Build Your Own Arcade Controls Forum
Main => Main Forum => Topic started by: melarky on December 07, 2006, 12:45:42 pm
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I got a call from my brother-in-law this past weekend telling me that someone he used to work with had a neighbor that wanted to get rid of a pac-man arcade and a pinball (didn't know the name).
Aparently, the previous home owners had left the games in the house, and now the new owners wanted them gone (free games, hard to beat that). We didn't know what shape they were in (electronically or physically), but couldn't pass up the oportunity to go get them for free.
When we got there, the machines were being stored outside under an overhang (but still exposed to the elements). The Pac-Man looked in pretty rough shape aesthetically, but if nothing else had some parts that could be harvested for other projects, so we loaded them both up (without testing them) and took them back to my garage to be worked on later (when we have more time).
We did at least plug them in, and amazingly both lit up, but neither really worked. The pinball (which ended up being a 1966 Williams Hot Line by the way) lit up, but acted as if a switch was held down and kept resetting solenoids and making a funny noise, but still better than we expected.
The pac-man screen came on, but it was all jumbled (kind of like the messed up last level, but the whole screen was messed up, not just half). Nothing seemed to happen when you pressed any buttons etc..., so we just left it at that (didn't have time to trouble shoot yet).
I went back into he garage the other day so I could snap a pic of the screen all messed up so that I could post it on some boards and get some ideas where to start troubleshooting, and amazingly, this time when I plugged it in, it worked perfectly. Not sure what happened, but it works great now, and I'm not complaining.
Even though it works, it still needs a lot of "body" work (alot of the paint is scraped off and flaking, and the bezel art is cracking and flaking on the glass, and the cpo needs to be redone, and the t-molding needs replaced, etc...). I still think we'll do it (I've always wanted a pac-man cab, and had considered making a mini 2/3 scale one like the donkey kong cab I just made: http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=60545.0)
I've included some pics below of the machines (we haven't really cleaned them at all, and they need it badly :) )
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Probably some condensation had built up inside causing a short, so it just had to dry out. Sounds like a great find!
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Thats a totally sweet deal. Let the restoration begin!
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Nice score ... there are a bunch of Pac restoration/troubleshooting links in the wiki (http://wiki.arcadecontrols.com/wiki/Restoration).
A nice place to start is the troubleshoting by picture page:
http://www.arcadegameover.com/pactrouble.html
Cheers.
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Thanks for the link CheffoJeffo, that is sure to come in handy. I'll try to snap some pics when I strart restoring them, and I'll post those in the project announcement thread (will probably be a while).
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Moisture would have been my guess to (though we really don't know). Glad for you that it didn't blow if thats what it was. In the future you should really remember to look over the parts first (I know it's tempting to just flip it on when you get it home, but sometimes a loose quarter will create a connection accross a circuit and blow something for example).
Good haul. So the pinball doesn't do anything yet except light up though huh? Let us know how this goes.
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Thats awesome. Great free find. I wish that stuff would happen to me. :'( :laugh:
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Just an update on that pinball machine, we finally had a chance to look into it, and it supprisingly, it started working too. I mean everything works on that thing (even all the lights work, I would have thohght most of the bulbs would be burned out). The only thing we did was greese up the points wheel (the 100 place wheel was getting stuck on "9" when trying to reset back to zero, we lubed it up with a little petroleum jelly, and it works good as new).
I really can't believe that both of these machines basically work with no fixing needed. They were stored outside for who knows how long and it doesn't look like they were really maintained before that either.
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Congratulations! Now clean those suckers up and post some more pictures! (Especially the pin)
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Ah, congrats on a sweet find!
Like someone else said, probably some moisture causing a short.
I'm not a pin guy but something that old is pretty cool. . .
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Never, ever turn down free games. ;D
Nice score. :cheers: