The Aussie Pinball Arcade
Aussie Pinball Forums => Technical Matters => Pinball Repairs / Problems & Assistance => Topic started by: nrh_racing on May 07, 2012, 11:51:52 PM
-
My first pinball machine, Little Chief.
Fixed a few things and then came the turn of turning it on.
All lights up and sounds like it starts to reset but the coin unit just continues to click, the main score unit is going the whole time to which i don't know if it's meant to.
At this point the flippers and bouncers work and even returns the ball to the shoot, but once it does that the return coil then continues to fire as well, It doesn't reset the score reels either.
Its just like it doesn't reset set at the first turn on and then cracks the shits.
Still just playing around with it but if anyone has an idea let me know
Thanks
-
Make sure the switch on the coin entry isnt stuck on.. it needs to close and then open again
-
There is something going on with that as it has an aftermarket switch that is wired in.
I just checked and it looks like the switch is doing nothing until i close the relay by hand then i clicks a relay but score motor keeps going and reels don't reset. I think somewhere on here said how to wiring a free play switch in?
-
Free play on EMs is a mod in the credit unit (in the head). There might be a button wired into your game causing the issue ?
The problem you describe is as per Gavin's comment. The coin switch sounds like it is "on".
-
I will put some pictures up tonight of the coin switch because i think there is something missing.
I can manually reset the reset relay and all the reels reset which makes me happy %.%
-
After the score wheels reset, what happens (in sequence)?
Does the score motor still continuosly run?
-
Just as an FYI .. the way it should work is
1) press start button (if credits on machine) or put a coin in which closes coin switch
2) step 1 pulses coin relay
3) a switch on coin relay closes causing reset relay to be energised
(off the top of my head)
-
Once the aftermaket switch (possibly a push button wired to the coin mech micro switch) is sorted and if score motor continues to run after score reels reset may be worth checking that a score reel 'zero position' contact is not dirty.
-
Will check those few things, when i manually close the reset relay and the reels rest the score motor still runs.
Will do some more testing tonight if i get a chance and will try and give you more of a clear idea.
What i do know is the soon as i turn the machine on ( underneath cabinet) the score motor starts from that, the start button does need to be pushed or if i do push it it doesn't change anything.
Another thing that i found strange and probably not adjusted right is the credit counter. If i manually spin it it doesn't get around to 1, lowest it goes to is 13 then around past the last number to the blank area. It's like the stop pins on the wheel need to jump the other side of the switches. Does someone have a picture of what it should look like at 1.
I'm thinking there is still something missing from the coin mech, so if anyone has a picture of my type of one that would be great. Will post a picture of what i have later tonight.
Totally forgot it still has a broken match unit in the head that i'm trying to source ( having trouble finding one) should i wait to get one of them before i do anymore diagnosing, maybe that helps it reset !@)
Thanks so much for the help
-
Mate... we need pics if possible of broken unit in head and the coin switch on the door.
The game is trying to get to start position.. so it is trying to reset. It cannot do this if a switch is either open when meant to be closed or vice versa.... the score motor will continue to run and run searching for the next logic step ( switch closure etc). You can try and override it by pushing the reset relay but it will do nothing as the game is still searching for the open/ closed switch.
post some pics of the areas suggested and we can go from there
-
I doubt the Number match unit will have anything to do with the game not resetting because the concept for that is one (or more) switches closing to pulse the number match coil (to change the lucky number) and also you can disable number match via a jumper on any EM I have seen.
As Gav says, bring on the pics
-
Ok here is the pictures of the coin door, you can see the push button top left of picture.
-
Here is the picture of the broken match unit, and the ball counter or something that i think is set up wrong, this is when it is displaying a blank number past 36
-
It looks to me as though the coin switch is permanently closed... the leafs are bent so much that one may be touching the other... straighten the outer one so its not touching anything and try to start the machine again
-
Credit unit looks Ok to me... the black bar rotates back till it pushes down on the top set of switches forcing both sets open... you should be able to pull the coil armature back so this spins round to ZERO position again when the 2 sets of switches are opened.. very common for these to be gunged up and not moving freely.
At the moment it is on maximum credits... wont affect start up as game is reading credits
-
Maybe the easiest thing to do would be unplug the coin door and then see if game resets .. I have never tried, but with credits on the game this should work
-
Bent coin switch, didn't look to be touching but moved it more. Unplug coin door machine didnt do anything just lit up.
Plugged all back if, plugged machine in.
