Nishijin B Angel Refurb

[NJ_Mike]

Hello again all,

As promised a post on my first refurbished machine, the Nishijin B Angel.

This was the second machine I bought, but it was plain to see that the seller kept it somewhere clean and dry. The only problems were slight water staining and dust, but not too much dirt, throughout the machine. As we saw in the YouTube videos earlier this week, I'm not inclined to blame water stains on the people I bought it from, as it could have happened when the machines were "reconditioned" leaving the pachinko parlor.

Because Angel was in relatively good shape, I decided to work on it first, and I decided I wasn't going to take the machine completely apart. I polished the nails without removing them from the play-field using Brasso. I cleaned all the chrome in the front with Blue Magic. I used Gel Gloss on the play-field and plastic pieces and good old fashioned soap and water on the back plastic pieces.

On the back I only took off the easily accessible parts and removed none of the lever pieces / rods / e clips, only the one that connects the main hopper empty linkage. I was able to get to most of the machine that way, although after I practice on my other two Nishijins, I will probably go back and completely take apart the back and clean again. When I put the parts back, I used #4 screws to replace the staples

I also did not paint any of the parts, you can see in the pictures they need it and painting is on my list of future to-do's. Same with electric. I'd like to rewire the entire thing, replace the empty hopper and jackpot indicator contacts with new ones and maybe upgrade to LED's. If I do the LED upgrade, I'll probably add some circuitry to flash the lights during a jackpot. The lights don't come on long enough for me. I also have some other electrical ideas, but we'll save them for when I get to it.

The pictures of the machine as it is today are attached. Angel has a sticker date of 52, which is an expiration of 1977, so maybe manufactured in 1975?

One of the tulips stuck open quite a bit, I was able to fix that by bending the downward facing prongs on the front of the tulip see-saw, and it works fine now.

The bell at the jackpot outlet seems to be held by a rivet (because I didn't completely take the machine apart, I'm not sure) which is loose, so the bell can be alternately really loud or muffled, which I can control by reaching in and spinning it until it catches or is loose. I can't seem to tighten it permanently by reaching in the front of the machine, which is why I think it's a rivet.

Every once in a while a the jackpot bell sounds odd and the payoff comes out into the receiving (lower) tray, which I find unusual, but it doesn't happen often enough to make me figure out why just yet. Maybe when I take apart one of the other machines, I'll try to figure out why.

For those that are interested, the jackpots work as follows:

A ball that falls into the top hole in the main jackpot falls down behind the jackpot and exits underneath the angel (or Cupid?) into the hole on whatever side of the upside down heart (angels wings?) that the angel is pointing to (using the bottom point of the angel plastic as a pointer), then opens the inside tulip on the same side the ball enters.

There are holes right at the dove's heads, left and right, that allow balls to fall down to the second hole in the middle of the main jackpot. Balls can also enter directly from the sides at 11 o'clock and 1 o'clock on the jackpot circle. A ball in that hole opens both tulips on the side that the angel (or Cupid?) is pointing to. And then the angel / Cupid swings to point at the other side.

A ball in the outer tulips opens both itself and the inner tulip next to it.

A ball in the inner tulip opens itself only.

Very rarely a ball will enter the upside down heart thing below the main jackpot feature on its own, the action is the same as if it fell from the upper hole in the main jackpot - it opens the inner tulip on the side of the hole it enters.

I find the machine to be an interesting combination of gothic (the piece above the jackpot) and cute (the cupid guy on the pointer below the jackpot). It's pretty fun to play for an antique too.

Mike

PS - I was wearing an orange shirt when I took the pictures and I can see now that I look that it throws off the color of the inner tulips in the third picture.

[DrDark]

Nicely done for sure.
Thanks for sharing.

[Microbus99]

Nice job! Very clean! How long did it take you to polish those nails? I did mine after I pulled them and it still took a long time.

[JACKSJE4]

Beautiful job!!

[NJ_Mike]

Gordon - based on other posts I read on PachiTalk, I applied Brasso to small groups of nails, or individual nails and then polished them with shoelaces, like you would shine a shoe.

