It's a week today since I took delivery of my first ever Pinball which is a Data East 'Adventures of Rocky & Bullwinkle'. Matt told me that it wasn't a Rolls Royce before I took the plunge and decided to go for it and although he's partially right I have to say I was surprised at the quality of the playfield, especially for the money paid.
It doesn't need anywhere near the amount of work that some of the other Shop Logs here do but hopefully some might find the few bits of work I am doing of interest and hopefully at the same time I can learn more about Pinball maintenance and repair.
I've decided to start off with a few simple jobs that will hopefully both improve the look of the table whilst also ensuring that any problems the table does have don't get any worse.
The first issue i've decided to tackle is the Hat Trick mechanism. It's a known issue that the 50v delivered to the Lion Coil causes the plastic to take a severe bashing. As a result of this there's a massive number of tables out there where this plastic is smashed to bits and it's no different here. One of the previous owners had done their best to patch up the plastic but the tape on it was causing it to stick. I was also having problems with both the Rocky and Rhino plastics so figured it was worth pulling the Lion out and disabling the mechanism until I get a replacement sorted.
I therefore removed the Lion and also the crank arm and the section that dropped into the Coil. This leaves it looking like this.
As you can see the Lion plastic is in a bad way. Someone has done their best to repair it but the additional thickness means it's binding in the slot and not raising or dropping correctly. I've also noted that the Rhino seems to travel up and down much more freely than the Rocky plastic. Not sure why that is - my guess is possible a coil sleeve issue?
I also spotted a couple of missing #44 bulbs that should be sat behind the coils for two of the plastics.
I'm also going to do the coil mod once i've moved the table. It's position at the moment makes soldering at the rear of the mechanism a bit tricky, but once it's shifted i'll drop the 50v feed to the Lion coil and heat shrink and tie it out of the way. I've then take a 32v feed from one of the other coils. This should have the effect of reducing the power with which the Lion gets whacked upwards and hopefully prevent any new plastic I fit from being smashed to bits.
I'm on the case with regards the new Lion and despite being told they were unobtanium i've almost managed to track one down. Hopefully i'll have more news on that next week.
Another job i've done is to go around the table and do a lamp check. Almost all of the main playfield lights are working apart from a couple of bulbs that are out near the top lanes and one which seems to have a fault whereby it's very dim until you apply pressure and then it's fine.
Finally, one strange thing I have noted is the table has a GI lamp fitted that shouldn't be there. It's mounted on a post with a surround similar to those i've seen on the Stern Elvis table. There's a picture shown below. No idea who fitted it or where the power feed for it is taken from. Need to investigate that one and see if it's a light that's been pulled out from somewhere else.
It doesn't need anywhere near the amount of work that some of the other Shop Logs here do but hopefully some might find the few bits of work I am doing of interest and hopefully at the same time I can learn more about Pinball maintenance and repair.
I've decided to start off with a few simple jobs that will hopefully both improve the look of the table whilst also ensuring that any problems the table does have don't get any worse.
The first issue i've decided to tackle is the Hat Trick mechanism. It's a known issue that the 50v delivered to the Lion Coil causes the plastic to take a severe bashing. As a result of this there's a massive number of tables out there where this plastic is smashed to bits and it's no different here. One of the previous owners had done their best to patch up the plastic but the tape on it was causing it to stick. I was also having problems with both the Rocky and Rhino plastics so figured it was worth pulling the Lion out and disabling the mechanism until I get a replacement sorted.
I therefore removed the Lion and also the crank arm and the section that dropped into the Coil. This leaves it looking like this.
As you can see the Lion plastic is in a bad way. Someone has done their best to repair it but the additional thickness means it's binding in the slot and not raising or dropping correctly. I've also noted that the Rhino seems to travel up and down much more freely than the Rocky plastic. Not sure why that is - my guess is possible a coil sleeve issue?
I also spotted a couple of missing #44 bulbs that should be sat behind the coils for two of the plastics.
I'm also going to do the coil mod once i've moved the table. It's position at the moment makes soldering at the rear of the mechanism a bit tricky, but once it's shifted i'll drop the 50v feed to the Lion coil and heat shrink and tie it out of the way. I've then take a 32v feed from one of the other coils. This should have the effect of reducing the power with which the Lion gets whacked upwards and hopefully prevent any new plastic I fit from being smashed to bits.
I'm on the case with regards the new Lion and despite being told they were unobtanium i've almost managed to track one down. Hopefully i'll have more news on that next week.
Another job i've done is to go around the table and do a lamp check. Almost all of the main playfield lights are working apart from a couple of bulbs that are out near the top lanes and one which seems to have a fault whereby it's very dim until you apply pressure and then it's fine.
Finally, one strange thing I have noted is the table has a GI lamp fitted that shouldn't be there. It's mounted on a post with a surround similar to those i've seen on the Stern Elvis table. There's a picture shown below. No idea who fitted it or where the power feed for it is taken from. Need to investigate that one and see if it's a light that's been pulled out from somewhere else.