Great detail, Nino; this will definitely help anyone else embarking on a similar job.
Correct Andrew - and hopefully it will give some confidence to "EM Newbies" to know that it is not that hard. It is a LOT more involved than a DMD in terms of time, but on the other hand, the playfields are very simple !
As promised, more "catch up" on this restoration. As I keep mentioning, I have 100's of NOS EM parts from "the old days". There are still boxes of stuff I need to go through, but I thought I'd digress on this for a moment. There was another example of a broken plunger and shaft. I'm not sure how "available" these are, but I'm lucky, I have a few spares !
Here's the broken plunger off one of the scorereel assemblies, and it's replacement - it might be a bit dusty, but it is genuine NOS ;
It came from this box of 20 - 30 !
I spoke to my Father last week, and he cannot recall the titles of 60's Bally EMs he operated, which was a bit of a letdown, but he was happy the part was going into a machine !
Here's some shots of the other stepper units I had to rebuild ;
Pop Bumper Unit
Credit Unit
Here's a picture of all units rebuilt - thats 16 scorereels and four steppers. The unit in the middle is the Match Unit. The repays in the lower corner were also cleaned and rebuilt. Basically, this is the head mechanicals taken care of.
Close up of the Mathc Unit with the bell etc - These are usually removed from European EMs ;
All of the cards from the game were carefully removed (where possible), and I've given them a quick clean, and laminated them. They might be pushing 46 years old, but I didn't want them to deteriorate any further. I've also sent scans of these to Peter to keep for his website.
Have a look at the condition of the backglass, and the masking used. Instead of silver, it is black. The backglass is not glass, it is similar to perspex. I have not seen this on an EM Pinball (Bingos - Yes). The condition is simply immaculate. The cards have been stapled to the headbox ;
I've logged over 100 hours on this game so far, but when I stood back and took these photos, I was completely satisfied !
.. and the front of the backglass ;
Next update will involve my INITIAL experimentation with the "Janes Zinc / Nickel plating kit" - I bought the full set with the power supply etc for some DIY plating.
