Yet Another TZ Restore (YATZR)

"There is a fifth dimension beyond that which is known to man."

I've always loved the Twilight Zone television show, and the movie. I don't really remember playing TZ in the arcade much, but I enjoyed playing it in college. So when the opportunity came to pick one up for an outstanding deal, I jumped at the chance.

It was fully working (no credit dot, clocked seemed to work), but heavily routed. I can't complain, as the price was great, but it looked like it had not been cleaned out in about 25 years.

There are lots of imperfections in the playfield, really glaring issues that just bug me. So, I decided that I'd take it apart and restore the playfield. I may or may not restore the cabinet, as while the decals are faded, it's really not in terrible shape. I may change my mind once the playfield is restored, who knows?

Anyway, here's where I currently sit.
- stripped playfield
- cut all major mechs and coils from harness (fully labelled, isn't that time consuming?), to be replaced with molex connectors

Next up, send the playfield off for restoration and start the harness cleaning!

I included some pics of the playfield to show the wear, as well as the thing up on the rotisserie. Man! It's dirty!

ProTip: Wear thin latex cleaning gloves so you don't get all that black coil dust in your fingernails.

Time spent: 6+ hours. I know I watched Snatch, Back to the Future, and listened to a couple albums while doing this over the space of about 2 weeks. I might be forgetting some time, but I try to time box my work via known quantities (movies, albums) so I can guestimate with some accuracy how long it took.

Parts already acquired:
- LSOG clear repro ramp
- LSOG new plastics

Yet To Buy:
- giant marco/pinball life order

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#2 4 years ago

DSM

Lostcause

Pinside member

4y 80,550 1,844 13

Good luck, it will be worth it. Love mine which is basically new!

#3 4 years ago

BEN

edward472

Pinside member

5y 69,300 1,532

If this is the one that was down in Gainesville, you did get a good deal on it. Heck I tried to buy it

#4 4 years ago

ROB

Rdoyle1978

Pinside member

7y 117K 18,144 14 6

You will want to do the cabinet decals after you do the playfield. Do yourself a favor and fix up the cabinet while the playfield is out of the game. TZ is worth it..

#5 4 years ago

MZR

damadczar

Quoted from Rdoyle1978:
You will want to do the cabinet decals after you do the playfield. Do yourself a favor and fix up the cabinet while the playfield is out of the game. TZ is worth it..

I keep having this thought.... sigh.

#6 4 years ago

ROB

Rdoyle1978

Pinside member

7y 117K 18,144 14 6

OP
Quoted from damadczar:
I keep having this thought.... sigh.

Seriously, it’s WAY less work than the playfield. Huge improvement.

#7 4 years ago

SMK

TheLaw

Pinside+ Addict

Ann Arbor, MI

12y 162K 48,066 19 30 1

Pro Tip: Put your TZ between 2 of your other games and you'll never see the sides again

4 months later

#8 3 years ago

MZR

damadczar

Well, the whole covid-19 thing kind of out a damper on this restore.

That being said, a few things have happened.

- sent playfields off to get restored
- giant marco / pinball life order
- found a blue clock housing
- bought decals

About the decals. I splurged on the phoenix arcade silkscreened decals. I plan on starting the cabinet restore next month while I'm waiting on the playfield.

I'm also going to be tumbling metal parts and installing molex where I clipped the harness. Should be fun.

Here's moar pics.

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2 months later

#9 3 years ago

MZR

damadczar

Well, the playfield has finally had it's base clear coat, and it's now at my friend's house.

He has done several restorations already (many documented here on pinside!), and instead of starting a new thread he's just gonna comment on this one.

Please welcome @mneubey!!

#10 3 years ago

MJN

Mneubey

I was going to document this in a separate thread, but this is way easier, so here goes ...

This is the first time I've ever done a repeat playfield, so I'm curious to see how much easier it might be. I am a big fan of the Silhouette Cameo club, and I've already recreated most of the artwork for TZ. For those who are unfamiliar with the process - I print everything on my vinyl cutter, weed it, and use it as a stencil to airbrush whatever section I'm redoing. This process is tedious, but the results are awesome.

The mini playfield looked ok after the base clear, but there are lines where it was majorly planked all over the entire thing, so I'm just going to repaint the entire thing, since I have already done the work on the silhouette, and it's not very big. On a side note, there was some kind of silicone stuck in the planking that made clearing it difficult apparently.

The blue vinyl sheet has the blue, black, and yellow sections of the mini playfield. Out of the five colors on the mini playfield, I'm going to start with the darkest colors, and move to lightest - Black, blue, red, yellow, white.

