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In Progress US Black Hole

MajesticPinball

Site Supporter
5Years
Joined
Jan 11, 2018
Messages
2,496
Location
Essex
I've not posted a shop log for years so bare with me, I thought I'd share my US Black Hole with you guys this time. Anyone who knows me will know my devout love for Gottliebs and this was a big Gottlieb grail of mine so I was super excited to get it. I've probably had it a year or so now and it lives at my workshop as I can't get widebody games into my flat (and this machine is BIG). Currently everything mostly works and it does play but it would benefit from a big clean and a glam-up, the sounds can be a bit glitched at times, there are display issues and the majority of the insert lights don't work, cabinet has been touched up previously and is pretty nice. Handful of wiring bodges here and there but the PSU, MPU and Driver Board have already been replaced for new before I got the game. So let's enter.... The black hole!

Here she is in the corner of my workshop, I installed Comet LEDs in the back box when it first arrived just to get an idea of how it would look, I'm not sure if I'll keep the ice blue/dark blue motif as generally I'm not a fan of coloured LEDs but we can address that at a later date.
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One thing that's a bit of a nightmare is this game is so big there is only one specific spot in my workshop where the beams are high enough to allow me to lift up the playfield!
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So I'm going to go through each playfield one at a time, I've taken the lower playfield out to work on at home as it's just so damn cold in the workshop at the moment, removing the lower playfield allowed me to get a good look at the transformer panel. Amazingly 2 lugs are barely clinging into the transformer and 1 fell off when I brushed past it - quite incredible that the game even fired up still. There's a fair bit going on here that isn't factory so I'll be doing my bit to put it all back to how it should be, I also noticed the knocker coil hanging out of the mounting bracket too.
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So I stripped down the majority of the top side of the lower playfield tonight, nothing too alarming or interesting to report. I used to be known for loving to hand polish metalwork that'll never been seen, as this is a staple of my Gottlieb collection I'll more than likely be stripping down all of the mechs and hand polishing everything just like it's 2020 lockdown once again!

I also couldn't believe somebody had the audacity to fit a Williams (🤢) coil into such a sacred appliance, that'll have to go! PXL_20260104_190743172.webpPXL_20260104_190747967.webpPXL_20260104_190755610.webpPXL_20260104_201658168.webpPXL_20260104_221130309.webpPXL_20260104_221136591.webpPXL_20260104_221142599.webpPXL_20260104_221147096.webp
 
That coil that's been changed to a Williams is a common failure due to how the mechanism works. I don't remember why, mines been fine but I've seen people add a new bracket with an EOS switch to it to prevent that coil from burning up.

When I did Claires Black Hole I really enjoyed it, it might be one of the favourite games I've shopped and I'm not sure why. I was really chuffed with how it came out, the blue and black art is fantastic and really comes to life when you clean it up and add tasteful LEDs 😍
 
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That coil that's been changed to a Williams is a common failure due to how the mechanism works. I don't remember why, mines been fine but I've seen people add a new bracket with an EOS switch to it to prevent that coil from burning up.

When I did Claires Black Hole I really enjoyed it, it might be one of the favourite games I've shopped and I'm not sure why. I was really chuffed with how it came out, the blue and black art is fantastic and really comes to life when you clean it up and add tasteful LEDs 😍
There was a note sent out from Gottlieb about changing that coil to a beefier one than what was originally supplied by the factory, can't remember for the life of me what they suggested but i'll find it somewhere.
 
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