Arepachi Shipping from Japan Experience

[emmadog]

been researching online and have found some firms as well as electronics forums catering to repair. these forums have tens of thousands of posts regarding electronics repair and refurbishment of a huge variety of electronic items. i posed my problem to these places and will let you guys know the results.
without the old circuit boards i think the most likely course of action will be to refit it with modern electronics to reproduce game play. this is 70's electronic equipment so it is prolly not very sophisticated and can be reproduced with software i would think. sort of like an emulator i guess. if this is possible i'm sure it will be expensive (of course) but far cheaper than that 20,000+ machine for sale at an earlier date!!

[mudfud]

OK. here's the reply from my electronics engineer friend

...

As for the arepachi, for a 4 x 4 bingo card, there are 10 bingos, the 4
rows, 4 columns, and 2 diagonals. So the logic is simple. If we number
the card 1 to 16 from left to right, top to bottom, the top row bingo is
1*2*3*4, where the * represents the logical AND function; all 4 items have
to be on to get a win. To combine this row with the next, we use an OR
function (+).
So the final result is:

Bingo = 1*2*3*4 + 5*6*7*8 + 9*10*11*12 + 13*14*15*16
+ 1*5*9*13 + 2*6*10*14 + 3*7*11*15 + 4*8*12*16
+ 1*6*11*16 + 4*7*10*13

This logic is easy to do with cheap logic chips of the old 7400 series TTL
(Transistor - Transistor Logic). We could use 6 chips type SN7420, which
is a dual 4-input NAND gate. An NAND is a AND with a inverted output.
This turns out to be useful, since we can use the same chip to do the OR
function using inverted signals. I can explain this in detail later. I
might have some of the chips that you can have for free. We could wire up
the logic on a breadboard in a few minutes.

...

notice he said "in a few minutes"?

wooo whooo! I will get this wired up when I get back.

if you can wait, I'll send you the instructions. otherwise, look for some surplus 7400 chips as above.

I think most arepachi's used leaf switches, is this right? he recommended optical, which would be more sensitive, and is what the new machines use.

[Moparformances]

evey Arrange Ball i have seen with the exception of the LT's newest one use micro switches

dont know how a optical switch works?? but the leaf switch is easy.. and a micro switch is cleaner... i would use Micro switches,, easier to mount them since there nearly the same size as a pachinko ball...

[daverob]

While you can do it with logic chips, it would be quite complicated and require a few dozen chips to implement a full set of game rules. If I was working on this I would do it with a microcontroller chip and write the gameplay rules in software. Something like a 40 pin PIC microcontroller would have enough inputs and outputs for all the switches, bulbs and solenoids, and you would only need a few extra chips to connect to the lamps and solenoids (which you would also need for a logic chip solution). If you replaced the lamps in the cell with LEDs the entire hardware would only need two or three chips.

The only extra bit of complexity is the software, but this type of project (software that reacts to switches by lighting lamps) is pretty much the first lesson in writing microcontroller software, so could be a good learning experience.

[emmadog]

Wow this forum never ceases to amaze with the amount of knowledge on here! As far as constructing a board with the chips and components goes I will definitely have to pay someone to do that. I can barely solder two wires together much less have an understanding of electronic theory.
I understand about the logic and rules as far as constructing a board goes but wouldn't the person constructing this have to have all other components of the machine present? Not only to make sure all of the components are "talking" to each other but also so that all of the electronic connections work? I ask this also because this one is more complicated than my other arepachis. It has two of those clear box switch things (relays?) in the coin dispenser mech as well as a 8 or 10 pin connector on it. There's also a circuit board on the lower right of the machine. I'll take more pics this evening. All the info provided sounds encouraging but I am clueless as to fabricating these items. Any help/direction is greatly appreciated and I'll happily compensate for services! Thanks.

[mudfud]

While you can do it with logic chips, it would be quite complicated and require a few dozen chips to implement a full set of game rules. If I was working on this I would do it with a microcontroller chip and write the gameplay rules in software. Something like a 40 pin PIC microcontroller would have enough inputs and outputs for all the switches, bulbs and solenoids, and you would only need a few extra chips to connect to the lamps and solenoids (which you would also need for a logic chip solution). If you replaced the lamps in the cell with LEDs the entire hardware would only need two or three chips.

The only extra bit of complexity is the software, but this type of project (software that reacts to switches by lighting lamps) is pretty much the first lesson in writing microcontroller software, so could be a good learning experience.

hey daverob. my buddy and I have been talking about this, too, but I think to start, my basic arepachi will be just NAND circuits.

