Williams EM Little Chief – Balls not counting… HELP

[JRK1971]

Balls not counting… Looking for some advice

OK guys, Im a new member on here so apologies if I get the protocols wrong, may have gone overboard with my size of post
.
I have bought a Williams EM Little Chief and it has ended up being a little more broke than I thought.  Got some burn’t wire, some old repairs with some dodgy wiring etc.
Would like to pass this problem across you guys and get some ideas of what to try next… I have done as much as I can so far, spent about 20 hours so far, and no go…

THE PROBLEM – The ball count doesn’t advance to next ball when the ball hits the outhole and it spits it out into the shooting lane. I’ve done a lot  of diagnosis and explained it below (sorry there is a lot of detail here)

The machine seems to power up fine, you turn it on by the power switch and it says “Game over” on the back board, no flipper action etc (as expected). 
You press the front door “Play switch” and the 1st player light comes up (on the one to 4 can play RHS section of glass), ball comes into shooting lane, player 1 scoring reel resets. The machines  does reset the Player Unit and Ball count unit back to 1 at this point. If you push the play switch again, the 2nd player light comes on (same for 3rd and 4th).
If you shoot the ball out and let it drain (with some score), it just spits it back into the shooting lane again without advancing the ball count, or going to next player (if have more than 1 player on game). Note here that when the ball does hit the outhole, the machine does count the scores from the ball and increment the score reel.


What I’ve done so far….
I’ve pulled down the player unit and cleaned all contacts, grime etc, adjusted the springs. It does manually advance and reset when activating solenoid lever by hand (can cheat with game on and advance the “Play in play” and it does show the next player & the score reel associated with it does score.
I haven’t pulled down the ball count unit, but have checked it advances and resets manually (again, you can cheat and advance it to next ball and it does show the correct number on the back glass).
The only other thing I can mention is that the Shooting land roll over switch doesn’t seem to activate any relays or make any action although the switch contacts do work (checked via multi meter)
Checked voltages and although a little high (using the high tap on transformer), aok.
The “Match unit” in the backboard isn’t working, and the Eject advance drum under the playfield is also shot (needs a new relay plate), if I can get the ball count going, I’ll get to this next.
I’ve got a copy of the cct diagram (I use to repair electronics) but am having trouble following the logic in this EM style stuff (guess Im caught in the 90’s LSI)…
Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Regards John.

[ajlaird]

Welcome, no protocols about the size of the post if it is pinball!

There are some EM specialists who will jump in shortly...

[Retropin]

Hi John,
Welcome to the forum mate.

Ill need to have a look at some WMS schematics which ill do tonight.

Seems the game works fine apart from the count units not advancing.

Player unit advances with your hand activating the solenoid... but does this advance during game play? Or is solenoid pulling in but just not enough power to advance the stepper?

Same with Ball Count Unit.. does solenoid try and pull in during game play?

Check the contacts on these ( leaf switch stacks) and make sure that what should be closed is and what should be open is... check closed ones with your meter.

Does ball count work with one player... is problem only there with 2 players?

Not sure what the  "shooting land switch" is... any chance you can post a pic?

Eject advance drum... can we get a pic of this too?

It may well be that this relay is the trigger for ball advance etc.. but will need to see exactly what it is and also look at some schematics later.

But if one or both count units are not even trying to advance then its either on the associated switch stacks or the trigger relay for these.

Will be back!!.....

[Strangeways]

Hi John -  to AP and the more info you post, the easier it will be to isolate the problem.

I've seen a similar issue on a WMS "Space Mission". The coin switch on the door was not gapped correctly and made contact during the game. Check that the two or three coin switches are not stuck "on".

Sounds like the problem is either the Ball Count unit or an relay activated by the shooting lane switch. The outhole switch KNOWS it is the end of the current ball because it sounds like the bonus unit is counting the bonus decrement.

So whatever is SUPPOSED to be triggered by the shooting lane switch is not. Need the schematics to work that out. I think you are very close to the culprit as this is the stage you are at.