Score motor is not winding off its head ^^^, you can play the game and score reels turn for all players, but doesnt reset and sometimes a relay sticks, maybe the 0-90 one.
The lights don't light up right on the head, player indicator, ball number and even the display lights go away after a while, all the tilt works then the lights all light up again. Chimes don't work either.
Maybe i have to go over every connection, just got excited to turn it on %.%
-
Do i hear right that you can get a game from her??
Scores sticking... need to clean all these out.
Lights on and off.. more likely dirty contacts, meths on a small piece of card between the contacts will clean these nicely
-
Yeah, i can play only 4 player though unlimited balls i think. can't reset unless i manually flick relay.
Think i'm will go through every switch relay and wire connection so hopefully it will do 5 balls and reset.
i'm not to stress if everything doesnt work but want it to reset.
-
You are in luck .
Both the manual and schematic are downloadable from IPDB
Here for the schematic
http://mirror2.ipdb.org/files/1458/Williams_1975_Little_Chief_Schematic.tif
and here for the manual
http://mirror2.ipdb.org/files/1458/Williams_1975_Little_Chief_Manual.pdf
Armed with both of those you can fix any fault on an EM pinball (with patience and practice anyway)
-
Thanks i have got those, been very helpful. It was one of the reasons i got this pinball machine actual.
Good news last night, after play it for about an hour with faults it slowly got better and better, is this normal, its like the contacts cleaned up or something.
I changed all the rubbers and most globes, heaps faster and brighter now.
So then i go to turn it on and reset the relay manually and notice a wire just hanging off one of the relays, i touch it where it should go and it flicks the lock relay off, this looked to be held the whole time. So solder that on, turn on, still have to reset manually, do that and its even more playable.
Indicates whos turn it is, scores well, lights up ball number etc.
Things it doesnt do is reset when it gets to ball 5, once it does get to ball five it continues to flick ball out but ball light goes out because i think it doesn't know what to do. So all in all its really close.
Even the start button works now,each time its pushed the crdiet counter moves $#$
Will go over a few things tonight to hopefully sort the reset out.
-
Great news .
Re getting better as you play it .. yes that is normal , the switch contacts are designed to be self cleaning (thats the theory anyway) so once you sort out the last gremlins and play the machine regularly it should be sweet.
You will find the occassional wire comes off.. its due to vibration .
Not sure if you know, but the schematic is supposed to represent the state of every switch after the start button has been pressed and machine has completed the reset cycle.
I also strip and clean all score reels and all other mechanical assemblies .. makes the game play better and also increases reliability .
Most of these games have likely never had that done since they left the factory.
-
Did not know the schematic pictured the switches like that, that will be good to know.
Just played it again this morning and after the fifth ball it held the ball, i pushed the start button and it all reset and lit up player 1 again $#$
Now to work out how to change number of players and fix match unit
-
Excellent ^^^
Best and most enjoyable way of getting to know EM,s and learning as you go.
Did you feel good when something starts to work. #*#
Whens the next machine arrive &&
-
It is !!!!
When ever a new light lights up i get excited, pretty sad really %.%
I was looking at a Williams Blue chip for $900 last light haha don't know how i would get that past the wife, it is all work though. Still like the project ones even though i ask you guys a million questions
-
Blue Chip was my 1st pinball .. had it for nearly 6 years .. theme is a bit lame but a great game IMO
-
great work mate for your first pinball, i think i said on your intro post that i only started with my first pin less than 12 months ago and im onto my forth, and you should expect to have more lol
and going by your last post here yo uare expecting more already looking at the next one is a sign you have a pinball problem ahahaha ^&^
-
Great to hear you're getting somewhere with this game.
Keep up the good work. ^^^
-
The pinball machine is working really good now, just one question should the bonus score 1000 to 10000 that lights up on the play field be added at the end of the game. It's like it only adds up to a total of 4000, u can hear the bouns unit clicking down but doesn't add for each click. Something with the score motor maybe
-
Hardly ever on the score motor.. more likely on the bonus unit. did you pull this apart and reassemble?? If you did, did you make sure it aligned as before?
If you havent touched this then the contacts and wipers may not be making good contact. Bonus units should be taken apart, cleaned and reassembled.. they are part of the logic of any EM game. Often over the years these got lubricated or sprayed with WD40 etc... this gunks up and prevents the contacts from making properly. You need to make a scrape with a screw driver or similar on one of the legs and also a mark where it sits on the contact board. Take all this apart, clean with meths and reassemble. Dont use a marker pen to make your marks as meths will remove this and youll be up a blind alley ( reckon weve all done this at some point!). Clean all the brass buttons with meths, make sure it all moves freely and reassemble. The brass legs should sit directly on a tab on each click.. there is some 10mm adjustment that can be made with these by lossening off the mounting screws. Align and tighten the screws.
