Ben's Bally Wizard! Project

[bstock]

Well I didn't think I'd even get started on this until some time into the new year, but I had some free time today and couldn't resist.

Here it is. As it sits, when plugged in and turned on the game lights up. When the coin mechanism is triggered on the coin door it triggers the score motor to complete one cycle and then it stops.

This is my first project machine, and first EM machine. Because of this, my plan is to run through Clay's systematic approach, outlined in the guides on www.pinrepair.com.

I started by checking the fuses. They all tested fine, but the 8A line fuse was actually a 20A fuse! Changed that out immediately.

Next was to check out the stepper units. After examining the 4 large stepper units, 2 of them had some issues, and two of them seemed to function quite well.

Over the years someone used some type of grease on this unit. As you can see in the video above, it's gotten pretty sticky and the stepper is almost unable to step up/reset at all.

After cleaning it up and putting it back together, it operates smoothly again.

You can see in the above video with the stepper working properly that there are two switches associated. The first is a normally closed switch which opens when the unit is reset to it's minimum. The second switch is a make/break switch which is activated when the stepper reaches it's maximum. These switches were already set up nicely and didn't need any adjustment. I simply cleaned and gently filed the switch contacts to ensure good operation.


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[WARLOCK]

Very nice Ben.
Looking forward to your progress on this one.

 

[tkaye]

Go Ben go!

 

[thewebexpert]

playfield looks great, I wish I could find a project with a decent playfield! have fun

 

[BMHouze]

I'm pretty sure I have some playfield plastics lying about. I bought some on e-bay years ago to swap out any damaged ones in my old Wizard! It's long gone now so if you need any plastics let me know and I'll have a look. You can have them for free, you just may have to pay for the postage, etc.

 

[bstock]

I'm pretty sure I have some playfield plastics lying about. I bought some on e-bay years ago to swap out any damaged ones in my old Wizard! It's long gone now so if you need any plastics let me know and I'll have a look. You can have them for free, you just may have to pay for the postage, etc.

Thanks for the offer! I believe I only have 1 cracked plastic. It's complete, but cracked. I'll let you know when I get to the playfield stuff. I've been really busy with work but I've got an update for this thread coming pretty soon. Hopefully this weekend. Making progress slowly but surely!


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[bstock]

Made some more progress on Wizard! over the last couple of weeks. I finished cleaning all of the stepper units. The credit stepper unit in the head had a toasty coil.

The coil had heated up so much that it had melted some of it's windings as well as the nylon collar on the plunger inside.

I ordered a new coil and I was worried I was going to have to try to track down a new collar for the plunger because the original coil sleeves were made of metal. Luckily the new coil came with a plastic sleeve, meaning the collar would be redundant. After I pulled the old coil and inspected the rest of the stepper, it was super gummed up with some kind of grease just like the others. The clock spring that supplies tension to the unit was also kind of mangled as seen in the picture below.

I tore the unit apart, cleaned it up, straightened out ugh spring and installed the new coil.

Next I went about inspecting the switches. I pulled the playfield and inspected and cleaned all of the relay switches in the cab, as well as the score motor switches. Nothing exciting to report here. Cleaned all the switches. Back was sore after being hunched over with my head in the cab for that long.

Score reels were next. I started with the player one reels. Each reel pulls out for easy servicing, and they are torn down very easily.

I removed all of the plastic components and cleaned the with a rag, toothbrush, and alcohol. The reels themselves were filthy.

After a good cleaning, they looked much better.

I thought I could expedite the process by removing the components from multiple reels at once and washing them in the sink with warm soapy water. I let them soak for a while and then started scrubbing with a brush. Luckily I noticed quickly that the heat and soaking meant that I was scrubbing the paint right off one of the score reels. Luckily I caught it before more damage was done. Only damaged the numbers one reel. Lesson learned.

The mass cleaning didn't seem to save much time, and the parts weren't coming out as clean as working on them one at a time with alcohol and small brushes/rags. The rest will be done individually the "slow" way. Cleaned and reassembled all reels on player one score, and checked them all for proper operations. The all function smoothly now that they are clean.

When I was inspecting the reels, I noticed a few issues that needed to be taken care of. Two of the wires running to the switching which are in charge of indicating the "0" position of the reel had broken solder joints at the lug. Some f the switch stacks were also loose.

Tightened the switch stacks and resoldered the wires. Player one reels done. Three more to go.

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[spiroagnew]

Luckily the new coil came with a plastic sleeve, meaning the collar would be redundant.

I've heard that somewhere before....

 

[bstock]

I've heard that somewhere before....

Good prediction Rob.


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[bstock]

Finished cleaning all of the score reels. Nothing exciting to report with the rest of that job.

I inspected all of the switches on the playfield and couldn't see anything funky. I reinstalled the playfield and plugged it in.

Was very pleased when the credit unit stepped up properly. As you can see in the video, the player two score reels didn't want to reset properly. I took a look and they seemed to be getting hung up mechanically. The plunger was getting stuck in the coil sleeve.

I tools it apart and cleaned the coil sleeve and tried again but ended up with the same problem. I couldn't get it stuck when I was advancing it manually, so I'm not exactly sure what the issue is there yet. I'm going to order some new coil sleeves and see if that helps.

