Internal auxiliary power socket

[Nedreud]

Both my old Bally's (Paragon and Vector) have an auxiliary power socket inside the main cabinet. It's mounted on the board along with the tilt sensors at the front near the coin door. It's a US-style 110V socket and personally I think it's a health and safety death-trap. I won't be refitting it during the Paragon restoration! I have no use for it and it's unlikely rated for 240V anyway.

But I have a couple of questions:

1. Why is it there in the first place? I'm assuming so that commercial operators could plug in an inspection lamp or soldering iron whilst doing on site maintenance.
2. Are they still fitted to modern games, e.g., Stern, JJP, etc.? If not, anyone know when and why it stopped?

 

[lukewells]

[QUOTE="Nedreud, post: 66169, member: 441"

1. Why is it there in the first place? I'm assuming so that commercial operators could plug in an inspection lamp or soldering iron whilst doing on site maintenance

[/QUOTE]

Yep that's exactly what it is for.

I also disconnect mine as they are indeed a death trap, as they are most often permanently live (regardless of the power switch position)

That said, Bally pins are death traps anyway, those regulator boards are an arms reach from the coin door and have 240vac and 200vdc on them on bare traces

 

[Nedreud]

I find the history of safety quite interesting. When I look at stuff like PSUs with bare connectors/traces I shudder slightly and wonder how they ever thought it was a good idea? But then you look at machinery from the steam age and realise there's tonnes of cast iron whizzing around without so much as a guard rail ready to rip off an entire arm or leg, so a power supply in a locked box seems relatively safe! At least Paragon has the PSU tucked away in the backbox. Still dangerous but less so than the cabinet mounted one in Vector. That's position in just the right spot so that no matter which part of the playfield you're working on if you drop a nut or screw it always lands inside the PSU just under the plastic "safety" cover.

And you're right. Looking at the schematics the service outlet is on the live side of the power switch, so it is indeed always on. This also means it's only fused by whatever is in the mains plug. I'd fuse at 3A in the mains plug as a pin draws about 2-2.5 amps but that's still going to kill you before it blows! I still can't get over that anyone thought this was a sensible idea. But then 120V is so much safer than 240V

 

[Paul]

It's "sensible" only because it would be a pointless Service socket if it was on only when the machine was switched on - i mean - if the machine was on it would be unlikely you would need to plug in a soldering iron - that would be when switched off....!!!

I do agree with you, however i can see the logic... We teach ourselves to re-solder and effect a fix with the machine off... and therefore if connected after the switch then it would be pointless having it in the first place...

 

[Nedreud]

Does anyone know if modern games still have them? And if they don't, when they roughly stopped fitting them? Now that the days of pinball halls are long gone I can imagine they're a redundant feature that would just add to the baseline costs.

 

[Jay Walker]

Does anyone know if modern games still have them? And if they don't, when they roughly stopped fitting them?

Williams system 11 games didn't have them for u.k. spec; the mains filter box (with the internal line fuse) had a blank square plastic plug fitted where domestic models probably had a small 3-pin outlet. German production seems to have been the same, as in the photo below. But when the filter box was moved to include the power switch, a service outlet was included again for u.k. production. It was a reverse-configuration or 'moat' socket, as sometimes seen on computer power supplies for the monitor. I got some plugs from RS components to make up power leads, each with a u.k. rubber socket on the other end.


Photo originally posted by 'replicas'.

From the safety viewpoint, I'm not sure what spec my Centaur II was, but it had a european 'schuko' socket provided, mounted to the tilt board in a neat housing with no obviously exposed connections. It also had an interlock switch which cut off the main power when the front door was opened.