Look at the schematic, and see what coil/relay "should be triggered" when the shooting lane switch is closed.

[JRK1971]

Thanks for the advice so far guys, i've been out in the shed and haven't gotten any closer. Appreciate all your advice, sorry I'm not getting all the testing done at this stage...

Can tell you the answers to your questions as follows:

I tried shorting the two switches on the coin door (that should be touching), unfortunately no go.

Game does seem to do everything else except advance the ball count or advance to next player (except for fact that the "Eject Advance stepper unit" is broken and the features don't work -needs some parts for the solenoid plate etc) - photo of this is below, a connection to the home switch is broken (but I've put it in home position which is normally open).

A photo of the switch in the shooting lane is also attached ( I can't find a ref to this switch in the schematic (link to schematic below)

In single player it never advances the ball count unit, in 2-4 player mode (eg set for 4 to play) it never goes to next player. Going by this, I don't think I have a coil problem as 2 coils would need to be shot (have measured them). Im having trouble checking the voltage across the coil - using a DMM, will make a LED test light so I can see it visually. I tried checking the contacts on the Outhole relay but my aligator clips are cr@p - need to go buy some (couldn't check the normally open successfully, was trying to hold solenoid closed and measure, but no good as needed more hands).

I have a copy of the schematic for the machine {from here http://files.flipperspill.no/Support/Pinball/Manuals/Williams-little-chief-1975-schematics.pdf } and it looks like the (location 6c on the schematic) problem could be related to the "Outhole relay" or the "Ball index relay" - my thinking with this is because 1A and 2A on the score reel both complete a cct from this area and both do either Ball unit Step Up or Player advance.

I did find an article that shows that the "Ball Index relay" is energised as soon as a score is acheived - this is supposed to ensure that the ball count increments (the relay does energise as soon as a score is made).

That's about it so far, haven't made any progress - been looking at the ccts for a while, not getting anywhere. Bit bummed out. Oh well. One last thing, tried to measure the contacts on the score reel - what is an easy way to do this (you need to be about 2 feet high with extremely small hands to work in there.

[arcadoz]

The ball count step-up coil and the player step-up coil appear to be around E6.
If neither are operating then the contacts from ball index down need to be checked.
The ball index relay is like the Gottleib first ball relay, it needs a score to prove that the ball has reached the playfield.
 Add score to operate ball index relay and short outhole relay contacts.

[JRK1971]

GOT THE BALLS COUNTING & THE PLAYER ADVANCING 

YOU GUYS ROCK 

Ok here's the answer. The "Gate Bonus Control" relay has 4 contacts - 2 are "normally open", the other 2 should be "normally closed" but were "fat fingered" open... A test with an aligator clip shorting out the two normally closed ccts and cycling the machine through the balls with both 1 player and 4 players showed both Ball count and player count advancing.... 

The photos shows the two contacts (after I adjusted them with a pair of plyers) - b.t.w is there a correct way to bend the terminals (should you pull the stack apart?)

Thankyou very much for all your help.

 I've got to start replacing burnt wires now (not my damage) and then look at the broken parts in the "match unit" and the "eject advance drum unit"

[Strangeways]

Nice work !

I think you were going in the right direction, so thanks for sharing the fix.

To adjust the contacts, you can use needle nose pliers, or a contact adjustment tool. There's a picture here ;

http://www.pbresource.com/tools.html

"L contact adjuster"

They are easy to make from a piece of copper pipe bent to shape, and the tip has a small cut - easy to do with a metal saw.

You can pull the stack apart, but adjusting should be easier.

[goodolddays]

Great to hear you got it sorted John  .
I know only too well how tricky some of these EM faults can be.
I recently spent the better part of 3 days (in stinking heat) trying to find a bizare fault on my '68 WMS Lady Luck (busting at 20).
Its always a great feeling when you finally nail it .

Cheers
Dave