Hi everyone. This is my first time posting but I’ve been lurking on the forum reading up on problem solving and I have to say this is a great forum for info and advice, so thank you to all for your wisdom as it’s helped me a lot.

We have a family heirloom in the shape of an original HIGH SPEED Williams pinball. It’s been in our family now for at least 30 years however it’s been sitting dormant for at least 10. It had an issue and was never resolved and sat in the corner since.
My daughter (3) has just shown an interest in it so I thought I’d try getting it going!

Through this forum is found the battery case was fault (dirty) and have rectified that issue and everything seems to be working fine except when I hit start it just sets off the bumpers.
After cleaning the battery case I put it in free play mode to get it out of the ‘adjust failure’ mode and it seemed to fix it except for this start button/solenoid issue.
I just turned free play off but it’s still the same. Am I stuck in a test setting??

Any ideas?

Cheers Owen

Photo is just for photos sake

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The middle battery had some corrosion on the negative terminal. I hit it with some sand paper to clean up the terminal and I now have even readings on the meter for all 3 (new) batteries.

Multiple solenoids fire when hitting the start button. Seems like it’s all the kickback solenoids (ramps top and bottom and the left side kickback) it fires them all in sequence twice then the start button does nothing.
This is the battery in question. The others were fine

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Oh!! I think there’s only one ball in there. I’ll give it a try with the others

Thanks grantopia !

Yeah it turns out the other balls went missing and the one left is starting to rust a little so I was going to get a new set. I don’t want it tearing up the play field

There’s a pinball supplier not far from my house

So I put 3 new balls in and it works!!

Thanks @grantopia!
I still have a couple bits and bobs to fix but the main one is the solenoid that kicks the ball to the plunger shoot isn’t operating.

I tested it with a multimeter and it seems to read the same as the other solenoids so maybe a switch? A fuse?

Any ideas?

Photo: this guy

Cheers O

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I would say extreme novice at best grantopia but I am enthusiastic. All advice is taken then googled on how to do it. I got 3 or .3 ohms resistance on all coils I tested.
Can you cross the terminals to fire the solenoid?
I tried that with the switch but nothing happened.

I’ve noticed the ‘hype’ music for multi ball doesn’t turn off once the ball is out of play so I’m guessing there’s a faulty switch at work here?

YeOldPinPlayer thanks for that.
I had a look at the chart. Found the coil and retested it making sure I had good contact and it’s measuring 4.3 ohms which is pretty bang on for the 23-800 coil

If I short the terminals will it fire the coil or am I going to do damage doing that?

Coil seems ok. Starting to think it’s. A switch

So I looked up how to test switches and it said the switch should read 0 resistance while activated and the switch next to that coil did.
However the one next to it for the second ball in line did not! It was kind of all over the place. Tested them both again and got the same readings. So I’ll have to pull it out and go to the electrical store once this round of Covid lockdowns are over

Hopefully this does it

Thanks grantopia ill have a look tomorrow.
Pretty sure we don’t have the manual so I’ll look it up online

Thanks for your advice

Wow that’s awesome YeOldPinPlayer ! Thank you! I’ll print that out so I have a hard copy

Made a stainless steel bracket for the traffic lights at the bottom of the ramp as they were sagging and the ball was hitting it some times and stopping it going up the ramp. Same with the clear plastic cover over the ramp. Got more clearance now and had a game and got back into the groove a little. Feeling more like the pinball of old now!
Still a few more little glitches to fix but we’re getting there

Ok so I ran the solenoid test and number 2 doesn’t fire.

YeOldPinPlayer is the transistor the little guy between the terminals of the solenoid?

Ah right O. I’ll take a look. Any way to test the transistor?

All the other solenoids seem to be working it’s just that one that’s not playing fair

Thanks YeOldPinPlayer mof

grantopia how do you test voltage to the coil? I’ve already done an ohm resistance check and the coil meets spec measurements as outlined in the manual

Sorry for the questions about the obvious but electronic problem solving is new to me

Cheers O

grantopia GRUMPY

Sorry it’s been a while. Been battling repeated lockdowns and work over this last few months.

I had a crack at measuring voltage but it was super hard to get any consistent reading on ANY of the coils except the 3 pin coils. I haven’t gone back to it yet as my MM ran out of batteries ‍♂️

On another topic I’ve notice something strange with the background music. It’s either on and doesn’t stop no matter what or it’s off and never comes back on unless you switch the pinball off then back on again.

Anyways I’ll endeavor to replace the MM batteries and have other go

Cheers O

Ok so the coil in question is reading about 4.7 volts. The other coils of the same caliber AE 23-800 (3 mushroom bumper coils up the top of the playing field) are measuring about 8-9 volts but one is also down around 5 but as far as I can tell that one still works

I guess I should just replace them anyway right as they’re reading so low

YeOldPinPlayer i’ve had it on this setting

I’ve been putting the negative lead to the center of the solenoid (the bottom of the rod) and the other through the hole at the positive terminal

I couldn’t take a pic while getting a reading as that would require 3 arms :/

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