. I emailed her back asking this same thing but haven't heard back yet. I'll post back as soon as I hear from her.

Thanks guys.. This is great information. I don't want to spend a lot of money and then realize i should have done something different. I really appreciate it... Jalpert i am sad i here you say that. Maybe i can put a few in there to at least get the LED effect.. But i am glad you told me.

gweempose, just heard back from Melissa regarding non ghosting superflexs

"Not right in the beginning, but eventually yes….we are working on getting our main inventory in."

don't let others opinions influence your own decision. there is certainly a divide between pro LED and non LED supporters... and very few in the middle but it all boils down to perosnal choice. there is no right or wrong. regardless of what some people say its your pin and you can do whatever you want with it.

Definitely a great idea. IIRC cointaker and pinball life both sell variety packs. When it comes down to it, it's your machine so make it how you want it.

-Hans

I think if you are doing it for heat reasons the LEDs are fine behind the translite. Otherwise, I don't fell you gain that much and a lot of times people use to bright of LEDs in the backbox and it just doesn't look right. I like the cool white LEDs in the TZ inserts. Just a personal preference. I didn't say you had to like it.

I think i will look up videos of different pins that have different LED's in them. I think i will like it just trying to decide which ones to go with. I love the IJ and i am trying to finds ways to go all out w/ it. I 100% will get the LED's so I will go w/ what HHaase said. Just buy a variety pack first to see how it looks. Thanks everyone..

Be careful with video's of Leds, they are exagerrated, much brighter than they are .., But still look awesome., You can also get a great read of where to put certain colors. Flashers , seem to be blinding when they flash, that would be my only concern......

But what fun it is to expieriment...