Complete Gottlieb Pyramid

[ronsplooter]

Got my recent eBay purchase setup so I can see what I'm going to be dealing with on this one. The seller had owned the game for the last 8 years apparently and it'd spent all that time in the basement of his cottage which was nice and dry and didn't get a lot of sunlight so it has protected the artwork. He and his family also played it reasonably regularly so it's not been sat for long periods which explains why it's basically all working. He told me that it came from an arcade in Weston-super-Mare but I'm not sure if that's where he got it from or that's from earlier in it's life as I'd be amazed at this being in an arcade anytime in the last 30 years. If anyone remembers playing a Gottlieb Pyramid in Weston then shout up in this thread

I gave the cabinet a good clean before setting the game up and it's in pretty decent shape and structurally all good. The front has got a lot of yellowing which I thought at first was nicotine staining but it didn't really clean off and on closer inspection it looks like some sort of old varnish or clear which I'll probably leave alone.







The backglass is also not as bad as I feared. I won't know for sure until I take it out but there's crazing on the Cleopatra figure and around the score reel windows plus some paint loss of the lion's body. The colours are all nice and vibrant though so it'll get sealed and then I'll figure out the best way to refurb it. I'm thinking of trying transparent paints this time instead of the coloured gels I used on Pinball Pool.



The playfield is very dirty and has wear in the usual places around the bonus inserts and the scoop kick outs but I should be able to touch all that up. My biggest area of concern is around the top lanes where the planking makes me think I might lose some paint during the cleaning process.









Inside and under the playfield is surprisingly clean which is a bonus! The head hadn't been opened in 8 years which has kept it protected and I don't think the playfield has been lifted too often either.







Looking forward to this one as I had a couple of quick games to test things and it's a really fun and simple game and the artwork is fantastic.

 

[David_Vi]

What a great find!

I swear I played one of these at the UK Open but don't remember it being an EM. Did Gottlieb do a solid state version?
I remember myself and @MajesticPinball getting all giddy trying to tap pass when packing down

 

[MajesticPinball]

What a great find!

I swear I played one of these at the UK Open but don't remember it being an EM. Did Gottlieb do a solid state version?
I remember myself and @MajesticPinball getting all giddy trying to tap pass when packing down

Yeah the SS version is called Cleopatra, love both these games. Can't wait to see this log progress

 

[ronsplooter]

Spent a little bit of time this evening starting to strip the topside of the playfield. No major issues found but I have noticed the plastics (which look original) are really thin! They're not brittle thankfully but there are a couple with small chips and cracks so I need to decide whether to replace them or not. I'm definitely going to need new pop bumper caps and the odd lane guide but all of the posts look fine so should just need a clean up. The flipper bats look like they may have been replaced at some point as they're not yellowed at all which is unusual of they were the original ones.



As seems to be tradition when I get a new EM game, I like to have a look at the play counter and see if the game was a success for the operator.



50482 plays is a lot!!!!! The insert on the coin slot says 2 games for £1 but there's no way it was set to 50p a game when it likely made most of it's money in the late 70's/early 80's. When I did this for Spin Out we went with 10p a game and I know the previous owner was using old coins to credit the game up so as some of those plays aren't real money I think using 10p a game this time makes sense as well.

50482 games at 10p a go means the game made £5048.20 and assuming a 50/50 split between Op and location gives the operator £2524.10. Gottlieb EM's in the late 70's were approx $900 NIB so lets assume £900 but Pyramid would have been cheaper as it's the two player so maybe £800. This game made some serious cash for its operator, 3 times what they paid for it!!!!!!!

 

[neil1637]

Yay! Glad this went to a good home. It was on my watch list but I was working at the auction end time, so at least we weren't bidding against each other.

It's very clean inside and out, especially inside though! Blimey. Very well stored.

Looking forward to seeing your progress.