In the meantime I reset the player to reels manually and tried again.

I almost couldn't believe it when that ball kicked out into the shooter lane. A lot of things have to happens correctly on these old games for that to happen. Next I figured I'd give it a go.

Unbelievably happy to see this game working. Great feeling to rescue a 40 year old game from a barn and get it up and running.

If you're wondering why I wasn't using the shooter rod, this is why.

Now it's time to make a list of everything this machine needs, order parts, and start cleaning it up!


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[Menace]

Nice work Ben! Feels awesome bringing something like this back from the brink eh?

D

 

[WARLOCK]

Ben, great work bro! Well done.

 

[DRANO]

Very nice Ben!!!
I find EM repair very rewarding. These older machines need more love

Nice work.

 

[bstock]

Now that the game is working it's time to tear it down and clean it up. I started tearing down the playfield. As soon as I started removing some of the posts I got pretty excited seeing the nice clean white underneath. I removed and bagged everything from the top of the playfield.

I don't have a rotisserie but I figured I'd be ok if I just flipped it upside down and set it across the cabinet to strip the bottom.

This is the first time that I've completely stripped a playfield. I wasn't sure what the best plan of attack was but after taking a look at everything I figured I would detach everything and then transfer it to a towel.

I started with the towel rolled up under the bottom end of the playfield and then kind of unrolled it under all of the parts.

After everything was on the towel I simply slid it off the playfield.

All of the lamps were tied together in loops of common grounds with wire that is stapled to the bottom of the playfield. I felt like the easiest way to remove these was to clip all of the wires at the lamps and run new wire when I reinstall the components. Once everything was removed from the bottom I marked out how the wires were run around all of the switches so that I could easily re-run the wire.

The last step was to remove the trim and apron.

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[tim.sanderson]

Wow! Good job, dude! You're braver than I... I haven't yet mustered up the courage to totally strip a playfield.

 

[bstock]

Started cleaning up the playfield today. First I used a rag and some novus 2 to clean off the top later of thick dust and dirt. Every time I clean a playfield I'm amazed at how much heavy dirt is all over them. This was no exception.

After removing the heavy dirt, I went to town with the rubbing alcohol and magic eraser. You can see in this picture that the magic eraser was doing a good job pulling the dirt out of the ball swirls on the playfield, which were extremely visible on the light yellow artwork.

There wasn't much left of the magic eraser by the time I was finished, but it cleaned things up and it looks a lot better.

Now that the playfield was cleaner, it was time to assess the overall condition. There was some wear at the bottom of the playfield from the apron, as well as where the right flipper had dragged. Also some minor wear around the switches in the inlane/outlanes.

The lower playfield overall was in pretty good shape. The inserts have very little cupping and there is only very minor wear around them.

There was a bit of damage around the pops, but overall it's not too bad.

The flip flags have also made marks on he playfield.

The worst part of the playfield by far was near the eject hole at the top. This is the area that I was most worried about touching up because of the damage to the text.

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[Chris Bardon]

Nice progress-the touchups don't look too complicated, but still not something I've ever tried doing. I'm a little surprised that magic eraser didn't lift the paint though. Are you planning on clearcoating the whole thing once you're done, or is that generally not a good idea with EMs?

As an aside, I actually did a double take on one of your photos-I think I have the same carpet in my basement, my walls are a similar colour, and I used to have a WCS at the end of a row next to a wall.

 

[bstock]

Nice progress-the touchups don't look too complicated, but still not something I've ever tried doing. I'm a little surprised that magic eraser didn't lift the paint though. Are you planning on clearcoating the whole thing once you're done, or is that generally not a good idea with EMs?

As an aside, I actually did a double take on one of your photos-I think I have the same carpet in my basement, my walls are a similar colour, and I used to have a WCS at the end of a row next to a wall.

Thanks Chris. This was my first time using a magic eraser. I've heard it can lift the paint, so I was very careful at first, but by the end I was really using quite a bit of elbow grease on some of the heavily soiled areas. As far as I know these playfields had a varathane type coating on them and it seems to be pretty tough. My plan is to clear coat it, which is the next step after more cleaning and prep. Once I lay a thin layer of clear coat I'll start the touchups. I'll be using water based acrylic paints to do the touchups, so if I screw up I'll just be able to wipe the wet paint off the clearcoat with a damp rag easily. Once the touchups are done I'll lay a few more layers of clear and leave it to cure.

 

[FastEd]

Thanks for sharing Ben! These posts are very inspirational. Are you going to do the clear coating yourself or send it out? I would be very interested in how you proceed.

 

[bstock]

Thanks for sharing Ben! These posts are very inspirational. Are you going to do the clear coating yourself or send it out? I would be very interested in how you proceed.

Planning to do it myself. I have access to a paint booth at work. I'll be continuing to document the process as well as I can. This whole thing is filled with firsts for me, the clear coating is no exception. I'm a bit nervous about it, but with some guidance I'm optimistic! I should also mention that I'm in constant communication with several of the "vets" around here, specifically guys who have done lots of stuff like this before. Without the assistance and guidance of several great people in the hobby and on this forum, this would be a far more intimidating process.