Arcade Collecting > Pinball
Careful what you wish for- I finally got to join the club
bobbyb13:
In desperation I posted a craigslist ad for a pinball machine project.
So...
This guy sends me a message that he has something that maybe I'll be interested in but can't recall what machine it is and he'll send me pictures once he gets home from work.
I think it was already 8pm.
If you know pidgin then you would know what I'm talking about but this guy's skill at texting in pidgin was pretty impressive.
He says the family is hoping for $1k but not interested in getting rich.
Sure.
This is December 30th.
Next morning he sends me a message that if I want to have a look I can meet him at some random address in a potentially sketchy neighborhood.
Sure. Why not.
And why don't I just bring $1k cash too-
I drive the 40 min to meet him and I find two guys who are really nice actually, one of who I can hardly understand because of his mumble, with a cabinet with no legs and no backglass.
Obviously the guy recalled seeing it in some meth den somewhere and figured he could get a few bucks out of it.
Here it is back at my workshop.
Yeah I know I blew it with the image aspect ratio but you get the picture.
They had unsuccessfully tried to get the back box off (the hinges had recently been hacked in half) and gave up.
It had been sitting in the dirt somewhere with no legs for who knows how long and someone tossed a beer at the backglass at some point too but surprisingly the boards (apart from alkaline destruction on the main,) harness, and playfield appear to be quite good.
Easy to see since there was no bottom on it.
I told them I would take it.
That ridiculous show was a favorite of mine and this obviously is a pretty iconic machine that deserves to live again so I gave them $400 (they need it far worse than I do) and said have a happy new year.
I'm afriad to imagine what they spent that money on.
I ordered some stuff from Marco and pulled the main board to clean it and see about replacing the three dead chip sockets (yet the chips look ok!) so we'll see how I do.
What an initiation this is going to be.
And it gets worse, because 4 days later somebody else called me to ask if I wanted a cowboy themed project-
For free.
I need to delete that freakin craigslist ad before the missus kicks me out of the house.
pbj:
Oh boy, you've got your work cut out for you. Looks like a reproduction translite is available, so get one of those ordered ASAP.
:cheers:
Mike A:
I hope you know a good divorce attorney.
bobbyb13:
--- Quote from: pbj on January 10, 2023, 02:29:38 pm ---Oh boy, you've got your work cut out for you. Looks like a reproduction translite is available, so get one of those ordered ASAP.
:cheers:
--- End quote ---
Thanks for chiming in gents. I will certainly have questions and need some direction.
Plenty to do- and I don't know ---my bottom--- from a hole in the ground when it comes to these things.
Nothing like baptism in fire-
I've got one of those translites on the way. I actually looked up whether or not I could even find backbox art on my way to pick up the machine.
I cleaned up the bottom and cut and glued in a new piece before I even brought it in the shop that afternoon so it is back to a solid box that can hold a transformer and speaker again.
Thankfully it hadn't sat in inches of water for a long time before it came to me. We just had a huge rain though, so probably sat in a 1/2" or less for a week or so.
The whole thing had been drizzled on randomly for a while I imagine based on the outer layer of ply delaminating in various places and the backbox back panel being swollen.
Just painted some legs I got from Marco for it today so I can get it off the dolly and work on it.
I think I have the alkaline destruction to the main board mitigated but I'm new to this part so who knows.
I got replacement sockets for three of the ICs so replacing those without destroying traces is the next hurdle.
The sockets were toast but the chips look ok.
Everything else looks damn good so I figured it was worth a shot at making it whole again, even if I don't know what the hell I'm doing yet.
--- Quote from: Mike A on January 10, 2023, 02:40:15 pm ---I hope you know a good divorce attorney.
--- End quote ---
:lol
And believe it or not Mike, the missus is on board with it!
She only wants to play Ms.Pac and Burgertime for video stuff but she was genuinely excited about a pinball machine.
So much so that she and Tyler just helped me carry it up into the loft.
In fact, she didn't even get pissed off when I told her there was a second one.
Heheh
But that should be in another thread.
pbj:
Honestly, if I were you, I'd probably just go ahead and order a replacement MPU/Driver Board.
https://www.thepinballwizard.net/rottendog-circuit-boards/data-east-mpu-board-mpu004/
Luckily you're in a golden era of replacement parts. Anything I buy dead these days I just plan on another $600ish for boards and displays.
Have you tried plugging it in and see what happens?
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