Well, i have been meaning to do a restoration thread on my progress to date on my Bally Corvette machine. After seeing @newdos thread, and thinking, 'hmmm mines just as bad, thank god theres someone as stupid as me!" , i decided to post up on here for you all to see.
After my mate @strobey has had pinball machines for as long as i can remember, even when we were young, ive always liked them and really fancied one. Being into my cars, i wanted a Bally Corvette, but found they didnt come up that often, and always out of my budget when they did come up (which was peanuts as i had a house restoration on at the time!).
Anyhow, come 2009 (i think) @strobey text me to tell me there was a Corvette on eBay needing restoration, so that said, going in blind as it was 150 miles away, with a winning bid of £400 it was mine! The guy was very clear from the start, and said that it was once a mint condition/collectors condition machine, but unfortunately, the machine was in storage which got flooded out. Now, the machine was on a pallet and was just above the water level, but no one reailsed the storage place was flooded for months, and the damp atmophere did its damage.
So, I trundled down to the outskirts of London one evening after work to collect it, and to my suprise, the guy had set it up and it actually worked!!!! Ok, a few bulbs here and there were out, and the display had a few lines out, but pretty much everything was there, and 90% working! So, i handed over my cash and headed home, knowing i had let myself in for a big challenge! But i was just super happy to have my first pinball...and a Corvette at that!
Now, over the next few years, i didnt really do anything to the pinball apart from have a few games on it and thats about it. It then went in and out of storage (thanks @strobey again for looking after it ) while i carried on my house renovation and other priorites. each year i would go to the Pinball Party and say "Gonna get cracking on mine when i get home!".....this never happened lol.
Fast forward to 2013 and i had my Double Garage built at home and bought the pin back to mine!
By this time, the cabinet had deteriorated even more. It was hardly holding together. I decided it was time to restore! But, it just sat in the corner of my garage for the next 2 years collecting dust as i was now onto restoring my Uno Turbo and tinkering on my Clio Williams. The pinball never got forgotten, just needed to finish some projects first before tearing down the corvette!
Hope you are all still reading LOL....
This brings me up to summer 2015 when i finally bit the bullet and decided to take many photos for referance and start pulling it apart. Now i knew how much work there was going to be, and i knew that there was ALOT of rust to sort, the cabinet to sort, the playfield to sort.............heres a few pics i took....
As you will see....it was a mess. Rust everywhere...playfield staining the lot. Even trapped/lost balls that had fully rusted!
Now, im sure loads of you would have just parted it out as its not really worth it. But i like a project and a challenge! Bit like @newdos
Sorry if all the pictures arent fully in order, it's taken a while to sort through them! I do have more pictures of it complete, but Tim has these on his computer, need to get hold of them!
More to come........
Dunc
After my mate @strobey has had pinball machines for as long as i can remember, even when we were young, ive always liked them and really fancied one. Being into my cars, i wanted a Bally Corvette, but found they didnt come up that often, and always out of my budget when they did come up (which was peanuts as i had a house restoration on at the time!).
Anyhow, come 2009 (i think) @strobey text me to tell me there was a Corvette on eBay needing restoration, so that said, going in blind as it was 150 miles away, with a winning bid of £400 it was mine! The guy was very clear from the start, and said that it was once a mint condition/collectors condition machine, but unfortunately, the machine was in storage which got flooded out. Now, the machine was on a pallet and was just above the water level, but no one reailsed the storage place was flooded for months, and the damp atmophere did its damage.
So, I trundled down to the outskirts of London one evening after work to collect it, and to my suprise, the guy had set it up and it actually worked!!!! Ok, a few bulbs here and there were out, and the display had a few lines out, but pretty much everything was there, and 90% working! So, i handed over my cash and headed home, knowing i had let myself in for a big challenge! But i was just super happy to have my first pinball...and a Corvette at that!
Now, over the next few years, i didnt really do anything to the pinball apart from have a few games on it and thats about it. It then went in and out of storage (thanks @strobey again for looking after it ) while i carried on my house renovation and other priorites. each year i would go to the Pinball Party and say "Gonna get cracking on mine when i get home!".....this never happened lol.
Fast forward to 2013 and i had my Double Garage built at home and bought the pin back to mine!
By this time, the cabinet had deteriorated even more. It was hardly holding together. I decided it was time to restore! But, it just sat in the corner of my garage for the next 2 years collecting dust as i was now onto restoring my Uno Turbo and tinkering on my Clio Williams. The pinball never got forgotten, just needed to finish some projects first before tearing down the corvette!
Hope you are all still reading LOL....
This brings me up to summer 2015 when i finally bit the bullet and decided to take many photos for referance and start pulling it apart. Now i knew how much work there was going to be, and i knew that there was ALOT of rust to sort, the cabinet to sort, the playfield to sort.............heres a few pics i took....
As you will see....it was a mess. Rust everywhere...playfield staining the lot. Even trapped/lost balls that had fully rusted!
Now, im sure loads of you would have just parted it out as its not really worth it. But i like a project and a challenge! Bit like @newdos
Sorry if all the pictures arent fully in order, it's taken a while to sort through them!
I do have more pictures of it complete, but Tim has these on his computer, need to get hold of them! More to come........
Dunc
Turn away now if you are easily scared!
