The Great Game Giveaway Of ‘09
I gave away a dozen or so games to a local friend last year. I took some pictures to commemorate the event.
Just what I need! More projects!
I picked up these 2 Mousin’ Around pinballs the other day. For the price I couldn’t turn it down. I made a short video showing how I load and unload games by myself. I’m not sure when these machines will be restored but I’m hoping it will be some time in the next couple of months.
New Toys!
Recently I decided to treat myself to some new multimeters. The main meter that I wanted to buy was the Uni-T UT81 scope meter but I was having it shipped from China and the seller had a bunch of other meters available for really good prices so I decided to go a little crazy and order a few more. I can definitely use all of these meters in the future.
I had to laugh when I saw that the contents of the package were listed as “Toys” by the seller.
Bally/Stern MPU Testing Just Got Easier!
The hardware that runs the classic Bally/Stern series of pinball machines is by far the most prolific of all the pinball systems. Consequently there are tens or even hundreds of thousands of these machines still out there. Many in need of repair. Over the years I’ve grown to know this hardware quite well and currently I’m working on some new hardware designs for use with this system.
One of the projects I’m working on is a daughter board to replace all of the RAM and ROM on the MPU board with a new board that connects to the J5 test connector on Bally/Stern MPUs. The board I’m covering in this article replaces the ROM only and uses two 2732 EPROMs. This is a proof of concept for a future design that will use a 2764 (or 128, 256, etc…) and an NVRAM.
My main intent with these boards was to be used as a test aid with Leon’s test ROM but they also work well to simply replace the EPROMs. This is especially useful on MPUs that are strapped for 9316 ROMs. I liked these boards so much that I designed a slightly nicer version with a couple more LEDs that I’m going to produce intended strictly for testing.
Here we see the board in action:
Coming Attractions!
Here are some sneak peaks of hardware I’m developing:
Pac-man Granddaughter Board
You’ve heard of a daughter board but how about a granddaughter board?
I built this thing a couple of years ago. I’ve been working with a fellow collector on some hardware development and he wanted to see an example of a logic IC hiding under and EPROM so I figured I might as well write something about this board.
The picture below shows 2 boards. One is a Ms. Pac-man daughter board and the other is my home brew Pac-Man board tester. It’s a daughter board on a daughter board so I like to call it a granddaughter board.
Classy Bowler Woodrail Comes Home!
Recently a friend of mine found a 3 game bulk deal and this was one of the games. He knows that I’m always looking for woodrail machines so he was kind enough to cut me in on the deal and sell it to me. Based on the price and his description I agreed to buy it without seeing it first. As you can see below I was not disappointed. The backglass is trashed but the cabinet and playfield are in amazing condition given the age of the machine. I really love the old woodrail machines and they don’t come up too often around here so I was really happy to get this gem.
Shay Arcade Group has a reproduction backglass available. It will end up costing me more than twice the price of the whole machine but given the condition of the playfield I think it will be worth it.
Jukebox Project - Rockola 464
I picked up this Jukebox a while back in a trade from a friend. It’s kind of a long story so I won’t go into all of the details but it was supposed to be working when I got it. Unfortunately it decided to seize up in the time that it was stored in a friend’s garage (maybe a year or so).
I ordered a new needle for it and I’m going to add a black light florescent tube in the cabinet. It’s supposed to have a plexiglass insert in the main cabinet but someone obviously thought it would be cooler to see the mechanism working so I’m going to work with what’s there. I think the black light will look cool. Once it’s working again, that is…
I will be selling it once it’s repaired. I’m not really into jukes and I already have a Wurlitzer Americana III that I’m planning to restore as a "keeper" so this one will need to find a new home eventually.
I got a manual for it in the big manual lot I bought a while back so that’s a nice coincidence.
I love Coincidences!
After buying a bunch of pinball backglasses that I wasn’t sure I would ever use I was thrilled to find a Gottlieb Baseball machine with a bad backglass advertised locally for a good price. The same guy also had a Bally Trail Drive machine for sale. I hadn’t heard of that game but when I looked it up on IPDB and saw the backglass animation I became really interested. I called the guy and made arrangements to pick up the machines the following morning (at 7:00AM!). I hate getting up early but it was worth it for these two. Someone else had arranged to look at the machines the previous day and didn’t show. Their loss was my gain!
Here we see the backglass in terrible condition. Fortunately I have a nice one that I bought only a few weeks prior that I have already sealed with triple thick.
PCBs Have Arrived!
The printed circuit boards I’ve been working on have arrived from the fabricator. I am absolutely thrilled with how they turned out. I’m still waiting on a bunch of parts to start assembling and testing the designs but this is a huge step in the direction of releasing some commercial products that will make the life of the pinball restorer easier.
