The Machine: Bride of Pinbot is a pretty neat early WPC title from Williams. It was the last alphanumeric machine produced by Williams. This one was overall in nice shape and had a lot of potential. The main problem was dirt and the typical cracked ramps.
Pinball machines have batteries. A lot of people don’t know this. The batteries maintain your settings and high scores in the game’s RAM. These batteries must be periodically changed so that they don’t leak. Here’s the consequences of not changing those batteries:
I was asked to install additional lighting on a 1994 Data East Guns N’ Roses machine. The customer wanted the topper illuminated and wanted under-cabinet lighting. Pinball Life sells an under cabinet lighting kit for Stern machines. The question is, can I easily get this kit to work in a Data East machine? Time for some research.
Terminator 2 is a rather simple but fun game. This one was in pretty good condition but had a few issues that needed to be addressed.
I was repairing a Data East power supply for a client and started off with the typical suspects. Capacitor C2 was clearly no good, it had spilled its electrolyte on the PCB and had to be replaced. This is fairly common because C2 is located right under the large heatsink, and it gets baked to crisp and dries out. C2 in the photo below is shown as an example, it is not the suspect that leaked.
This game had no CPU controlled lights. In other words, none of the playfield insert lights worked. So you couldn’t tell what shots to hit nor could you see your progress while playing. Not to mention you also don’t get the light show during attract mode.
I picked up an Attack From Mars in 2010 that came directly off route. It was pretty dirty but surprisingly it was very close to 100% working. The playfield and backbox general illumination (GI) were out, and one switch was missing its wireform actuator. I found the actuator in the cabinet, stuck it back on the switch, and everything played fine. So now it is time to tackle the GI problem.
Note: There’s usually no reason to go to the extent I did to rebuild this power supply. The only reason I replaced so many parts on it is due to its condition. If your power supply is in good shape except for some specific issue such as low 5v, bad fuse clips, etc., just fix what is wrong. Don’t replace tons of stuff like in this article.
Power supply rebuilds are pretty easy. A pinball power supply is rather simple and there are a few common components that fail. So fixing what you have usually makes more sense than buying a new replacement power supply.
Of course, sometimes you don’t have a power supply to fix. This was my situation. I debated buying a new power supply. But then this showed up on eBay:
I have a walk out basement. For the most part it beats messing with stairs, and it is great for moving machines in. I can get them unloaded and into the basement by myself. Getting them back out is a bit harder and takes another person because of this:
For around $160, the Harbor Freight 500 lb lift table is great for moving and setting up pinball machines. However, it is not perfect. The handle gets in the way, and it will not fold down. Let’s fix that.
