I nearly bought a FT a few years ago ,but decided to buy a Star Trek instead , so if one comes up on the market will they still hold there value ,as you just can't by any of the shelf parts or manual etc....
How much is a 2nd Hand Highway pinball worth?
- Thread starter carl lawrence
- Start date
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@AlanJ them boards look a night mere to try and fix ,at least with stern you can pick one of the shelf so to speak if you have deep pockets 
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And yep ! @Tilt_Birmingham ,not seen one last a day without breaking down unfortunately
.And yep ! @Tilt_Birmingham ,not seen one last a day without breaking down unfortunately
Its a gamble... We couldn't get ours fixed when they were still operating... Whats its going to be like now they are no longer exist...
Its all well and good saying everything is fixable... But how long will it take... How much will it cost???
Take this LE for sale currently if that gets banged up in transit or a board goes next week... That 6k machine will then be worthless and unplayable until its fixed then you have more money in it...
Would any sane people gamble 6k on a game?
Its all well and good saying everything is fixable... But how long will it take... How much will it cost???
Take this LE for sale currently if that gets banged up in transit or a board goes next week... That 6k machine will then be worthless and unplayable until its fixed then you have more money in it...
Would any sane people gamble 6k on a game?
no sane people in pinball. full stop [emoji23]
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Harsh but true.
There is some effort being put in on Alien, but not on the big board front, as there are no schematics (publicly available at least)
I gambled over 9k for an Alien LE.
Pinball community is awesome. I’m not afraid of what can happen, I ‘m sure I could fixed every issue.
Pinball community is awesome. I’m not afraid of what can happen, I ‘m sure I could fixed every issue.
i think Matt had a full throttle on site with no problems for quite a long time ?
I now own it
Also read reports from supposedly very knowledgeable people on pinside saying sterns modern Boards are very badly designed for cheapness ?
I want an Alien or ghostbusters but am worried about both for longevity, agree it’s a risk, ho hum
I now own it
Also read reports from supposedly very knowledgeable people on pinside saying sterns modern Boards are very badly designed for cheapness ?
I want an Alien or ghostbusters but am worried about both for longevity, agree it’s a risk, ho hum
i think Matt had a full throttle on site with no problems for quite a long time ?
I now own it
Just the one Tony?
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I think the FT and Alien need to find there true value and be advertised on eBay, gum tree etc , these rare machines may hold a status as classic cars ,you can look at them but they are not for playing with .it's a sad affair losing a pinball company plus losing all help in getting these lovely machines back up and running ,let's hope something might grow out of the Ashes !!
D
Deleted member 2463
In this situation its a case of could you afford to lose the money or not. If you can't then stay well clear, there are lots of great games out there to choose from and go play alien at Flipout and FT at Tony's new place when it opens.
I've been to a lot of places around the world and whenever there has been a full throttle there, its been out of order... I think I've seen 6 in the wild and none of them worked. Alien at flipout has been quite reliable since whatever the weird issue was that was causing it to blow fuses which seemed to fix itself. I really wanted an Alien but knowing what I know about how they were produced means that I couldn't own one.
Neil.
I've been to a lot of places around the world and whenever there has been a full throttle there, its been out of order... I think I've seen 6 in the wild and none of them worked. Alien at flipout has been quite reliable since whatever the weird issue was that was causing it to blow fuses which seemed to fix itself. I really wanted an Alien but knowing what I know about how they were produced means that I couldn't own one.
Neil.
I need to play Alien at some point. Such a great theme and cool looking game. I'm in London next month so may go on the hunt or if anyone can point me in the right direction...
My old one at Flip out Croydon.
Good question. I think it depends on which title we're talking about - Alien is a much more desirable theme to most so I would imagine that to the right buyer it would be worth considerably more than FT.
Personally I wouldn't buy either at their current asking price due to concerns re spares should something go wrong - I've already got a Big Lebowski to worry about there - but I'd probably take a gamble on a cheap FT. Maybe £2k or so?
Personally I wouldn't buy either at their current asking price due to concerns re spares should something go wrong - I've already got a Big Lebowski to worry about there - but I'd probably take a gamble on a cheap FT. Maybe £2k or so?
When these boards are under the playfield they get shaken to hell - they use a small USB connection which did crack off in the one in @Tilt_Birmingham that to be honest stood there not working for most the time we had it.
FT itself is a great game, but I would want one for £1,000-£1,500 as if it failed - you are left with a paperweight. Or you stick in a PROC system and rewrite the game which is a hell of a job.