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#11 3 years ago

MJN

Mneubey

I took care of the black last night. The most tedious part of this is removing each of the stars and dots from the vinyl and placing them on the actual playfield so I don't paint over them. The Silhouette can handle some tiny things, but it's really hard to make it work if they are too small unless you just do it by hand - at least in my experience.

Today I'm at least going to take care of the blue, and possibly the red as well. The mini playfield is going to be fairly quick

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#12 3 years ago

JON

bigehrl

Jackbar

New York, NY

12y 97,150 3,829 79

Mneubey incredible work!

#13 3 years ago

MJN

Mneubey

Thanks!!

Quoted from bigehrl:
mneubey incredible work!

#14 3 years ago

MJN

Mneubey

I decided to go ahead and do the blue and yellow today and yesterday. Here are a couple more pics to help show the process a little better. Lay down the stencil, paint, and voila! Red and White are last, and shouldn't be a huge deal. It looked pretty good after the base coat, but my main goal with repainting is to get rid of all the lines left over from the planking, which were all over the place.

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#15 3 years ago

MJN

Mneubey

Just did the red today, leaving the white as the last color. "Flip Here" looks a bit funky, only because I put a mask over it while I'm doing the circles. I find the original lettering is best if you can preserve it.

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#16 3 years ago

MJN

Mneubey

Finished the White today. Besides a few minor touch ups, this thing is done.

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6 months later

#17 3 years ago

MZR

damadczar

Well, it's been a while since this thread was updated, but a lot has happened in the intervening time.

First off, while the playfield was getting restored, we also focused on the cabinet.
I've included some pics of the empty cabinet initially, to give you an idea of what we were starting with!

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Thankfully, due to the excellent skills of Mneubey and the decals from Phoenix Arcade, this thing turned out beautifully.
We stripped the cabinet bare, sanded, bondo'd, sanded, painted, and applied decals.

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I've been slowly but surely putting the cabinet back together.
New lockdown receiver, and the best powder coating from @robertstone0407.
Larger speakers for when it's all put back together.
Clear coin door inserts.
I changed the button colors up to something a little different, which I think works (at least for me).
White LED flipper buttons.

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I just need to clean the boards and reinstall them into the backbox, and clean the wiring harness (ya for dishwashers!), and I can start on the playfield re-population next.

#18 3 years ago

MZR

damadczar

And speaking of playfield.... wow.

Another Mneubey special. We ended up re-painting almost the entire thing. And with the help of another local we had the clearcoat applied and leveled.
Simply amazing.
Cannot wait to start working on this thing.

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#19 3 years ago

JAW

jawjaw

Pinside member

Humble, TX

9y 85,550 5,534 5

Cab looks great!

#20 3 years ago

MJN

Mneubey

Haha, Sorry! I was just buried in stuff (3 TZ cabs, and 2 TZ playfields, along with multiple other projects), so I didn't do a good job on updating the progress of the cab, or playfield. I have pics throughout the process, so I'll post a few when I get a chance.

#21 3 years ago

MJN

Mneubey

I dug up some pics of the process - Here is the backbox warning decal screen process. My wpc screen isn't exactly straight, so I have to take a few steps to make sure it's perfect. I mounted a board on the side at the angle it would take to make sure it's straight in the short period of time I have to adjust it after flooding the screen.

The first pic shows the backbox when it arrived. The factory screen for this one was waaaaay low for some reason. I'm not sure I've seen that before.

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#22 3 years ago

MJN

Mneubey

Here are some pics from the cabinet restoration. I'm sure I have some detailed pics somewhere, but these were what I dug out in the last few minutes.

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#23 3 years ago

MJN

Mneubey

And finally, the single most tedious process in the entire playfield restoration was trying to fill, and cover up these post holes. As I understand it, there were some TZ's that had these posts so it wouldn't drain directly out of the pop bumpers. I bondo'd, leveled, and covered it with artwork. The other hole was just filled.

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#24 3 years ago

RCA

alexanr1

Pinside member

12y 74,550 1,338 85

Long project. Looks like you have been at it for a year at this point.

#25 3 years ago

MZR

damadczar

Quoted from alexanr1:
Long project. Looks like you have been at it for a year at this point.

Yeah, like with many things, COVID kinda screwed this up a little bit, timing wise.
Endgame is in sight now.

10 months later

#26 2 years ago

MZR

damadczar

It’s been almost a year since I last posted, but I’m almost done at this point.

Tubular rivets are the worst when you don’t have the proper tools. I’m waiting for a hand 1/8” roller so I can hammer new ramp flaps in since they don’t fit into a press.

Otherwise, it’s pretty complete. Been a hard long road to get here, with lots of learning along the way.

This was my first playfield swap, and first pinball restoration. Dang. All other games will be much simpler now.

More as I finish the last little bits, but here’s some pics.

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1 week later

#27 2 years ago

MZR

damadczar