SkeeBall Electronics

[Rouxster]

Hi, I am building a skeeball game for the first time. I'm struggling to find a simple scoring system and was hoping to get some direction. For starters what components would I need for a simple scoring system (sensors/triggers, scoreboard, drivers etc)? Second, where can I find these parts? Again I am looking for something basic and I am a complete beginner so I know very little about the electronics needed. Also is there somewhere I can find the dimensions on a typical skeeball game. Thanks a lot!

[matsadona]

Well, from my point of view there are two ways of doing it.
* Based on a PC or Raspberry Pi (Windows or Linux) - and then put together a small scoring application. Then you can have animations and sounds etc. It has been done already, just search for Skeeball in this forum.
* Full electric. It can be done with just relays (and some wiring), but going with an arduino would be very much more convenient. Pretty easy to setup in and outputs. I guess everything you need have already been done so just gather the information and copy paste.

When it comes to triggers I think most are using optical sensors, but a simple mechanical switch is doing it as well.

This makes me wanna build something my self... 

[PL1]

Welcome aboard, Rouxster.   

The not-so-good news is that skeeball is far more tricky parts-wise than a simple control panel with joysticks and buttons, but you should be able to overcome that with careful research and planning.

The good news is that there are lots of good skeeball threads around here -- some have measurements, some have simple scoring programs, and some even have more complicated games than the original.

Here are some threads/links you might find useful: (in no particular order)

Nickels - Skee Ball V2.0 and Nickels resources

Entropy42 - Skee Ball Restoration and Improvement

Thatpurplestuff - That's how I roll!

Jayhawk - Skee-ball Repro

Ixliam - DIY Skeeball

Ixliam - Skee-ball

UncleT's Skeeball Pics - Contains measurements and a ramp profile template   

If you decide to use a wire-arm microswitch, the Zippyy CNR-05S-03-Z (Happ P/N 1351) stands up to some serious abuse without the arm popping off like it does on many other switches.



Good news: The Zippyy has survived torture testing with no problem despite striking the wire arm with a 1x4 from multiple odd angles with WAY more force than any skeeball could ever generate.

Bad news: Happ now has a HUGE minimum order  -- you'll need to find a Happ reseller or other vendor that carries them.


Scott

[thatpurplestuff]

I haven't updated my thread in forever, but I've had great results with beam break sensors.  For $2 a piece they are cheaper than the wire arm microswitches and far less finicky.  You can operate a Skeeball machine just fine with those switches but they require maintenance to keep going (I found I was having to tweak the wires here and there to get them to register correctly as the ball passed through)... as long as you keep these beam break sensors from getting hit by a ball or something these should be far more reliable.  I can post a pic of mine wired up, but I'm afraid it might be more confusing than helpful given my wiring job and the fact that each hole has RGB LED wires as well.  As long as they are getting plugged into something like a GPwiz from GGG or a *pac from Ultimarc, they basically wire up just like a normal microswitch.

I just love these sensors, and actually bought a bunch more after my initial purchase for other projects down the line.

https://www.adafruit.com/products/2167

In regards to software, I know nickels has released his software and it looks great.  Mine will be released at some point, but I'm pretty erratic in the time I spend on it and I've taken a bit of a hiatus lately.  No ETA.

[Rouxster]

Thanks everyone, so far this give a ton to go off of! If you have anymore tips and advice especially regarding the scoreboard assembly please let me know. I'm excited about the info yall shared! Thanks again!