Vintage ...What is your worst "oh cr*p" moment and what was your best "save"

[p.opus]

I saw this thread on this listing on ebay: This Ebay Auction Answered a Nagging Question. Tehis poor guy took apart his modern machine, and after not working on it awhile forgot how it all goes back together. He's now trying to sell all the peices to some "lucky" buyer who will put it all back together.

When restoring my first vintage, I had that sinking feeling we all feel when our machines are in pieces and wonder if we've gotten in over our head. Fortunately I had extensively bagged and numbered all my pieces so putting it back together was much easier than expected.

Of course sometimes things don't work out as planned...

So I wanted to know guys, When working on your machines, what was your most "oh cr*p!!!" moment? You know that moment where a slip of the hand or a bad decision makes you think you really just screwed something up. And as a follow up, did you "save" it? If so, how did you?

My CR Yamato is the first modern I've actually done any extensive work on. Recently I was trying to brighten up one of the LED's on one of the shock cannons and it required me to dig extensively into the machine. When I finally got to the LED board, I noticed the LED was "darker" than the other two. I tried various methods to "clean" it. But finally went to a Dremel tool. Well I ended up getting the stuff off the LED, but in the process, I "ground" a little too much off one side and killed the blue element of the multicolor LED.

Oh Oh...Now instead of a dim LED, I had one that was either a different tint from the other two, or completely off. Well that won't do.

I actually went back into the machine, located the leads to the blue LED elements on the other two cannons (with help of a magnifying glass), and managed to grind them off. Now all the cannons act the same, have the same tint, and same brightness.

It was as good a save as I could do. The cannon no longer matches the tint of the speaker LED's or Start Pocket LED's if 'blue' is involved, but at least they look normal now, and only I know the difference.

So guys, what is your best "oh cr*p" moment?

[emmadog]

Nothing was ruined but it was a good lesson.
I had the playfield propped up on an EM pinball while changing bulbs and cleaning. I was using some degreaser in an aerosol can and left the can in the machine and lowered the playfield. The playfield pressed down on the aerosol can and sprayed out most of the contents inside the machine's cabinet but I didn't hear it. My hearing's not what it used to be thanks to quite literally millions of rounds of various calibers as a SWCC and hunting all my life. Imagine standing right behind a mini gun spewing fifty .308 caliber rounds a second. That translate to 3000 rpm which is actually half of what a mini gun is capable of. Ours were slowed down because we didn't have the airflow over the barrels as aircraft provide so they'd melt pretty quick. Then of course 50 cals aren't exactly quiet, 240's (M60) replacement, Mk 19 auto grenade launcher, multiple small arms, and other fun exploding stuff. Plus I was an instructor my last 2.5 years in so I was always exposed to these noises as the cocky FNG's fresh from selection checked into my command and needed "help". I digress as usual. So the can is spraying and I ran to the bathroom. I return and start up a game. EM pins produce plenty of sparks and this is normal. So as I pressed the start button a loud explosion goes off. The spark ignited the vapors and blew the coin door open which knocked me in the gut. A fireball proceeds out that door and blackens my shirt accompanied by the smoke alarm going off and the dog going crazy. Amazingly the pin sustained no damage and the singed shirt hangs in the basement as a reminder to not be stupid.

[p.opus]

Classic!!! I'm so happy you didn't get hurt. What beautiful irony. You spend a lifetime around guns, bullets, and explosives and you almost buy the farm from an exploding pinball machines...

[emmadog]

yes, that is pretty funny. to think of all the close calls during high risk training and deployment and then to come home and get laid out by a pinball machine. such is life.

[heima]

Would make an interesting epitath. Great story emmadog.

My biggest oh-sh$t moment came at the office, and fortunately did not involve firearms. Additionally, no one was physically harmed, but I got a severe headache.

My pachinko oh-sh$t moment happened a very long time ago. I think it was 1970, maybe 1971. My father serviced elevators in San Francisco, so he had full access to the buildings. The buildings were located in the Financial District, Chinatown, Japantown, and the China Basin. Sometimes he would have to drive up to the Budweiser brewery in Fairfield.

Anyhow, he took a call at the Miyako Hotel in Japantown, and while there, discovered a severely busted and dirty pachinko machine in the basement. He brought it home and gave it to me. From best of my memory, it was a Nishijin New Prince. I think. This was a manual loading machine, one ball at a time. It also had a mechanical button on the front panel that though the linkages lifted a small piston, I never could figure out its purpose. If I pushed it hard and fast enough, I could launch a ball out of the pachinko machine and across the room.

The pachinko was very dirty with rust, a broken jackpot, and twisted and bent levers. I had never seen a pachinko machine before, so I had no idea how it all worked. Still I started to clean it all up. The glass was long gone so my father cut a plexiglass sheet for me. Only three balls were with it, so I really could not play it. My father said that if I got it working, he would get me more balls.

