Ok. My last post was a doozie so I am going to ask a nice and simple question that should not create much of a stir. What was the worst hack/repair that you saw? Or did?

I saw a machine that the seller stated he painted the cabinet detail in with a 5 inch paintbrush. The kind that you would stain a deck with. And he did not use stencils. It looked like it was flipper painted by a walrus. Or by someone using an oversized deck brush.

A flipper coil that had lost the end bracket and the owner tried to duct tape it in place under the PF. Same owner "touched up" some insert wear with nail polish. Might not have been so bad if he used the same color as the playfield area.

Broken backglass that was replaced with plexi glass and it was screwed into the backbox with the translite duct taped to it. (only MacGYVER should be using duct tape to fix things.)

A broken ramp flap so the ramp was drywall screwed to the playfied.

And a missing coin door that was replaced with a piece of cardboard. And it was on a crude hinge system and had the door lock installed. Its a good thing that it was not on a route like that. I can't imagine it being to hard to break into. Just to name a few.

Unfortunately the repairs that I saw were all true. Sometimes things are better left alone. Granted a pin looks better with a coin door attached, but not one that was made out of a box.

I had lost my soldering iron once so I heated up a nail with a blow torch to solder the wire onto the lead. Later I did a proper repair on it.

On the flip side, I sold a Black Rose that had been in a fire to someone a while back. It was in several boxes. Just parts and a really bad cab. The only thing that was replaced were two circuit boards. I saw the game at his house and it looked amazing. Not collector quality, but you could not tell that it was as bad as it was. What an amazing restore that he did. I wish I could replace mine with his.

Speaking of old rubber, I have seen some rings on a playfield that had turned to chalk and the owner kept trying to wash them instead of just getting new ones.

A friend of mine told me about a machine that he went to check out and the seller had tried to clean the rust off of a pinball with a palm sander.

Very impressive work on TAF cabinet front.

I love this thread. The staple on the ring is interesting. I have heard of people super gluing broken rings back together. If you are trying to fix a machine on location in a pinch that is one thing. An owner with a machine at home, no excuse.