I found that the elastic from the legs of an old pair of boxer briefs worked well also, it was cotton fabric and I cut it off in a solid ring so at times I would be able to run it like a serpentine belt around groups of nails above and next to one another. A car reference for the Audi engineer.

All told I would say I put in at least 5 - 6 hours polishing the nails alone, and I wasn't completely satisfied with it and had to go back and do quite a few over, spots were missed. I had lots of little cuts on my fingers.

Another lesson learned - I did the nails last and had to re-clean the play-field. I think I'll try removing the nails on my next refurb, but if I don't, I'll polish the nails before I clean any other part of the machine. There is a lot of dirt and grime (25 years+ I guess) that gets loosened into the machine and the Brasso mucked up the play-field a bit.

Mike

[victor]

hi nice job how did you polish those nails again , i just got one myself, a nishijin B don't know the name on front , where would i start first...
thank you
victor

[NJ_Mike]

Victor - there are a lot of more experienced people around than me, but I would start by polishing the nails. If you aren't going to take them out of the play-field, I put a little Brasso polish on a rag and cleaned a single nail or a group of nails where they were close together. Then I put a little more Brasso on the rag and dabbed it onto the nails. After it dried a bit, I took a shoe lace or a piece of cloth and used it on the nails like a shoe shine rag on the post of the nail, then polished the heads of the nails afterward.

They shine up really nicely, but the rags you use will get very dirty, so I changed them out quite often. I would also recommend cleaning the nails before you do any other parts of the play-field as the dirt from the nails and the polish itself tends to get everywhere.

Also - if you use a rag that has lots of loose thread or lint, it will leave pieces / threads on the nails and you'll have to get rid of that too. That was one good part about the shoe laces, I used laces from an old pair of running shoes. they didn't shed a lot of thread or lint. The bad part is those laces were too small and thin and got dirty quickly. I washed them in my slop sink and let them dry between working sessions on the nails.

Even a couple of weeks later the nails still shine right up with a little buffing.

Hope that helps.

Mike

[victor]

thank you it helped very much...
vic

[heavyguitarman]

Don't pull nail unless you have a bunch of ruined ones and are going to replace all new. There is more to it than just putting back in the hole, there is a specific degree of angle that I had to build a jig for, and then the game has to be manually tested to make sure all targets can be made. It's a pain in the butt to do it right. I have the degrees on my custom refurbish post.

[takethecastle57]

Miracle Polishing And Cleaning Cloth . The original Miracle Cloth which has proven to out clean and polish any other product.

[Lt Teddy]

I have only been a member o f Pachi talk for a short while but I am amazed at how all of the refinshers have advanced from helping each other just over the last few months. With the small amount of good old pachinkos out their you have given new life to alot of abused and forgotton pachinkos. My hats off to all of you. Keep up the good work.

[NJ_Mike]

Miracle Polishing And Cleaning Cloth . The original Miracle Cloth which has proven to out clean and polish any other product.

I've seen your recommendation in other posts and plan to order some and give it a try. I didn't enjoy the Brasso fumes and the smell stays on your hands for a while even with repeated washing.

(Edit) - Takethecastle - you should get a commission from those guys, I just bought some. Mike

[JACKSJE4]

Your hands will smell like coconuts after using the Miracle Cloth. It's much better than Brasso.

[NJ_Mike]

Your hands will smell like coconuts after using the Miracle Cloth. It's much better than Brasso.

All I need then is a cloth soaked in rum and I'll be all set!

[digital1]

Don't pull nail unless you have a bunch of ruined ones and are going to replace all new. There is more to it than just putting back in the hole, there is a specific degree of angle that I had to build a jig for, and then the game has to be manually tested to make sure all targets can be made. It's a pain in the butt to do it right. I have the degrees on my custom refurbish post.

I agree. I took the nails out and I damaged the cell surface a little. I wouldn't take them out unless you were redoing the entire cell with a new material. I knew I was recovering mine so I didn't wory about it too much, but I was carefull and still did some damage to the cell.