Williams Ringer, Penny Pitch, Darts (Owners Thread)

Great Group - I'm looking for one of these so I will follow! I would love to have any of them - I love the artwork on all of them too. Cheers!

Very cool game restored one several years ago for a friend of mine at the Aliquippa Arcade Museum (Pinball PA)...Great game play too for an EM.

Have fun with it!

OHEMIO

Can we get some commentary about the cooling fan mod shown on this one?
https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/williams-ringer-arcade-machine
I'm pondering whether to install something similar on my Ringer.
.................David Marston

Never had an issue with ours granted its not installed in a hot barn so everyones needs may be different I guess. Not really a high tech game so seems overkill to me.

High score to date on mine is 36 runs.
On Frames 3, 6, and 7 getting a ringer "Shoots Again".
Mine was very inconsistent with it's shots. Around the same amount of turns
would vary widely, so I did a little testing and a little surgery on the backside
of the Score Motor's wiper board, and instead of on (I believe) the 5th lit horseshoe,
the clutch breaks away after the first two are lit. That made the amount of the wheel's
turns much more consistent....

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Does anyone out there actually own the Darts version? The only real pictures I've ever seen are the ones on clay's site. No video out there I could find of it. The internal dart throwing mech for the light animation looks to be a different too. I've seen plenty of Ringers out there and Penny Pitch is just a different glass but never seen a Darts.

It's been years since I went through the Ringer. I use Remmington Gun Oil for quite
a few applications, so there's a good chance that was the final one used when servicing
the wheel. The wheel still spins freely and smoothly..

I've been tring to buy a Ringer for a while now, like 3 years... Hopefully one will turn up at a reasonable price, and I'll add it to my personal collection..

Thanks for starting this thread.

Steve
Mi Pinball Refinery

One thing I did to my Ringer was add a third hole closer to the switch for the nylon peg in the off-weight wheel. This is to give a few more last second switch hits as the wheel swings back and forth just before it stops swinging. People think they have a ringer but then, bam! 3 more switch hits and now they they get 1 point. Similarly, you might think that you didn't do a good spin, and the next thing you know, RINGER!

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I don't own one, but I saw it on location for a few months at a restaurant in Hanover, NH. This would be back when it was up for location testing in 1971 or so. I guess it didn't pass the test.
.................David Marston

Mike is like the Ringer ninja master.

That's too bad if they never made any past testing. It looks like it would've been fun.

First of all, thanks Trizel for starting this club!!!! Here's my project and now freshly restored Ringer & Penny Pitch combo. This thing had the crap played out of it and was quite a basket case. Plus somebody thought it would look great to paint the cabinet gray with a roller >sigh< . One bonus was somehow the goodie bag survived which you can see stapled next to the coin door opening. I almost went with the yellow cabinet as on the flyer but thought it might look too loud; glad i stayed with the more mellow blue base color. The alternate themed penny pitch backglass is interesting but not nearly as good as horseshoes. My kids get horseshoes but were like "what the heck is penny pitching?". This is the ultimate hold beer in one hand while you simultaneously play the game with your other hand and BS with friends. Very fun party game.

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As i stripped off the gray paint i was able to make out the original lines, from which i was able to make a set of stencils - a very tedious task. I probably would have gotten with Pinball Pimp for these had I not been able to make out the original outlines. The cabinet paint I used was all rattle can rust-oleum safety blue for base, rust-oleum safety red for the horseshoes and rust-oleum 2X golden sunset for the yellow parts.

I mirror polished the spinning wheel shaft with a cotton wheel and polishing compound, cleaned out the bronze bushings with alcohol and then wiped on a few coats of this dry teflon bike lube amazon.com link » on everything (which by the way works great on steppers and other mech's), and man that thing spins forever.

The wheel was pitted and flaking badly so i sent that along with the coin door insert to Chris Royalty at Hot Rod Arcade and he did a fantastic job of reconditioning and chrome plating. The stainless steel part of the coin door I re-grained with some fine scotch-brite and windex which took out most of the random scratches and gave it a nice even sheen.

For back-lighting I put in comet warm white 2-SMD's with a frosted lens, except the four blinkers which are original 455's. The LED's flicker just a bit but it is nearly un-noticeable if you're not specifically looking at it.

There was nothing special about the mechanics and steppers, standard dis-assembling and cleaning/polishing/lubing all the mechs. There are waaaaay less mechanisms with this game than an EM pinball machine so in that regard it was less time consuming and easier to troubleshoot when it first started up.

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I got mine about 3 years ago. She was looking pretty tired. To make things worse, it fell onto it's back during shipping, completely destroying the back glass.
Took it all apart and repaired the cabinet then repainted using stencils from Pinball Pimp. A couple of hours on the buffing wheel cleaned up the wheel and coin door. Took apart and cleaned every switch contact and stepper. I tried LEDs when I re-lamped, but I had a lot of ghosting so switched back to #47s. Ordered a new back glass from BGResto. The only thing I haven't been able to replace is the yellow plastic instruction strip that runs under the back glass. Mine was pretty beat and non usable.

As for adding the fan, I believe that is in case someone starts a game but doesn't finish it. At the beginning of each shot a coil is energized to pull the wheel with the switch contacts into the wheel that you spin. After about two revolutions, this coil de-energizes so you can't try to slow down or speed up the wheel to influence your shot. The problem is, if you walk away without finishing the game, that coil stays energized and will overheat. In fact, I had to replace mine when I did the rebuild.

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Love Ringer I got lucky when I found mine. Got listed on Craigslist nearby, was sitting in a storage unit.

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Good job. I know how much work is into that..
When I first got in the hobby (early 90s), I was picking up Wedge Heads for 75 bucks from an old
3 story Gris Mill warehouse, and there was this machine called Ringer. Who knew. Could have had
it for $75.00 I do have one from a trade deal and did okay, but I certainly have more than 75 bucks
invested into the one I now have.

I really enjoyed working on this. It's one of my wife's any my favorite games.
Usually when working on an EM, I would only break down and clean what was needed, but on this I cleaned every switch blade with a fiberglass pencil.
There is just something about EM's that make then special.

A small piece of 3/8" fuel hose works great.

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never seen a yellow cabinet before. I had the production blue one.

I've only seen the yellow on some of the flyers. Glad they went with the blue.

Yes, there is a tool.
CTA Tools 1012 Mini Bulb Remover/Installer amazon.com link »

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damn you for making me spend money. I currently use a coil sleeve with a shooter tip shoved in the end, in reverse. makes a good bulb extractor. but this would be great for those that are really stuck in.

The wiring of the caps looks correct. I'm not sure what that other wire is doing. Where does it go?

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Great to see a thread for this game. This is an awesome addition to any game room. Its hard to believe so many of these got thrown away back in the day.

Thanks Trizel for highlighting Ed's video on Pinball Mayhem's YouTube channel. Here's the link to the 17 video playlist
Jeremy (Pinball Mayhem)
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLKBzlsEWMlPKql9T5QMCszjExZ7nC4S4k
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