Live playfield pyrotechnic smoke effects. I should install a few in my Volcano.

As a fellow System 80/Volcano owner I feel like you wouldn't need anything extra for smoke effects, just wait a bit

Can’t say I have ever seen this hack before.

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Hey, at least they didn't just jump the fuse!

DCRand

Curious why any form of spacing would be required in that "match hack" ? What does it do?

Reduce buzzing maybe?

He may have just watched the movie Cobra...

This one deserves a medal, pure genius !

I do this one a lot as a quick fix when trying to get a game working and the fuse holder is weak or broken. It’s also a good way to use up the physically smaller fuses (of the same value) that come as part of the big Amazon fuse kit. If I’m tracking down a problem that keeps blowing a fuse, I use up the physically smaller fuses of the same value in the kit instead of blowing the correct ones while tracking down the problem. Then once the problem is fixed, I remove the jumpers and install the correct fuse.

Therein lies the difference between a repair and a hack.

I'd have expected a broken fuse clip - maybe one was just loose -

Dodged a bullet when I did a similar thing recently while diagnosing a GI problem - had a game that was blowing the 25a GI fuse after about 10min.
Thought I had the problem fixed, so hooked up a 20a breaker via alligator clips to the 25a fuse clips, and about 20 min later when I checked on it, one of the clips that was attached to the game had literally heated up and smoldered away without blowing the breaker.

Same here (see above) but just because I'm lazy and haven't soldered blown fuses into the circuit breakers that I use. Will probably do that now though.

what hack?

Instead of blowing fuses until I find the problem, I let the problem light up a 100W bulb instead. Works like a champ.

Richard

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That is a good idea.100 watt incandescent bulbs are a thing of the past (Well Nearly) here in CA thanks to Al Gore.

I don't understand what you're doing here. If it's simply preventing the fuse from blowing by bleeding off current, then the circuit that contains the fault is still drawing the same amount of over-current, except now you no longer have fuse protection.

I'm no EE and not even a pro repair guy, just a hobbyist, so take this however you may. There's no fuse in that circuit, the bulb is replacing the fuse. The current from the dead short is indeed bled off by the bulb. No further damage is occurring in the circuit. When the short is repaired, bulb no longer lights, replace with correct amperage fuse and enjoy.

The pic is evidence of a shorted transistor in the solenoid section of a Williams driver board. If one over-fused or simply jumpered the fuse, you would expect damage to continue; the smoke would have to come out somewhere. Instead, it simply lights the 100W bulb (dimly, but visibly) as an indicator.

I also used this method during troubleshooting of a Williams System 7 MPU that had a blanking problem. It would blow the solenoid fuse on power-up but if you replaced the fuse with the game still powered, it would run fine until you next cycled power. Removed fuse, jumpered in the bulb test rig, and began my troubleshooting. Turned out the 555 timer IC was no good, causing the blanking failure. MPU would fire all the solenoids on power-up, overloading the circuit. When I bought that game (BKLE) it had a whole pile of black burnt coils sitting in the bottom of the cabinet; wonder how that happened?

Richard

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The hookup was unclear in your original post, but this explains a lot. The bulb is acting like a resistor in place of the fuse and limiting the current to the circuit.

Clever, but I am not entirely sure if this is a good working practice for all scenarios, fuse sizes, bulb wattages, etc. Keep in mind that the bulb is also causing a voltage drop in the circuit, which may or may not matter to the other components.

cfh was working on a pin today and ran across this. When a chime plunger's nylon tip falls off and you dont have another, simply fit the eraser end of a pencil (#2 or #3) onto the tip end of the plunger. Rub the eraser on the inner cabinet or floor to "tune" the chime using calibrated ears.....

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Cool! Now what the hell am I going to do with all those smaller fuses?

You gotta give the guy credit…it’s fricken genius!

Classic move!

As much as I do appreciate cfh's work, I think adjusting the makeshift plungers rubber tip does not do very much to tune the chime.

That was what he found. He removed it and installed a new chime plunger with nylon tip.

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Creative hack some tech did with a new Bally Mystic back in the day for the center coin mech slot they never used in my area. Cut a metal fuse holder cover (top). My continuation hacks to operate old early Bally electronic pins from a quarter to a dollar for location play in my area. This is for a Power Play for a bar. Most barcades & locations in my region is $1 a play, going $2 a play new games, & $1.50 a play games 3 - 7 years old. Canadian dollar to USA is about 75 cents + we have taxes. Getting expensive to operate & buy new or old pinball games for location play!

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Wish I knew? Best guesses have been to stop vibration, or to line up the plunger and coil better. My personal belief is the tech could foresee the day there would be an internet, and knew there would be a pin forum. So wanted to give us something interesting to wonder about.

Adding an inline bulb is an old trick when working on old radios, etc. The power supply caps can go bad over time, and instead of blowing up parts in the radio, the bulb (selecting the wattage is important) will light up if there's an issue. Granted, a external fuse would provide protection too, but popping fuses all the time can be a PIA. I wouldn't be surprised if some old radios or TV's even had proper protection (i.e. a fuse).

I recall some older William's pins (Systems 3's) that the secondary of the transformer went straight to a bridge rectifier (no fuse). If some diodes went south, that could be troublesome for the transformer, and that later models had fuses added.

Here's some random link I found discussing it: https://antiqueradio.org/dimbulb.htm

Whirlpool ramp is out of order

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Be sure to lower the price per play until repaired....

Too soon?

maybe this was the precursor to the GotG rocket kick back (done at a lower cost)

WOZ monitor replacement

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Wow! just Wow! LOL!

I'm going with this for now; Binds like a champ!

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lol.. I feel like it needs an E-clip to secure the tip of the post.. or it is just glued in?

It's a mini post to replace the real crank pin. . . with white grease in the guide; Threads were too long, so instead of modifying the post, the plastic was cut away to 'reduce' obstruction.

The mini post gets caught on the ramp guide which torques the crank arm/post in funny angles. . . It's madness.

Crank pin is a short cylinder with even shorter threads.

Stern - Split Second
Jones connector madness

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Gorgar says...

...Bigger is better, or not?

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Some methhead spent a whole day on this.

I think I saw it before, in the old EM handbook of bulletproofing classic solid state.

I am surprised they didn't drill a hole right through the screen to screw it in and mount it!

i like how he braided the diode leads so tightly to make up that bridge rectifier arrangements. Very artsy....

Looking at that Rectifier board and seeing some of the hacks I have over the years makes you wonder how many games spontaneously combusted on location!

In the age of Molex it kills me to see a stupid Jones plug out of its era

Wow. Just wow. I would have started with a fresh rectifier board and then snip every wire before the Jones and after the rectifier. Holy cow!!

This is from a recent full overhaul I did on a game.

Before and after:

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The electrical tape.... In the words of Derek from Vice Grip Garage while evaluating a vintage vehicle he's rescuing "...well this looks like I've already worked on it..."

I never could figure out why some people hate grounding so much!

They must not understand what it's for.

Running power into the ground might shock your feets

I took a basic electricity class in 8th grade that gave me more lasting knowledge than I imagined at the time. I also worked as a truck, tractor, and auto mechanic and honed my electrical skills on those jobs.

A lot of people, IMO, have never had any kind of electrical training. And then they buy a pinball machine.