Picked up a STTNG off FaceBook Marketplace.
It had been knocked down from £6K (hah!) to £3,750. It was in Northumberland - a 3 hour drive from where I live in Hull so didn't really have the opportunity (or desire) to go look at it in person so I had the guy that was selling it facetime me and give me a guided tour of the machine.
It had been left for some time in a cold damp warehouse and it was showing. Dust and muck and rust everywhere and the mpu board was clearly shot from acid leakage. The guy was nice enough but knew nothing about pinball machines or what he had. I'm certain he would have taken less but I offered him £3K for it and went and collected it that afternoon.
I've had it at home a couple of weeks now. Initially down the shed as I was working on a BoP for somoene so no space for it in my gamesroom. BoP was collected at the weekend so STTNG came in to the house and I started working on it Sunday and for a couple of hours after work each night this week.
Thus far I have:
- Removed power driver board and tested all transistors - amazingly all tested good - and resinstalled
- Checked all fuses - again, all good
- Taken out old mpu board and thoroughly cleaned with white vinegar, wire wool and isopropyl the mounting brackets that mpu was on in backbox
- Installed a Rocket CPU board from Pinsound
- Tested machine and it is fully functional with the exception of one opto switch not working above the Borg Ship and the lower left flipper sensor not working (though flipper was working)
So now, I know it works, I have:
- Vacuumed under playfield and in back-box - the grossest part of the job so far with dead spiders and cobwebs everywhere. Mice had even nibbled away the cloth sheafing around the transformer wires.
- Totally stripped playfield
- Taken the opportunity to buy myself a new toy in the form of an ultrasonic cleaner and cleaned the metal parts of the cannon turrets
- Put the wireforms in a bath of Evaporust
- Put the metal parts of the cannon turrets in my tumbler since as I wasn't overly impressed with how they came out of the ultrasonic cleaner :-(
- Removed the subway ramp to get access to some of the under playfield lamps (for LEDs) ready to clean
Ordered:
- New rubber kit
- Pinball Heaven wire looms
- 6 new pinballs (the old ones were rusted to F)
- Full LED Kit
- One (yes, just 1!) broken plastic
- Flipper optic board
- 3 new flipper bats
- Replacement opto transmitter and receiver for the one not working
- One replacement target
- One Neutral Zone hole protector
Have posted a few photos of before and after strip down but have taken dozens more ready for the rebuild (and if anyone needs some in the future)
To be continued...
It had been knocked down from £6K (hah!) to £3,750. It was in Northumberland - a 3 hour drive from where I live in Hull so didn't really have the opportunity (or desire) to go look at it in person so I had the guy that was selling it facetime me and give me a guided tour of the machine.
It had been left for some time in a cold damp warehouse and it was showing. Dust and muck and rust everywhere and the mpu board was clearly shot from acid leakage. The guy was nice enough but knew nothing about pinball machines or what he had. I'm certain he would have taken less but I offered him £3K for it and went and collected it that afternoon.
I've had it at home a couple of weeks now. Initially down the shed as I was working on a BoP for somoene so no space for it in my gamesroom. BoP was collected at the weekend so STTNG came in to the house and I started working on it Sunday and for a couple of hours after work each night this week.
Thus far I have:
- Removed power driver board and tested all transistors - amazingly all tested good - and resinstalled
- Checked all fuses - again, all good
- Taken out old mpu board and thoroughly cleaned with white vinegar, wire wool and isopropyl the mounting brackets that mpu was on in backbox
- Installed a Rocket CPU board from Pinsound
- Tested machine and it is fully functional with the exception of one opto switch not working above the Borg Ship and the lower left flipper sensor not working (though flipper was working)
So now, I know it works, I have:
- Vacuumed under playfield and in back-box - the grossest part of the job so far with dead spiders and cobwebs everywhere. Mice had even nibbled away the cloth sheafing around the transformer wires.
- Totally stripped playfield
- Taken the opportunity to buy myself a new toy in the form of an ultrasonic cleaner and cleaned the metal parts of the cannon turrets
- Put the wireforms in a bath of Evaporust
- Put the metal parts of the cannon turrets in my tumbler since as I wasn't overly impressed with how they came out of the ultrasonic cleaner :-(
- Removed the subway ramp to get access to some of the under playfield lamps (for LEDs) ready to clean
Ordered:
- New rubber kit
- Pinball Heaven wire looms
- 6 new pinballs (the old ones were rusted to F)
- Full LED Kit
- One (yes, just 1!) broken plastic
- Flipper optic board
- 3 new flipper bats
- Replacement opto transmitter and receiver for the one not working
- One replacement target
- One Neutral Zone hole protector
Have posted a few photos of before and after strip down but have taken dozens more ready for the rebuild (and if anyone needs some in the future)
To be continued...
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