Jacks Open Cleanup

[Pintoxicated]

Yeah I'm not looking forward to trying to find the break in the ground wire....a few more hours no doubt.   

Here is a pic of the backbox, I have added an arrow pointing to the capacitor.  On the back page of the manual, it has a list of new things added to this machine.  The capacitor is one of them.  You can't see it in the pic, but there is a big black wire going to the top of the cap - it seems to be this bugger of a thing that is common to all the problems - machine's loss of power, grounding and so on.  I'm off to go and try to get another cap now and see what happens after that.  Even if it wasn't bad, it won't hurt to replace it anyway, the solder work on it looked to be original

[Pintoxicated]

Anyone wanna buy a non working Jacks Open?

[Strangeways]

Checked my (former) Jacks Open - Does have the capacitor.

EMs are really not that hard - but I have found that it is very difficult to troubleshoot over email or forums. Sometimes, you can catch a fault with your eye, or nose etc.. So much easier when you are there.

Keep at it - Maybe a local member can have another look for you ?

[Pintoxicated]

Spent hours and hours cleaning, re-flowing solder here and there, moving some relay coils around without success yesterday, best I could get was the machine to kick out a ball.  Turned it on this morning and played about 15 games on it - the machine only reset once.  I am hoping that just maybe she is starting to find her groove and will start working more consistently.  I will reflow solder to the remaining connectoins on the transformer today and see if we can't get rid of that 1% reset.  I re-flowed the solder on the black wire that seemed to be linked to everything that was playing up.  Cleaned the credit meter and ball counter.  Just got some drop targets sticking if they get dropped by a glancing ball strike - some more cleaning to do there.

[Strangeways]

Spent hours and hours cleaning, re-flowing solder here and there, moving some relay coils around without success yesterday, best I could get was the machine to kick out a ball.  Turned it on this morning and played about 15 games on it - the machine only reset once.  I am hoping that just maybe she is starting to find her groove and will start working more consistently.  I will reflow solder to the remaining connectoins on the transformer today and see if we can't get rid of that 1% reset.  I re-flowed the solder on the black wire that seemed to be linked to everything that was playing up.  Cleaned the credit meter and ball counter.  Just got some drop targets sticking if they get dropped by a glancing ball strike - some more cleaning to do there.

sounds like you are on the "Right track". Funny as it may seem - EMs can "fix themselves" over time. As you play the game, the contacts "self clean".

[Pintoxicated]

Ohh deary me......same result.  Played probably 25-30 games all up this morning and then as the day warmed up, fault started re-appearing and then same thing, got to a point where it wouldn't boot up a game again.  When it is running, the machine and game itself runs fine. 

Could it be a dud transformer - if so, what is the best way to test it without zapping myself and what are the chances of finding a replacement?  To look at it, it looks pretty ordinary, the insulation between the bindings has opened right up.

[Pintoxicated]

It finally looks like the problem has been solved with the Jacks Open machine.  Thanks to everyone that contributed and offered encouragment.

Turns out it was a power related contact on the AX relay that wasn't adjusted properly and was only just touching which would have been causing high resistance as the machine warmed up and then it got to a point where it just wouldn't work.

Anyway, played many many games on it yesterday and there were no signs of the machine faltering.   

Thanks again.

[Strangeways]

Great persistence has rewarded you with a working machine !

 

[goodolddays]

Good on you  . Persistence paid off in the end eh? Good to hear you got it sorted out.

[millsy]

We knew you could do it. 

[Pintoxicated]

I couldn't do it by myself, I had a lot of help from heaps of guys, especially Ralph in SA.  He spent a few hours on the phone with me and led me to the fault.

Have we as a group got a collection or database of schematics something along the lines of the DVDs that are floating around?  Something like that would be a great help at sorting some problems that pop up from time to time.   

I was pretty disappointed about not being able to fix it myself but thanks to everyone I learnt a fair bit about the machine with this fix.

[MartyJ]

Great stuff and  for Ralph!

Well, you learned about the problem and would be able to fix it next time!  Thats the main thing.