I’m posting this in case anyone else experiences similar odd symptoms or buys a Made in Brazil 8 ball trough membrane.
I’ve been suffering with issues on my A13 during 13 ball multiball. Symptoms were the 8 ball trough (top left of playfield) wouldn’t always reload the balls into it, 2 balls in the VUK that feeds the shooter lane, multiple balls would be put into the shooter lane that feeds this 8 ball trough, once any of these happened it was pretty much game over. Other symptom was during 13 ball multiball you would notice the 8 ball trough not reload and then the flippers would become unresponsive, then it really was game over!
I’ve been fighting this for a couple of years, but each time I would take a look all was fine and it would work faultlessly for the next few 13 ball games, very frustrating!
Anyway, it got to the point the issue became permanent, which is great for finding the cause. What I found today was the 8 ball trough had one dodgy switch, always registering a ball even with no ball present!
As I always seeming to be picking up spares to put in the come in handy cupboard, I just happened to have a spare 8 ball trough, I bought it from the US, but it came with a known damaged switch membrane, fortunately I also just happened to have a couple of new reproduction membranes I bought of eBay from a guy in Brazil, no other options that I’m aware of, so was these or nothing, so with new membrane fitted I was hoping the news would be good.
All fitted, all seemed good at first, then I noticed the 8 ball trough was taking longer than it should to reload. Looking into the switch matrix and the 8 ball trough inputs, I discovered that switch positions 4 & 6 were reversed, comparing the other spare membrane I had and the original it was apparent the new remade membrane had a small error with these tracks inverted. A quick reconfigure of the diode board for the membrane and all inputs are now correct.
I know the clever people on here would just make up a new board to invert these tracks, but sadly that’s beyond my pay grade.
Good news is it’s now working back to how it should be.
Happy now
Chris.
I’ve been suffering with issues on my A13 during 13 ball multiball. Symptoms were the 8 ball trough (top left of playfield) wouldn’t always reload the balls into it, 2 balls in the VUK that feeds the shooter lane, multiple balls would be put into the shooter lane that feeds this 8 ball trough, once any of these happened it was pretty much game over. Other symptom was during 13 ball multiball you would notice the 8 ball trough not reload and then the flippers would become unresponsive, then it really was game over!
I’ve been fighting this for a couple of years, but each time I would take a look all was fine and it would work faultlessly for the next few 13 ball games, very frustrating!
Anyway, it got to the point the issue became permanent, which is great for finding the cause. What I found today was the 8 ball trough had one dodgy switch, always registering a ball even with no ball present!
As I always seeming to be picking up spares to put in the come in handy cupboard, I just happened to have a spare 8 ball trough, I bought it from the US, but it came with a known damaged switch membrane, fortunately I also just happened to have a couple of new reproduction membranes I bought of eBay from a guy in Brazil, no other options that I’m aware of, so was these or nothing, so with new membrane fitted I was hoping the news would be good.
All fitted, all seemed good at first, then I noticed the 8 ball trough was taking longer than it should to reload. Looking into the switch matrix and the 8 ball trough inputs, I discovered that switch positions 4 & 6 were reversed, comparing the other spare membrane I had and the original it was apparent the new remade membrane had a small error with these tracks inverted. A quick reconfigure of the diode board for the membrane and all inputs are now correct.
I know the clever people on here would just make up a new board to invert these tracks, but sadly that’s beyond my pay grade.
Good news is it’s now working back to how it should be.
Happy now
Chris.
