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Battery low voltage audible alarm.

  • Thread starter Thread starter pintableuser
  • Start date Start date
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pintableuser

Hello,

So far we have worked our way round solutions to reduce the effect of acid damage to pinball circuit boards caused by defective leaking batteries

aa. Change the AA batteries regularly
bb. Fit an AA battery extender to position the batteries away from the boards. (and change the batteries regularly)
cc. Take care with the specific type of battery fitted avoiding poor quality and pirate copies.
dd. Replacing completely with button type batteries etc. etc.

Does anyone think that fitting a small low voltage audible beeper alarm, similar to those low voltage ones in a domestic smoke alarm would be helpful.

This would ideally activate before the factory reset low voltage situation was reached...... the background low beeping could not be ignored.

Can it be done?......
 
Can be done quite easily. Do we know what the voltage has to drop to for a factory reset to occur ?
 
Probably need a very clever someone with a nice test bench and a variable d.c. Volt supply...... some crocodile clips and wire.
I've got some wire..... crocodile clips.... and a few used AA batteries which I could Discharge in steps to vary the volt output, then test til a rough factory setting point was reached.
9volt circuit in a domestic smoke detector....... approx 4.5 volts on pinball cpu.
Looking at the detector circuit board, the measuring cell, is Redundant...... then most of the other electrical components are not compatable and are basically a big question mark for me. Probably starting from scratch is the answer?
Has this been tried before.?
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Jay Walker said:
I was looking at the Wpc theory manual recently - in a section about the 'Factory Settings Restored' message, it mentions that the Cmos Ram resets if the voltage on its two power input pins drops to 4 volts.
Click to expand...
Ok, so we are looking at a trigger of about 4.2v.
 
stoptap said:
Something should be possible using one of these.

http://ww1.microchip.com/downloads/en/DeviceDoc/21434J.pdf
Click to expand...

Jeez, your good Andrew.

I had a look at what's on the open market for voltage monitoring.

aa. Plenty for model aircraft and drone battery pack low voltage alarms to warn the aero modeller/ drone pilot their plane/drone is going to drop out the sky. Similar situation, handy if it could be adapted but perhaps wrong setup,

bb Alkaline battery monitor but no beeper. Consists mainly of a colour changing led which gives you a continual visual display through a small drilled hole. Was thinking in the machines cash door perhaps.
At £8 it's expensive for what it is.

I like the smoke monitor alarm slow beep type .....shouldn't drain the batteries continually like bb.

Could anyone who is changing their batteries in the next few days take some readings of the battery voltages please and advise quoting the period of use. Cheers.
 
I think it is very doable John.

An Ultrabrite LED flashing behind the coin reject button would be a subtle (but noticeable) alarm when the machine is switched off.

I'd look at building one but I don't have any machines with old school batteries anymore.
 
All input appreciated.
Quite away from fitting to any machine ..more like identifying/sourcing required components and bench testing using the remote battery pack as retro-fitted to many pins.
It's a good day for it.
 
would you not have leakage but still have high voltage?

Better to put in a remote battery box and change every year?
 
Haven't reached the 'leakage' trials yet, but by fitting a battery extender box, to me, is like repairing a dripping tap by placing a bucket under it.
 
I wonder why they never thought of getting the game to monitor the battery voltage and then give a credit warning on the display ?
 
pintableuser said:
Haven't reached the 'leakage' trials yet, but by fitting a battery extender box, to me, is like repairing a dripping tap by placing a bucket under it.
Click to expand...

yes fair challenge - hence why I've gone battery less on the machines that I can do this on, I'm just worried that your solution might be akin to the fire alarm going off after the whole house has burned down :D
 
Good point Andrew, but you would only get the credit dot and "bong-bong-bong" once you switched on the machine and as Neil says perhaps at such a time damage would have already been done.

I don't play every machine everyday, some may go for a month or more before being switched on . I do go into the room most days where a slow low voltage alarm "beep....beep" would give indication that all was not well with the ,line-up and an identifiable machine would require attention.

I change the batteries every 12 months (April Anniversary) with same source batteries and have been caught out with CPU battery damage on a couple of occasions. This has led me to consider all options to prevent a repeat........ I'm not a big fan of current choices.

Meanwhile, I reckon a log of all my working battery readings this month (@9month use), then again on renewal date may show some interesting anomalies .
Still trying to source a suitable audible unit.
 
Thanks for that. The latter I ordered earlier to add to my bench test "equipment" BUT, I think it maybe a very very loud screecher.
Plan to go along to the local aero modellers club and see if they can add any ideas on this subject.

For easy access on test I have run some wires from CPU to the cash box and put an extender there.
 
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