Happy New Year to all! For lack of a better place I'm putting this post here since there's a very extensive discussion of Williams score reel restoration. I'm beginning (again) a restoration project on a 1795 Williams Little Chief. This machine was close to working properly years ago, but has suffered some neglect, and prior to any extensive playfield or cabinet rework I wanted to get the thing working completely. First thing I found was that it was not resetting properly, and while looking into that, it seemed that the score reels were not working smoothly, so my assumption is that this needs to be addressed first. While working on the first reel (Player 1 10's, probably the most used reel), I found the following: there is a pin on the bottom of the ratchet lever that rides in a slot in the base of the reel. This pin has worn to the point of being half gone (could not get a decent close-up picture), causing the lever to wobble or not track smoothly. The only real fix I can imagine is a new part, but I wonder if anybody has attempted to either replace the pin with a new glued in piece of plastic, or perhaps a small screw? I may try to find a replacement part, but if none are available.. Thanks for any ideas!

Bill...

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Oops! Dyslexic fingers! Should have read 1975! I found some used reels on Ebay, so the immediate problem is resolved. Still interested in knowing if anybody has successfully repaired parts such as this.

Hey, no worries! I did consider starting a new thread, but since this one was active, I took a chance on it. I'm compiling a bunch of questions and some status and will more than likely start a thread soon.

Anyway, I want to thank you for sharing your trials and tribulations here; it gave me the confidence to go ahead and do more than just poke around. I found some reels on Ebay (DUH! should have checked there first!) which allowed me to fix the one very worn part; the others (so far) have been much better. I have finished the player 1 and player 2 reels, and they seem much better, though I have not yet tweaked the switches properly - there 1 is one that seems to think it's at zero constantly. The parts for the 3rd player set have been cleaned and are ready to go back together. All in all, decent progress.

Again, thanks to all for this great resource!