Bally Evel Knievel Home Model

[chopperthedog]

This thing popped up on CL and I had no idea there was an Evel Knievel home model, but the one thing I was really intrigued by was the double flippers on one side. Did some searches and only saw the pictures on klov and ipdb. Made contact with seller who ended up being really cool and in the music biz, we knew common people but our paths have never crossed til now. He ended up giving me a sweet deal.




Got it home and set it on some horses in the living room and started with checking all voltages. Was getting proper readings and it wasn't until I got the mpu on my bench for an inspection and it looked like Harambe tried doing some work on the main cpu.

I wish I had taken some before pics. The whole chip was on an angle with all legs bent and 2 broken off with a massive amount of solder globed on both. The above pic shows after. I was able to straighten and clean the legs along with doing quick repairs on the 2 broken ones (I am not the one that melted the socket like that).




Pooped the mpu in the game, board boots and BOOM! ball ejects out. Play a quick game and quickly identify all the play field issues and pick up a bunch of needed parts.




Started with getting flippers rebuilt with new coil sleeves, end of strokes, flipper leafs, rubbers and setting them at the proper angle.



Rebuilt the power supply with all new caps, voltage regs and some diodes. Had the larger caps on hand and put them to use, yeah not the same package as the originals, but meh it's a damn cap. The 2 10,000uf's are installed in parallel to achieve the stock value of 20,000uf for that position.




I knew there was a bad transistor on the mpu since one of the pop bumpers had the wires pulled from the coil and the same pop was completely seized. Just look at what that poor coil and sleeve went through above.




Both pop bumpers rebuilt with new coils, sleeves, rod & rings and skirts. Interesting to see that in the 2nd series of the home models that bally went with spoon leafs and wisely ditched trying to use micro switches on the pops.




The speaker that comes with these is literally like a 16oz solo cup with a 1 1/2" little speaker riveted to it. I've replaced the last 3 home models I've worked on with a standard 6" speaker that sounds much better.




Here is the way the back box comes stock. As I had it apart and was cleaning the glass I saw that the small motorcycle above the buses was screened to be back lit and had got an idea.




I picked up a led chase kit at Fry's for 4 bucks and came up with a 6 led strip using some 1/16" black hdpe to put behind the buses.






I moved the original light that was behind the buses up to where the little motorcycle is and added a new light behind his left arm.



The above video clip shows the added led chase circuit.




The spinners had the same POW! graphics that fireball used and I had to order up the proper spinner decals.




Also installed some transparent blue lane guides that look way better than the red ones did. This pic also shows the added GI bulbs I added under each of the corner plastics.

So, now I needed to find some room for this pin, plus it was time to finally make some changes in a room that has been an evolving catch all.






Step 1: flooring, called up a buddy in the carpet biz and he hooked me up with a quantity of 50 Armstrong padded commercial carpet tiles for $1 a tile.




Step 2: painstakingly removing the damn border properly so the room could be painted right.




step 3: Relocating my workbench to the closet that had been filled with sh!t. Like I said the room was a catch all for years, dragged my big ass garbage can right to the backdoor and purged old pc's, junk x-mas gifts and other crap.




Room painted and Evel moved in.




Couldn't find any vids of this table. Good ole chopper is there for ya.




These two compliment each other nicely, the double flippers completely changes your focus and is a neat game changer.




Here's an odd looking panoramic to give ya a good look at the paint, carpet and game lineup. These home models are really cool pieces that don't get the respect they deserve.



good day.

[Le Chuck]

Room looks great bud!  Love you collection, awesome post as per the usual.

[Malenko]

great work as always!

[pbj]

Excellent post.  This forum needs many more like it.

[yotsuya]

Amen. Chopper has some great stuff.

Less Pis, more restores.

[Ken Layton]

That Evel Knievel looks great!

The original power transformer didn't have much for amperage for the general illumination circuit. The game desperately needed more lights in my opinion and adding more incandescent lamps would have overloaded the power transformer and connectors. This is one of those times where LED bulbs saved the day and allowed you to add more bulbs & light. I love your idea with the LED chasing lights on the busses, brilliant! Your game really "Pops" now!

A suggestion: put color changing LED bulbs in the pop bumpers.

[chopperthedog]

Thanks for the kind props guys.

That Evel Knievel looks great!

The original power transformer didn't have much for amperage for the general illumination circuit. The game desperately needed more lights in my opinion and adding more incandescent lamps would have overloaded the power transformer and connectors. This is one of those times where LED bulbs saved the day and allowed you to add more bulbs & light. I love your idea with the LED chasing lights on the busses, brilliant! Your game really "Pops" now!

A suggestion: put color changing LED bulbs in the pop bumpers.

Thank you sir. I have tried numerous leds (in small quantities) from all the major sellers and I am just not an led guy and need that incandescent glow. I did do new Trifurcon terminals on all major power connections throughout the game. As for adding bulbs to the play field and back box, I think it levels out with the fact that it's all #555 bulbs now instead of the higher draw original #147. No, to a color changer in the pop bumpers, I love the #455 bulb in the pops too much to change and I really wish I could find a stash of about 5 boxes of the original GE #455. The modern eiko's just don't cut it, the older ones have a much more random and spastic nature to the blinking pattern.


good day.

[Ken Layton]

Any pictures with the backglass taken out so we can see the chaser LEDs you installed?

I see that the chaser kit is a Velleman # MK173 (Jameco # 2196537).

[chopperthedog]

Any pictures with the backglass taken out so we can see the chaser LEDs you installed?

I don't, plus this version with the plastic frame is a pain. It's just a 9" x 1" strip of 1/16" black hdpe with holes spaced to hold 3mm amber leds. I only like taking the glass out with head laying down on this one, fireball is just 3 screws and safer to work with the glass.






Got a new phone and did a couple quick videos tests.




Came across the slo-motion feature (first for me) on the new device and shot a quick one with fireball. Pretty neat stuff to watch.



good day.

[Jeffhuffman0000001]

Great thread. I'm new to the forum and have the Evel Knievel home model,been in the family since new,and just quit working,hopefully with help from forum members like you,I will be able to get it back to life.

[Ken Layton]

Here's a good start to repairing your machine:

http://www.pinwiki.com/wiki/index.php?title=Bally_Home_Models

[Ohiotim5]

Just got an EK home version. Working our a few issues but am looking for some possible advice.
The upper playfield lights are not working at all. Tried replacing the bulbs but that didn't work.
Everything else has fixed so far except for those lights.

I'm pretty new at this so any suggestions or advice would be appreciated.

Thanks!

[Argman]

I recently just acquired this exact same machine from someone throwing it out. The right flippers don’t really move and the back, while entirely intact, has been broken off of the main body. Looks like it could be reassembled. I did plug in briefly and some lights came in but definitely not fully functional so I unplugged immediately. I don’t have the time or knowledge to put in to fixing. If anyone would be interested in acquiring let me know. Can provide any photos or other information. Located in suburbs of chicago. Thanks!