 

[mufcmufc]

He told me that it came from an arcade in Weston-super-Mare but If anyone remembers playing a Gottlieb Pyramid in Weston then shout up in this thread

Pinball News - First and Free

www.pinballnews.com

11th pic down, just sayin’

 

[ronsplooter]

11th pic down, just sayin’

Nice one mate, the front is looking a lot less yellow back in 2011 than it does now

Does anyone know the Richard Cadell mentioned in Martin's article? I can see the leisure park has a website so assume it's still open, I wonder if the pins are still there?

 

[neil1637]

Pinball News - First and Free

www.pinballnews.com

11th pic down, just sayin’

Oh my, oh my. Look at all those EM games and tables. And STILL operating on site (up to 2007 at least).

Surely that must be the only place doing this?

It's about 500 miles away from me, but I'm sorely tempted.

Thank you so much for sharing.

 

[Taxiturn]

Nice one mate, the front is looking a lot less yellow back in 2011 than it does now

Does anyone know the Richard Cadell mentioned in Martin's article? I can see the leisure park has a website so assume it's still open, I wonder if the pins are still there?

He has a Wikipedia page as he is apparently the current hand inside Sooty. Also says he sold the Leisure Park in 2014…

Richard Cadell - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[mufcmufc]

Nice one mate, the front is looking a lot less yellow back in 2011 than it does now

Does anyone know the Richard Cadell mentioned in Martin's article? I can see the leisure park has a website so assume it's still open, I wonder if the pins are still there?

They were all sold about 10 years ago

 

[neil1637]

They were all sold about 10 years ago

Damn shame. That would've been amazing to see on site.

 

[mufcmufc]

Damn shame. That would've been amazing to see on site.

I went about 10 years ago when they were all still there, it was good. I ended up with the Wizard (which now lives with @mission65), I think @andy bought a few of them from the site

 

[andy]

I went about 10 years ago when they were all still there, it was good. I ended up with the Wizard (which now lives with @mission65), I think @andy bought a few of them from the site

Yes I had the Fireball and Wizard, 10 years ago sounds about right. I dont know where any of the other games went though.

They were delivered in a Luton with a big picture of Sooty on the side!

 

[HHH]

They were delivered in a Luton with a big picture of Sooty on the side!

So it was a clean sweep then ..................

 

[Ashbo]

So it was a clean sweep then ..................

That's the way to do it!

 

[ronsplooter]

Top side of the playfield is stripped and I've begun dismantling the bottom. So far, every insert I've touched is loose and has popped out so they'll all need re-glueing. Not a big issue and tbh it'll help with the levelling but interesting that the glue has failed on all/most of them. Other then the usual gunk from the game being played I'm surprised at how clean it is underneath, should clean up really nicely

 

[ronsplooter]

Almost done breaking down the playfield, just the pops to remove. The big relay bank will be staying put and I'll clean in place, not dismantling that bad boy seeing as the game was working



Spent time today on the lower cab, stripping everything out for cleaning and also removing the bottom board so it's easier to work on. Taking the door off shows just how badly the cab has yellowed in the white and the purple has basically gone. I wasn't planning on doing anything with the cab but this has got me contemplating a quick and dirty (sort of) repaint. I don't want to have to remove the rails tbh and no one makes stencils for Pyramid/Cleopatra so I'd be making my own.....it's a fair bit more work but it would be cool to get the purple colour back. I need to have a think

 

[ronsplooter]

Had a think and I'm not going to repaint the cab at this time If I've got to go to the effort of creating stencils then I should do it properly and I just don't have the time for that with two pin projects currently on the go and another coming very soon.

Definitely invoking the spirit of "you don't play the cabinet" on this one

 

[ronsplooter]

I've cleaned the playfield as much as I dare and below is the starting point for paint touch ups. It actually held up to the cleaning process better than I had feared what with the planking and existing paint loss









Didn't get too much time this weekend but I have started the white primer on the worst of the bare wood areas. With this game being a lot of yellow touch ups I need a good base to paint onto so that the colour looks decent

 

[ronsplooter]

In parallel with the playfield work and cleaning up the cabinet I'm also progressing the dull job of putting everything through the ultrasonic cleaner and then the tumbler so I've got shiny parts to put back on. Pic below is today's lot having come out of the cleaner before they go for a tumble This is my least favourite part of working on a game

 

[ronsplooter]

Having removed all the inserts as they were basically falling out I chucked them in the sink for a clean but what I wasn't expecting was for them to develop a sort of cloudy/milky residue I assume this is the original playfield coating/varnish reacting with the extended exposure to water.