The SBC in the game is easy to change.
The node boards and other boards like sensors/leds will be a pain in the backside to replace. The sensor boards are quite easy to replace however they have heighway software flashed onto the small pcb - if my memory serves me right.
Schematics are not available for any of the pcbs inside. Even if they existed they are not really 'home repairable'. They were designed well but made cheaply so after the warranty would run out, boards would fail and AH would make more cash out of the zillions who bought his games.
As no exact figures are around about how many machines got made - I would guess maybe 300 games left the factory TOPS. It is not a business plan to copy these boards - and if they did - they would be very expensive to make in small quantities.
Was told by other 'ex' employees these boards are extremely hard to repair.
Replacing coils will be easy enough but these are not the main issue with the games.
Keep in mind the one we had at Tilt was only working for a few weeks of its 9 month stay. We just about managed (Pinball Heaven) to get a 75% refund for the game and we were extremely glad to see the back of it. Within the game we had 4 node board failures. The crap USB hub failed (easy fix), amplifier blew (again easy fix) and I found burnt out connectors in several molex plugs that took the 48v to each PCB.
In the time it was in Tilt it took very little money compared to a Stern.
It is amazing that you can repair pretty well anything on a WPC/WPC95 Bally/Williams that was made in the 90s.
Do not think there is a market for used Heighway stuff, it looks extremely unlikely that the company will start up again (who would be mad enough) and due to the low numbers of games being sold I cant see anyone doing replacement boards.
The best option would be is getting in touch with Romain at Team Pinball to see if he could help - but I get the feeling they do not want to be linked to the old company in the same way I do not want to be linked.
If you own one of these games - put it on ebay and get what you can. @carl lawrence - my advice is stay clear unless you get one DIRT cheap.
I am sure when the node boards start to fail you will see a few getting broken for spares!!! For instance if one node board fails - put the other ones up for sale at silly money and try and get as much cash back as you can. Same for the other components.
FT itself is a great game, but I would want one for £1,000-£1,500 as if it failed - you are left with a paperweight. Or you stick in a PROC system and rewrite the game which is a hell of a job.
The SBC in the game is easy to change.
The node boards and other boards like sensors/leds will be a pain in the backside to replace. The sensor boards are quite easy to replace however they have heighway software flashed onto the small pcb - if my memory serves me right.
Schematics are not available for any of the pcbs inside. Even if they existed they are not really 'home repairable'. They were designed well but made cheaply so after the warranty would run out, boards would fail and AH would make more cash out of the zillions who bought his games.
As no exact figures are around about how many machines got made - I would guess maybe 300 games left the factory TOPS. It is not a business plan to copy these boards - and if they did - they would be very expensive to make in small quantities.
Was told by other 'ex' employees these boards are extremely hard to repair.
Replacing coils will be easy enough but these are not the main issue with the games.
Keep in mind the one we had at Tilt was only working for a few weeks of its 9 month stay. We just about managed (Pinball Heaven) to get a 75% refund for the game and we were extremely glad to see the back of it. Within the game we had 4 node board failures. The crap USB hub failed (easy fix), amplifier blew (again easy fix) and I found burnt out connectors in several molex plugs that took the 48v to each PCB.
In the time it was in Tilt it took very little money compared to a Stern.
It is amazing that you can repair pretty well anything on a WPC/WPC95 Bally/Williams that was made in the 90s.
Do not think there is a market for used Heighway stuff, it looks extremely unlikely that the company will start up again (who would be mad enough) and due to the low numbers of games being sold I cant see anyone doing replacement boards.
The best option would be is getting in touch with Romain at Team Pinball to see if he could help - but I get the feeling they do not want to be linked to the old company in the same way I do not want to be linked.
If you own one of these games - put it on ebay and get what you can. @carl lawrence - my advice is stay clear unless you get one DIRT cheap.
I am sure when the node boards start to fail you will see a few getting broken for spares!!! For instance if one node board fails - put the other ones up for sale at silly money and try and get as much cash back as you can. Same for the other components.
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If they had components on the boards like they had on Bally /Williams etc etc in the 90s etc etc.. then the unskilled would have a chance to fix them , as these components are now so small now ,in another let's say 10 years when I will be pushing 60 , I don't think I will be able to pick these components up in my fingers ,let alone see the dam things .so for me I will not buy a Alien or FT unfortunately .