Do all this and you should get your bonuses registering.
What a bonus unit does is allow current flow to a set of switches... all tabs sit high on voltage and as the wiper moves over them it runs this circuit to ground.. this will pull in a relay further down the path, which then allows scoring, bonus lights to work, etc. If this is not working properly then youll hear clicks as it turns around but there is no path to ground and so you dont get the points you are meant to.
DDtoys i believe wrote a piece here on AP about pulling these apart and reassembling in Tips 101.. go look it up and follow it through.
Best of luck and report back any success.. we love hearing this kind of news!
-
Thanks for the info. I was to scared to pull apart the unit :D I don't know if there all the same but mine has two fingers. The bonus lights would not all light up and I traced that to the contacts of one of those fingers, sanded all the points that one touched and now all lights work. Would the other finger be for scoring, I cleaned it up but maybe that needs some more cleaning, just didn't know if I was in the right area
-
Need another hand
After painting my pin, removing complete top reel board as one, left the bottom board in, i keep blowing a fuse.
http://www.ipdb.org/machine.cgi?gid=1458
It keeps blowing the 15amp fuse that is on the brown wire, bottom left of wiring diagram. I traced it to the credit reel, if i open the switch (no credit in the machine) and turn machine on everything lights up as normal. As soon as i add credits it closes this switch and the fuse begins to glow slowly, blowing about 5-10 seconds later. I thought one of the wires were touching the earth on the back board lights but i cant seem to find another out of the ordinary, i have had the machine on its side so i thought maybe a screw or washer may have fallen and bridging a wire, cant seem to see anything. Something i did notice is i thought the extra globes that it lights between the 5-10 seconds of the fuse blowing are brighter, maybe somethings giving it more voltage?
Any ideas?
-
You definately have a short... can be a bugger to track down anmd mjany fuses can be lost trying to find it.
I use a 15A trip switch from Jaycar for this sort of thing... each time it shorts you just push the button.
If some of the lamps are brighter, then this is ,your best clue... trace the power line to these through until you find the fault. 15A is for the headbox only... you should only need to look here unless something is across thre Jones plugs. Make sure you dont have a loose staple etc
Williams EM games have one major flaw in their design and this maybe worth checking out.
When you lift up the PF the loom of wire rubs against the transformer housing... when PF is down its also on the transformer housing. This wears away the cotton insulation over time and it only takes one tiny bit to wear and touch something and you have a very hard to find short
-
Thanks so much at least its narrowed down to the headbox, i will get one of those trip switches and start tracing the power wire back. It was the globe for "player 1" i seen so i will focus on that wiring.
-
Ok i worked out a bit more, i didnt get a chance to get the switch you talked about just went through a few more fuses %.%
Traced it to one of the plug that plug into the headbox, the one with about 10 wires in it. I can plug all the rest in and the headbox background lights all as normal. As soon as i plug the plug in they all dull, only the background lights and if i push the start button it resets and the main motor just continues to turn.
I worked out which wire in that plug made it dull, that went to the credit unit (brown wire white tracer), tracing into the bottom box ( white with red tracer) to the credit relay.
I have stripped the top reel board and of the box and had a real good look over it, can't work it out. I'm sure it's only something simple as it worked well before hand, thought i was careful removing everything but obviously not ^.^
-
Really need help before i burn this pinball %.%
When i turn it on and push the reset button it all resets and the reset motor continues to turn and it also counts all the bonus counter up then if i do that a couple of times to try and source the fault if blows the step down transformer fuse?
Could this be a short in the pinball transformer? I'm at a loss, is there tech at the ballarat area i'm willing to pay because i'm over it
-
Mate... sometimes you have to walk away from a game for a few days to clear your head. Its very easy to tell yourself its one thing and even though youve checked this, the fault persists.. this is when you need to take a step back and more often than not the solution comes to you once your brain has had a breather.
Bonus count unit.. the stepper in the headbox yes?
At start up, the whole game goes into reset mode... every switch on this reset has to be aligned for it to actually reset... stop and then give a game.
If all scores are resetting etc and its the bonus count unit that continues to turn then chances are that it has not found its ZERO point and so it turns and turns until it finds it.
Did you pull this apart to clean?
