Beginner technician at HoG

[YetiFiasco]

Hi Guys,

I help out at Heart of Gaming in Croydon, fixing cabs and helping Mark with whatever I can. The place has never had any pinball machines though, which felt a bit sad, so I bit the bullet and purchased my first (Revenge from Mars!) very recently, Martin is yet to ship it down for us.

Now it's there and available for public play, it's going to need repairing so I better skill myself up, thankfully this forum is a treasure trove for the uninitiated.

Does anyone have any tips/preventative maintenance for machines in public spaces?

 

[DRD]

The games basically get "tired" with use. Breakdowns are inevitable and hard to predict.

The playfield gets dirty and slow. Lamps will fail due to bulb failure or lamp holder vibration. Rubbers get dirty and snap. Flippers eventually get sloppy and slow. Bits of exposed plastic snap from time to time.

It is more a job of periodic maintenance once they are sited. Clean the thing to keep it playing fast, fix up problems you can see, keep it playing sweetly

RFM is a tricky one as the screen etc is basically unique to two late Williams games. Few folk know how to fix techie problems - but there are guys on here that do

Setting it level (left tonright) and at the right angle (front to back) makes a huge difference to how they play.

Good luck with it

 

[pinballtoys]

Hi Guys,

I help out at Heart of Gaming in Croydon, fixing cabs and helping Mark with whatever I can. The place has never had any pinball machines though, which felt a bit sad, so I bit the bullet and purchased my first (Revenge from Mars!) very recently, Martin is yet to ship it down for us.

Now it's there and available for public play, it's going to need repairing so I better skill myself up, thankfully this forum is a treasure trove for the uninitiated.

Does anyone have any tips/preventative maintenance for machines in public spaces?

never knew this place existed, will defiantly visit when you reopen
cheers Bob

 

[YetiFiasco]

The games basically get "tired" with use. Breakdowns are inevitable and hard to predict.

The playfield gets dirty and slow. Lamps will fail due to bulb failure or lamp holder vibration. Rubbers get dirty and snap. Flippers eventually get sloppy and slow. Bits of exposed plastic snap from time to time.

It is more a job of periodic maintenance once they are sited. Clean the thing to keep it playing fast, fix up problems you can see, keep it playing sweetly

RFM is a tricky one as the screen etc is basically unique to two late Williams games. Few folk know how to fix techie problems - but there are guys on here that do

Setting it level (left tonright) and at the right angle (front to back) makes a huge difference to how they play.

Good luck with it

Thanks for the info! Screens aren't a problem for me, if anything we deal with more CRTs than anything.

 

[YetiFiasco]

never knew this place existed, will defiantly visit when you reopen
cheers Bob

Come on down! I think the plan is to reopen mid July.