I have been meaning to learn to program the micro computing chips, are these like the arduini chips? problem is that I am very much a mac person, and hadn't wanted to get a winXP machine (though I bought an OQO a year ago b/c it was "cute")

perhaps I will keep it simple with the old 7400 series and then, after I get a few more of my machines cleaned up, work on emmadog's as a learning experience. long ago I could program in pascal, C and some idl, so I am hoping that writing software shouldn't be too hard

will post more when I get this project going.

[emmadog]

Here is the latest. I found out that this machine does in fact have a speaker and am waiting on replies from the inquiries I made to pinball refurb companies as well as a couple of electronics repair firms. I also emailed Satomi in the hopes that they may have schematics or some pertinent information. After I gather as much info as possible I'll make a decision as to shipping it out to a company to get it up and running. If I can find no such business/individual then it will very likely go to Mudfud's so she can have some fun with it, hopefully get this interesting machine working.

[daverob]

hey daverob. my buddy and I have been talking about this, too, but I think to start, my basic arepachi will be just NAND circuits.

The NAND circuits will only work if the switches stay on (ie a ball is held on the switch), if the ball only pulses the switch as it passes then you'll need extra logic (a latch circuit) to hold the signal on after the ball has passed the switch, otherwise the output of the NAND circuit will be lost as soon as the switch turns off.

ie if you only had the NAND circuits and no latches, then you would have to get four balls to hit the right four switches at exactly the same moment for the output to be triggered.

I have been meaning to learn to program the micro computing chips, are these like the arduini chips? problem is that I am very much a mac person, and hadn't wanted to get a winXP machine (though I bought an OQO a year ago b/c it was "cute")

I'm a Linux person, and have pretty much given up using windows machines. Although most of the development software for microcontrollers is written for windows, you might be able to get it working using Parallels on a Mac (the stuff I use seems to work fine using Wine/Virtualbox under Linux), if not you can always use boot camp if you have an Intel Mac.

You could use an Arduino as a controller, but I don't think the basic system would have enough inputs and outputs for all the switches, lamps and solenoids (the duemillenova only has 14 I/Os), so you would need to work on expanding it a bit.

If I needed a controller and couldn't find one off the shelf I'd probably use something like a PIC16F887, it's got 35 I/O pins, can be programmed in C or assembler, and only costs a few dollars. Put it on a circuit board with a power supply and a few ULN2803s to drive the lamps and solenoids and you've got something that would be more than capable for creating a custom Arepachi.

[mudfud]

thanks!!

my eeePC is Linux, so I could use that.

I will look for this chip. any surplus places to order from?

excellent point about the switches not latching. my first design with switches in series used a shelf to hold the balls until the proper match, then dumps the balls for jackpot. do they make latching nands?

looks like. will be reading a lot about programming chips this week!

will let u know.

[new in town]

thanks!!

my eeePC is Linux, so I could use that.

I will look for this chip. any surplus places to order from?

excellent point about the switches not latching. my first design with switches in series used a shelf to hold the balls until the proper match, then dumps the balls for jackpot. do they make latching nands?

looks like. will be reading a lot about programming chips this week!

will let u know.

I'm in that Business now.

Product Search - microchipDIRECT (Daverob is it the I/P version that is needed)?

http://ww1.microchip.com/downloads/e...Doc/41291F.pdf

ULN2803 search, ULN2803 datasheet, ULN2803 buy, ULN2803 sell - IC2IC.COM : marketplace for brokers and distributors of electronic components

http://www.datasheetcatalog.org/data.../366828_DS.pdf

I can also give you info and a Web site to a Company that sells Pic Micro Burners for these Chips if you venture into this realm. It's the same Company that I have the Chip burner for the AutoSlot Chips.

Due to the Proprietary information on this, Please PM me about it if you are interested.

Allot of learning is required as to being able to write the "Code" to program these Pic Micro Chips which I am starting to learn now.

[emmadog]

posted pics of this arepachi on my "random pics" folder

[emmadog]

a little more progress on game play. on the center pocket labeled "CD open" it dawned on me that when a ball goes into that pocket it also opens pockets C and D as well as lighting the number 14. going to try and make progress on deciphering the instruction placard this weekend.

[emmadog]

http://www.pachitalk.com/forums/vint...i-project.html
No new info here-just tying up this loose end on this thread as to what happened to this machine even though the original subject of this post was my YJA shipping experience. The thread morphed into this machine's condition and started on the subsequent repair.
The link above tells the end of the story.