Are you 100% sure you have it in the correct position when it was put back together again.
Is the tension correct so wipers make good contact?
There is also an adjustment on these for the spider wipers.. you can loosen the screws slightly and turn the rivetted plate 10mm either way... make sure the spider wiper is dead on a single contact and not inbetween 2.. its easily done.. also make sure that all leaf switches on this unit make and break properly using a DMM.. sight isnt enough.
The fuse on the step down... what size is the stepdown? Sounds like its too small or just about up to par... should always have approx 1/3rd extra power for anything like this.
Whats happening is that the score motor is turning and coils are firing all the time its continually running... this draws quite a bit of current which puts stress on the stepdown warming it up and so it overrides and shuts itself off.
2A is more than enough for an EM stepdown so long as the game is operational...... after all not everything is working at once. If everything were to fire/turn etc at the same time then it pulls a current spike and its too much power for the step down.
Same principal is in your house.. you can run multi socket power boards from all wall sockets, but if you have everything plugged in and running then you will trip your power supply... all these things assume that you wont use everything at once.
This is a different fault to before with the bright lamps.. did this get sorted??
Also.. these issues only appeared after you pulled the game apart to repaint yes?
...just trying to eliminate/ narrow down things for you... every fresh mind helps... ^^^
-
The blowing the fuse on the step down makes total sense to what your saying as its lighting up the bonus lights aswell as everything else so i think your on the money there.
I didn't strip the bonus unit (in the main box) although i think i may of sanded all the points before putting it back together meaning i could of put something out of adjustment. I think it's still diming the lights but i can't get it to the point where i was before, like it's got worse.
If the bonus unit isnt adjusted right could it earth the lights dim, meaning it could be the bonus unit from the start?
-
and yes working 100% before i prettied it up, should of left it shitty %.%
-
Whats your voltage ACROSS a dull lamp?
-
about 3.5 - 4 volts
-
OK.. sounds like you have either a bad connection or have a stray voltage riding up the ground.
get an alligator clip and attach it to the 0V point on the transformer.. then measure the ground to the dull lamps.. it should read 0V ( no potential difference)... my guess is thats its reading 4 - 6v which means you have a lamp voltage from another source shorting the the ground on the dull lamps
-
Ok, will have a good look at the bonus unit adjustment then measure the volt as you said,
Im sure it will be something little and stupid as i found with problems i have had in the past one little thing snow balls on these machines and makes it look like something really big.
-
LOl- ALL problems are little and stupid... Finding them is the hard part! LOL
-
True, i have had fun finding all the other teething problems but this one is doing my head in, two weeks now without playing a pin ^&^
-
True, i have had fun finding all the other teething problems but this one is doing my head in, two weeks now without playing a pin ^&^
Must be time to buy a second one then to avoid times like this %.%
-
%.%
I'm want that indy 500 on egay, trying to work out how to get it past the other half %.%
-
%.%
I'm want that indy 500 on egay, trying to work out how to get it past the other half %.%
Pleasure of having many machines.. can sneak one in pretty much unoticed!
-
Hahaha
If i manually activate the tilt relay the lights go bright again, even know what wire it affects but still can't work it out or see anything wrong with it ^&^ Look at the bonus unit and it looks all adjusted right as wells as the credit unit and player unit as i sanded them too
-
Lights stay dim if i activate the tilt switches under the play field or side of pin, only the relay its self makes it go bright
-
Ok... i dont have the schematics for LITTLE CHIEF but i do have BIG BEN which is of the same year so operation will be the same.
TILT relay has a normally closed switch on it... this is directly linked to a 2 way switch on your ADV UNIT SWITCH which can be open or closed... if this is closed then it activates your bonus unit.. it has to go open to disable the bonus unit continually running.
Been a while since i worked on a WMS game, but when it tilts, lights go out, so id be checking all contacts on this relay and making sure the 2 way switch on ADV UNIT is operating correctly
-
This may be some help, i have followed the wire from the tilt relay to here and havent seen any shorts/problems
-
Youve gone up a blind alley mate... nothing wrong in the pic you posted. The bottom switch that is closed only opens once the credit wheel has done its full turn and the bar opens this.
Did you check the ADV UNIT relay?
-
Looks all good I think
-
Here's a pic
-
Yes but have you made sure it makes and breaks with a DMM?... You need to test all contacts with your DMM as dirt and slight of adjustments with throw the logic out
-
Just ran back out and it tested ok, gave it a quick clean as well. Thanks so much for your help by the way ^^^ ^^^