Autolaunch intermittent problem

[Shark]

im having another issue with my machine.. i liken my pinball to an old car..no sooner has one issue been fixed, another materialises soon after..


pin in question is Freddy.
Freddy has a manual plunger shooter and an autolaunch kicker/shooter that activates during multiball. usually, a moment before a ball autolaunches, a diverter lane on the playfield will open so the autolaunched ball takes a different path to a maunal launched ball (so to avoid the boiler shot)..

autolauch which was working fine before, now only seems to work intermittently. during multiball the diverter lane opens, but the ball(s) do not launch, they just get stacked up in the shooter lane..

i do not see any obvious wiring/solder problems and the autolaunch kicker moves freely by hand. it does work sometimes.


any ideas guys?

thanks

 

[ronsplooter]

First thing to do is put it into switch test mode and check that the switch in the shooter lane is working. Sounds like it might not be picking up that there is a ball in the shooter lane and therefore not firing the autolaucher. Check it with your finger but also by dropping a ball into the shooter lane.

Does the autolauncher fire in the coil test mode?

 

[Shark]

thanks for your pointers..

the kicker and mechanism appears to be working fine in test mode, the rollover switch appears to be working fine in test mode too. ball diverter lane working too.
playing the game, the autolaunch does work but again alot of the time a couple of balls queue up to be launched. some games worse than others, where before, they would shoot as soon as they entered the shoot lane and the diverter lane opened at the same time.. now the diverter lane opens but no autolaunch.



on a side note, while in test mode a checked all other functions and have found 4 bulbs which need replaced..thats something else on my list...

 

[ronsplooter]

Are all the ball trough switches working ok? Not sure whether these Gottlieb's use opto's or switches but check to make sure they're all working as the game may not know how many balls are in there which might account for it kicking balls out when it shouldn't.

 

[Shark]

i'll have a look at those switches..never thought to look in the troughs..

the probelm is not as you say "kicking balls out when it shouldn't", rather the opposite.. its not kicking balls out when it should :gossip:

 

[ronsplooter]

the probelm is not as you say "kicking balls out when it shouldn't", rather the opposite.. its not kicking balls out when it should

I mean kicking balls out into the shooter lane from the trough when it shouldn't and I think you mean it's not kicking balls out into play when it should. If there's already a ball in the shooter lane waiting to be auto plunged then the game should know to wait until thats gone before kicking another out of the trough. If the shooter lane switch is ok then I can only think that its something to do with the game not knowing whats going on in the trough. I'm not system 3 expert though so someone with a better understanding of how the machines work might have a better explanation :rockon:

 

[Moonraker]

Sounds like the switch in the shooter lane needs tweaking or replacing. Test again using switch test and a pinball to activate the switch.

 

[Pudsey pinball]

Check the trough switches and that the balls are rolling in to the correct position within the trough,over time the trough gets pits in the metal as they drop in from playfield making the ball hang up,also check all switches in that row as it could be a switch confusing game elsewhere,is there ant magnets in the game that hold the ball? If so it could be that the balls have magnetised and can hang up in trough

 

[Shark]

this makes good sense thanks guys. i suspect the game doesnt know what is going on in the trough. i'll need to take the cover off the top of the playfield and have a look at the switches inside the trough.


on an unrelated note, just been reading the manual abit more and note that i have two balls missing- there should be three captive balls in a newtons cradle style, on the playfield but there is only one ball there. more on my (getting bigger) required parts list..

 

[Pudsey pinball]

That's prob why your having the prob if balls are missing but check it all out dude

 

[Shark]

no, its unrelated. the playfield is meant to have 3 captive balls stacked in a row. upon hitting the captive ball(s) the captive balls rolls back and hits a target/passes and opto.. this awards features etc. with only 1 ball in the tunnel, hitting it doesn't reach the target at the end of the tunnel meaning some features are not becoming available. the balls are never in play and never come out of their tunnel. i suspect some op in the past has removed them for use as spares, not caring about the potential loss in gameplay.