Time passed, and I eventually got it all assembled and cleaned up. Not as nice as your restorations, hey, I was 8 at the time, but playable. The jackpot mechanism confused me because of its curved pieces. The pieces would sometimes bind and I did not fully understand its functionality. I glued it together as best I could. The ball "tunnels" or ducts were cellulose folded and stapled. Not even molded plastic. I made some replacement pieces out of acetate report covers, and my father used his staple gun to fasten them.

The big day finally came when my father brought home 300 new balls, which he said came all the way from Japan. Quite proudly I set the pachinko on the dinner table and filled the hopper. With my first handful of balls, I began feeding them in, one at a time, shooting them up to the playfield. The plinking sound was quite pleasant, and I had forgotten to put a bowl at the dump slot. As balls would thack onto the frame and roll across the table, my mother quipped that I better get something under there because she wasn't going to clean up the mess.

No sooner that I acknowledged her threat, did I hit a jackpot. But nothing happened. Remembering how the weight of the ball moved the release lever down, I reached behind the pachinko and pulled the lever down. This was the oh-sh$t moment. Of course the lever had jammed, and my pulling down on it broke where I had glued it together. The sound of the silver Niagra Falls of balls was deafening. The dog was barking, the balls were going everywhere. Across the Congoleum floor, into the kitchen, into the family room, down the heater vents, down the stairs into the deep pile shag rug, everywhere.

The pachinko machine was banished to the downstairs activity room. I eventually properly fixed the pachinko, and for over 5 years, I would find pachinko balls in some of the strangest places. In a book case, behind the toilet, how they got there was beyond me. My mother would find the balls when vacuuming. They rattling as they zipped through the central vacuum's long hose. She would give me updates when this happened: "Found a pachinko ball!", and would cuss under her breath at the pachinko. This was my gue that I would be emptying the vacuum's waste bin later. She hated the noise the "damn" pachinko made and had me move it to my room and keep the door closed when I played it. And I had to vacuum my own room.

In time I found girls, video games, and cars, and the pachinko was sold at a garage sale to another 8 year old kid.

Flash forward to a few months ago when I bought my first pachinko in, what, 40 years, which was the Docker. I remembered the satisfying sound of the bell at a jackpot and though the Docker's wasn't the same, it still "dinged". That is very important, something almost Pavlovian going on. My other modern, Rose of Versailles, has no bell, so no ding.

I think I will go play the Docker now.

[p.opus]

Priceless!!! My mother hated my first pachinko machine. First, because it was noisy and balls went all over the place. Second, my Dad had given it to me for Christmas, and after the divorce, my mom hated the gifts I got from dad for Christmas. It didn't help that I was playing it all the time either.

[bundito]

Ugh, I just committed my first yesterday.

I was trying to get the dark blue launch ramp removed so I could give it a good scrubdown with Simple Green. I ended up stripping the holy hell out of the screen circled in yellow. Hard to see; right next to the red Pachinko Palace decal.

stripped.jpg

I knew from previous projects that if you strip a Philips-head screw, you can carefully cut a groove into the head with a rotary tool and use a flat-blade screwdriver. I tried that. The close confines made getting the cutoff wheel into position really hard, and impossible to keep steady. I ended up just making it worse. So I found my "Gator" stripped screw removal kit - the kind where you bore out the head with a little cutting end, then switch to a reverse-threaded gripping end. Ugh. Even at the smallest size, I bored all the way through the head until all that was left was a shiny stub of the screw shaft. I also chewed up the plastic tab a little. It's still attached, but looks super-ugly (to me; I doubt a "normal" would even notice).

Part of me wants to get it off (somehow), measure it in detail, and try to order a new one, 3D printed from Shapeways. My copy of Solidworks and my digital calipers are feeling unloved. But I know that if I do something drastic to get it off (like cutting off the tab to get it free), the machine won't be playable. I don't believe there's anything interesting behind there, or I'd get it remade with clear plastic.

This might be a minor "oh ****" moment for most ordinary people... but I've got this OCD thing going on, so... ugh.


-Dito

[p.opus]

This might be a minor "oh ****" moment for most ordinary people... but I've got this OCD thing going on, so... ugh.

I feel ya. I had to dig into a $400.00 dollar machine because a light was dim...And then even worse, After I FUBAR'ed one of the lights I had to cripple the other two lights so they would match the third. I get the OCD thing...

[bundito]

I feel ya. I had to dig into a $400.00 dollar machine because a light was dim...And then even worse, After I FUBAR'ed one of the lights I had to cripple the other two lights so they would match the third. I get the OCD thing...

My lights are going to be LEDs. I decided that the moment I inspected the original wiring. Those old-school screw-in light bulbs are a PITA (pain in the a**), they require more power, and they give off heat.

