What's new
Pinball info

Register a free account today to become a member! Once signed in, you'll be able to participate on this site by adding your own topics and posts, as well as connect with other members through your own private inbox!

can someone explain how electronic coin mechs work please?

AlanJ

Site Supporter
5Years
Joined
Dec 27, 2017
Messages
8,571
Location
Leeds, West Yorkshire
i’ve got the hang of mechanical mechs, the coin drops through and triggers a switch easy.

But how go the electronic coin mechs work? Do they just pulse an on off signal to one of the several coin input pins on the games coin door interface board, or is it more complex than that?

Are all the different manufacturers coin interface boards compatible with each other?
 
So they are predominently made up of inductors and detectors... When you drop a coin in the old ones they tend to just check for size and weight... the electronic ones measure things like materials and their effect on the inbuilt inductors (Magnetic fields), and compare readings to an internal table of "accepted values", and if it falls into one of the programmed limits then it "assumes" it's a particular type of coin.. then they pulse credit lines out to the machine corresponding to the coin value - again internally programmed. This sort of thing...

1656755268817.png

Bit more info here : https://www.underthepier.com/01_how...nic coin mechanisms,coins out the reject slot. (hadnt seen this before - is a good explanation!).

As per usual, different manufacturers create their own "standards" - Machine suppliers then build the coin acceptance usually around one type of unit (some based on security, others based on unit size)... A lot of the time they are interchangeable, however because of the physicals not all are suitable for each application.
 
From what I gather they come pre-configured to recognise the current coin types, and then you set dips to say how many credits each coin type gets, i.e. 20p = 1 credit, 50p = 3 credits etc.

So then when you put the relevant coin in it the triggers what would have been the mechanical switch multiple times based on how many credits its programmed to give.
 
Id love to know why they fail for no reason and rebooting a game can solve the issue. Words bloody and nightmare at times
 
Fantazia2's reply above recalls the 'credit board' arrangements used to update an older machine to an electronic acceptor; one of the machines' original coin switches (set to 1 coin, 1 play), would connect to the additional credit control circuit board, which put on Credits according to how its option switches were set for coins inserted into the electronic acceptor. Somewhat like an old VCR connected to a Tv set; it can show any channel from its own tuner on the same 'number' of the Tv. The machines own coin metering becomes irrelevant, so a meter on or near the credit board counts coin units. I converted a couple of late System 11 games with this method, including if you can credit it (pun not intended) Riverboat Gambler, even though the u.k. production already had an electronic acceptor. System 11's three coin channels didn't allow a 20p input, in fact Williams didn't have 20p programmed into the factory-fitted acceptor.
 
cool thanks,

im tring to figure out if I can replace a coin mech with some electronics that pulses the game - but I can't find much info, will study the above link
 
In my JAMMA cabinet I just ground the coin wire to add credits. A lot of people just add a microswitch.
 
In my JAMMA cabinet I just ground the coin wire to add credits. A lot of people just add a microswitch.
Cheers. confirms what I figured out looking at at the coin door interface board and mpu schematics for a williams wpc game. - the interface board just passes the coin selector signals through to tge mpu board into a set of dedicated switch detection circuits, that will trigger if grounded, so it seems easy enough to create a grounding circuit that plugs in in place of a std coin mech. even better, there is a 12v supply there too.

the older games are a little trickier as there is no dc power supply at the coin door, so i’ll have to grab it from somewhere else….
 
Back
Top Bottom