Playfield Refinish

[emmadog]

Ok so I am contemplating refinishing the playfield on a PF in the hopes of restoring it close to it's original color. After taking the plastics off and seeing the nonfaded areas beneath and comparing that to an L-man version (for some reason those didn't fade to the same extent) I believe I have found the original color, sorta. As opposed to painting I thought of buying a sheet of vinyl decal material. I have worked with this stuff in the past and it is quite durable and I have found just the color I need online. This will definitely be a labor intensive project as the machine will have to be completely dismantled, pins removed, etc. But it seems that you could get a completely smooth, uniform appearance easier and with less prep than painting. Anyone have thoughts or ideas/experience concerning this? Thanks for any input.

[JACKSJE4]

Several people in this forum have removed all of the pins from the playfiled (myself included) and I would advise extreme caution!!! While it may seem like a simple but tedious process, it is in fact risky. Many of the pins have threads on the tip, which can make them very hard to remove and equally as difficult to reseat them. Also, the holes for the threaded pins are deeper than the others, so you will need to keep track of which hole they came out of.

Once you have all of that figured out, keep in mind that almost none of the pins are straight - most all have been bent to align the heads for the patterns you see. When you remove them, mix them up and then put them back in, it is VERY time consuming to get them all aligned back up again so that the playfield looks good. You also need to make sure that the pin heads are all at the same height and that the balls will fit underneath them.

Unless you have a Pachi playfield that is in a very sad and sorry state, and there really is no other option, I would advise against removing the pins. It will take a lot of tinkering and adjustment before the game looks and plays the same again.

Jeff

[emmadog]

I knew there would be some great info on here! I had not even thought about the pins being bent. If I were to do this I would use new pins. I wish I still had an old parts pachi laying around to try the pin removal/placement on. Thanks again.

[Lt Teddy]

My thoughts on the subject were if you were going to do it you would create a grid and pull all of the pins on the powerflash carefully and lay them on it. That way you would have the pins in the exact place at the right depth and grooves on the pins.
Then I would sand down my board and take some new or old pins (it would not matter) and stick in the holes finger tight. I would then refinish the top and then pull those pins and put the originals back in the right place.

Note I have a machine I have been trying to talk Mopar into doing this with but between Him and me we are buying too much and not getting caught up. Maybe Mopar will get organized and we will see.
Of course it is always great to have ideas if you are not the one to implement them. Or do the work.

[luckydog]

poor Mopar

[emmadog]

Very good idea about using a grid. However I was considering using the vinyl decal sheet to eliminate having to prep the surface and then paint. I am thinking that the self adhesive vinyl would lay right on top of the existing laminate that way it would have a smooth substrate beneath. Then just cut out all the holes with a scalpel or the like. A potential cosmetic problem I see though is pushing the pins through may cause the vinyl to slightly "go in" with the nail as opposed to meeting at a right angle to the nail. It's a small issue but I want the appearance to be as original as possible. In the end vinyl decal material may not work but right now I see no obvious reasons why the finish wouldn't look as factory as the current one minus the fading and slight water damage. Plus the vinyl sheet I found is pretty much a spot-on color match. I'll look for the link in a sec but it's a pic of a T-bird PF with s cell that looks to be unfaded. Looks like robin's egg blue. Thanks for your input.
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Decalfx.com has the material. If you go to the uncut decal sheet link then scroll to the bottom you'll see the light blue color. Can't paste the link since I haven't figured that out yet on my phone.

[Lt Teddy]

Thank you for the ideas, I will get Mopar right on all of them. One just has to have patience. Its like the old saying with me: Patience my --- .

Now If mopar does not read any of this I will probably be ok.
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poor Mopar

Do not worry about Mopar he does alright without any encouragement.

[emmadog]

Don't know if Mopar will get around to it but that's the route I'm gonna take. The issue as always is time. I've been out of town for the past month and won't be home for another week but I am gonna go ahead and order the vinyl and new nails now. I'll document the whole process once I get started and post on here.

[digital1]

I did the exact thing you are talking about. Find my thread about the "Coke Machine" and it should answer many of you questions.

I strongly recomend making a tool like I did to put the pins in at the corect height and it makes it easy to bend pins where you want them. I used the same pins that I took out (after cleaning them) and didn't have too much trouble. I think it plays the same as before I took out the pins.

The vinyl needs to have a block out layer (it will be gray on the back) if you have any graphics on the playfield. If it is a solid color you will be fine.

The pin tool I made had a rounded tip that was perfect for pushing in on the holes where the pins came out of. Some pins raised up the edges around the hole. I pushed on each hole with the tool untill I couldn't feel any high spots and when I put the vinyl on you could see the demples where the pins go. That made it nice.

[emmadog]

digital1,
I liked your idea of preserving the registration and license stickers. I wasn't sure how I was going to salvage those but I knew I wasn't going to leave them off or cover them up.

[Moparformances]

well dispite all the slack at my pace of work

im thinking due to the damage on my cell its going to have to be a strip and paint??

but i have not totaly desided yet

[luckydog]

the good Lt will take up the slack from your pace of work