Thankfully it just needs some Novus 2 to get them looking decent again You can see below the 2 green ones on the left that I've polished up vs the rest:



And here's some close ups of a couple of them to show the difference:

Before


After


Before


After

 

[ronsplooter]

More playfield painting today Happy with the red and golden yellow so calling those done and I've also drawn back in the missing art where the scoops kicked out. I'm experimenting with repainting some of the white areas but not sure whether I'll keep that yet The plum/purple and greeny yellow still to do and I'm expecting those to be a bit trickier to colour match!

 

[ronsplooter]

All of the tumbling is finished and I've got boxes of shiny bits to go back on so I can focus on getting the playfield paint touch ups completed and ready for clearcoat. Two big areas still to look at are cleaning up the bottom board (hoping this is mainly switch cleaning) and the backbox which includes stripping, cleaning and rebuilding all of the score reels!

Here's the bonus stepper unit stripped down and cleaned up ready for re-assembly

 

[ronsplooter]

Plum/purple is done and looking decent and I also did a first pass of the greenish yellow but that definitely needs another round I think I'm going to selectively redo the white but mainly at the top of the playfield around the rollovers where the planking is at it's worst. I've then got a lot of black line detail to draw back in before I can re-fit the inserts and clear everything.

I was originally thinking Spray 2K for the clear but I'm actually going to try something new and go with a more period correct looking (hopefully) varathane which will be a bit more matt. I'll be applying this using foam applicators rather than a spray can so could go horribly wrong but it's fun to try new things

 

[ronsplooter]

I did a bit more touch up and completed the greenish yellow but I decided to lay down a sealing clear for the painting I've done so far as it's quite a lot and if I mess up any of the last bits I don't want to have to re-do loads. First job was re-gluing all of the inserts, then wipe down with a tack cloth and a thin initial coat of the varathane clear (the foam brushes seem to work well). The below pic is just after that first lot of clear went on, I'll review tomorrow and see how it's looking but I'm thinking a 2nd coat before going back to the painting would be good

 

[Jay Walker]

I see it's the same playfield for both the e/m (2 and 4 player) and solid-state variants, which wasn't the case with all dual-format games.

Are there otherwise unexplained dimpled mounting points under the playfield, for the 'diode boards' of the solid-state games' switch matrix?

I picture Gottlieb's assembly line as having the playfields being started as suitable for either (hence the coils having diodes as required for solid-state use), and arriving at a stage where they'd be committed to either e/m or electronic, such as having the relay bank fitted.

 

[ronsplooter]

Took advantage of the nice weather on Sunday and cleaned up the bottom board, cleaned all switches and adjusted a couple that were wrong. Replaced a few dodgy wiring hacks and checked all the relays were operating as expected so it's ready to go back into the game

 

[Paul]

Took advantage of the nice weather on Sunday and cleaned up the bottom board, cleaned all switches and adjusted a couple that were wrong. Replaced a few dodgy wiring hacks and checked all the relays were operating as expected so it's ready to go back into the game

View attachment 252975

How's your back after that lot?!

 

[ronsplooter]

I created a set of waterslide decals for the insert key lines and they finally arrived so spent some time today applying them. This is the first time I've tried this as I normally just paint them back in by hand but this looks so much better and they're really easy.to work with. The playfield is almost done as I just need to do a few last black line touch ups and then final coats of clear to seal everything in.



Here's some before and after pics showing the waterslide decals:

 

[Slingshot99]

Hi, can I ask what medium you use in your tumbler and are the waterslide decals available for sale anywhere? Thanks