Complete GOTTLIEB OPERATION BLUNDER

[new forest pinball]

How I ended up with this I have no idea...neither does the seller probably!? (Lol, who shall remain nameless). On first inspection, with eyes wide shut this game looks almost acceptable...but on further OCD style inspection it's not!......I intend to get my lad jack to tidy this for me this week. Need it done quick as it is taking up precious space. The good news is I have a fair bit of nos stuff for this game so things could work out you never know?? (He...hee). Here is a couple of pictures, just to give you a taster of its condition.



My main concerns I think are how dark it is. The gi is super dim. As is the backglass illumination. The translite is really faded. The whole thing stinks of fags. The sound quality is ok...until you connect the cabinet woofer! Then it's absolutely terrible! Spotted lots of little things, will go thru those step by step.............watch this space...it's only fair to give the odd GOTTLIEB a bit of love now and again...plus the joy of restoring a pinball whatever its rating (ipdb or pinside) is very satisfying indeed!......

 

[new forest pinball]

Not a lot happened to good ole blunder today.......here is a few jobs we spotted that need doing initially....
1). Back box lock....think the Incredible Hulk was the last person to use this lock?....

2). Check out the translite illumination board....more nicotine brown than white!...check out those flashers..the latest fashion forget leds, get your self a set of black flashers!!

3). One clear flipper button(complete with fag burn), and a solid red button on the other side..

4). This is a classic operator bodge job...see if you can spot it???........

Yep you got it! One gottlieb flipper(with worn off logo as always) and one Williams flipper..classic....

So the only job that got done today was the translite...quite a bit of scratching and fade, not obvious until you compare it to our NOS one!...looks much better.....more tomorrow folks....
ORIGINAL...

NOS.......nice.....

 

[new forest pinball]

A few things done today, which is good. Let's start with the back box... light board painted and new bulbs.and flashers fitted..led display removed, joints re-soldered and glass polished.

New lock fitted for the backglass and speaker panel.....

The shooter rod and springs are knackered, so fitted a new rod and spring set. Polished the metal housing and fitted new flipper buttons, went for white as this was the colour we had the most in stock.....
SHOOTER ROD BEFORE.....

NEW SHOOTER ROD AND FLIPPER BUTTONS....

Playfield stripped ready for a foam clean and polish. Note I have left the posts in situation, this is pure laziness and is not a good example of playfield stripping worthy of imitation, but with foam cleaner sprayed all over them it should clean them fine as the GOTTLIEB posts do not have deep groves like the Bally Williams equivalent. The plastics on this game have neve been removed ever. (This is obvious due to the underplayfield looms that have never been disconnected). They are really grimy, and the mountains are covered in lots of fluffy dust! If it was white we could leave it as it would look like snow! (Lol). Playfield is very dirty, has full Mylar so only wear is by the bodged Williams flipper!

Plastics ready for a good wash and polish, metal parts straight into the tumbler!....let's get ready to tumble!!

More tomorrow hopefully..........

 

[new forest pinball]

The goal today was one of smaller proportions, as customer commissions took priority. Plus my lad jack was back to his "real" job as he calls it today. First up was to clean the playfield and the cabinet. The playfield will receive a three part treatment as follows......

1). FC-90 foam cleaner. We like this because it is more of a mousse than a foam so it really clings to stuff!.....
2). Novus 2 for that more ingrained grime, plus it also removes the light scratches on the Mylar, useful on this occasion as this operation thunder has full Mylar.
3). Finally a coat of treasure cove pinball wax...nice....
So here it is after....

Installed new flipper bats and silicon rubbers...sorry about the poor pictures will take a better one tomorrow when it is a bit lighter. But if your eagle eyed you will notice we have installed led super bright flashers, for the g.i. We have used comet 2 smd faceted lens supreme brightness non-ghosting leds..wow! They look great..pics to follow when light!...
Now I know what you are all wondering...will there be any pointless mods? Sadly no...but we will be modding the g.i. With two 6.3v smd led strips..one to illuminate the power plant and one longer strip to illuminate the left side mountains. The power plant is so dim you cannot even see the ball in it..cleaning the plastic will help of course. We choose white rubbers as that's what I have most of..brightens it up any way...and they were white originally......
Then the last job of the day was to wash and polish the plastics..the metal parts are still in the tumbler and will finish tomorrow for re-assembly. Here they are washed and polished....

To be continued.......

 

[new forest pinball]

Some more progress....been a bit distracted as I had two customer commissions arrive , a sttng and a taf , also had a brief visit from Joanne, @astyy partner to pick up his freebie Friday goodies.. (in the most exotic Christmas jumper...lol..) anyway....here's a few playfield pics after the clean up...


The two led mod strips are clearly seen in the third picture.....
Next job was to replace the ramp opto's as they were intermittent....all joints re-flowed....

The shooter lane guide was missing , so installed a new old stock one...oohhh!

The hum on the audio is terrible! So we need to rebuild the aux power supply..will replace the capacitors and diodes, and see where we need to go next???!.....

Here's the playfield partially back together..note the led smd light strips, I cannot begin to tell you the improvement this makes, particularly to the power plant..looks really cool!

Next job is to complete the playfield...ciao fer know....

 

[new forest pinball]

The final attack!.......
Been a while as customer commissions took presidency......now where were we?
Ahh yes aux power supply capacitors and power ic's changed for cleaner sound....cabinet speaker voice coil burnt out so new one ..put a three way in..(because that's all I had in 6.5" 4ohms..no other reason..but it does sound good.) noice! !


Put comet dual smd super bright leds in the g.i. Nice and bright! Also 9smd super bright flashers! (I say , how extravagant).


On attempting to just get away with re-soldering the opto's on the left ramp, on testing it became apparent that the opto transmitter had failed so in with a new one...if you look carefully you can see the old one perched on the bracket..


New apron cards produced from what I found derelict in the cabinet..not the best but better than nothing.........

Flippers replaced with new ones...and superbands rubbers in black.


On test play it was observed that when the ball was ejected from the vuk, it was returning to the shooter lane rather than the right upper flipper?....this was for two reasons 1) the plastic covering the diverter was to far to the left leaving an oversized gap. 2) the wire form was bent inwards, now works perfect.

Other problem we noted was with the spinner , it was being trapped by the left mountain plastic stopping it spinning! (Kind of defeats the object!) cured that by spacing the plastic upwards under the fixings by 4mm...perfect..look closely as the spinner is obscured!......


Wow! Now plays really nice with all switches , bulbs and features operating as the designer intended...you know what this is a good game..quite enjoying it! (For a GOTTLIEB) here it is in its full blunderment!!!!.......ciao fer now keef........

 

[Sgt GrizZ]

Nice one Keith .... turned out lovely