I don't think my old Sankyo has/had many lights (3, maybe?), but I'm going to add more. I particularly want a light inside the plastic dome near at the launcher area. I plan on adding some inside the back mechanism (with a switch) so I can show my mechanical-nerd friends how nifty the levers and balances are.

I still don't know what to do about my stripped screw. I could probably drill it out with a hard steel drill bit and use a larger screw. Or fill the resulting hole with something and reuse the original-size screw. I could cut off the old tab completely, get a new one made, and use a heavy-duty epoxy to reattach it from the inside of the ramp. Any suggestions?

[p.opus]

That's a tough one. Breaking the plastic tab isn't a big deal. There's two other screws holding that piece to the play field. The purpose of that piece is to keep the ball from striking glass when launching the ball. I cracked mine completely in half during my first restoration and ended up super gluing it back together. Luckily most of the break was below the chrome frame, so it's not very visible when closed.

Considering how deep you are already in, you might as well replace the background. So in that case, grind off the plastic surrounding the screw Be sure to cut the chewed up piece as well, if you can. Cut the screw off using a rotary tool and get it even with the back board. Then put the new background graphic over it and Viola, no one knows it's there. Then when you put it back together, there's no tab there, so it doesn't look like you need a screw there.

And it you are really concerned about that mounting point, then use some contact cement to stick the plastic piece to the bottom of the metal track. But I wouldn't worry about it. Those other two screws should keep that assembly in place adequately.

[browne92]

An old trick I use to remove stripped screws is to come straight down on them with a pair of cutters, each blade on opposite sides of the screw head. Clamp down on the head until the cutters dig in, then give a twist. Repeat. Takes awhile, but it works.

[bundito]

I haven't yet done any damage to the playfield. A new graphic would be cool (mine is kinda abstract), but I'm going to keep it for now. I'm assuming that can't be done without pulling all the pins, right?

That sounds like an opportunity for a whole bunch of really bad "Oh s***" moments!

-Dito


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk - now Free

[Chumsize]

Hmmm... Not a vintage issue, but on my second pachinko - an "as is" Eva 4 - I was trying to diagnose why the chance button wasn't lighting. So I figured how to remove the button assembly and all... but when I went to remove the ribbon cable attachment, instead of the male connector coming out of the female socket... The whole thing popped off the circuit board. And it was surface mounted. Really should have looked for the release latch there... not just yanked on it. Attempted to re-solder the female socket on... got close, but then never good enough to get the button to register.

Took me about a month to figure out where to wire a temporary chance button into the back of the machine... and another month to find a parts dealer in Japan who would deal overseas. It cost about a 100 bucks after shipping and all, but everything works wonderfully now.

I was on Pachitalk at the time, but I don't think I've ever mentioned this here before. I was way too embarassed. Pretty stupid mistake.

[p.opus]

I made a similar post in the modern side since not all of us follow both forums. But your story is great. I'm hoping to have Hanabi merge the two since this one is getting all the play.

[Drunkenclam]

I brought a machine. Then another, and another. Then I went through about 8 months where a different machine would arrive from Japan each month and then I went "Oh Cr*p" But things have calmed down since then

[p.opus]

I haven't yet done any damage to the playfield. A new graphic would be cool (mine is kinda abstract), but I'm going to keep it for now. I'm assuming that can't be done without pulling all the pins, right?

That sounds like an opportunity for a whole bunch of really bad "Oh s***" moments!

-Dito


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk - now Free

Believe it or not...Not really. Once you take off the other features from the playfield, removing the nails is pretty easy. Some needle nose pliers and a screwdriver handle to use as a fulcrum and the pins come out easily.

Actually the scary part is separating the playfield from the frame. But a nice pry bar and some patience and it's not too bad.

[Cheverisi]

my biggest oh *&%$#@!! moment was when I was cleaning out my Sankyo 1987 Flying carpet machine, trying to figure out why my ball launcher motor would not work (turns out skin needs to be in contact with the silver metal rim on the handle for it to work). I decided to dissect the motor and assembly to see if any wires or parts had lost contact or had broken after my motor seemingly did not work, while I was cleaning out the dirt from the cabinet, and making the following UH OH... What was I thinking??? errors:

1. I did not use a camera to document the machine's dissection and part anatomy locations (duh )

2. I took the balls from the machine that had rust and cleaned them in CLR, only to make the rust far worse and giving me black pachinko balls!!! (BOOO!!! > )

3. I got all my machine back together for the most part, but was stuck on reassembling both the Jackpot dispenser gear system and had my launching motor plastic facing // wiring // screws in individual pieces (screws, random plastic tiny pieces...)

4. I struggled for 1 month over the jackpot dispenser gear system and could not get it to fit... but my save was that I was simply placing the parts back together in backwards order // upside down (think goodness for grooved parts!!)

5. My launching electronic system sans the motor was still in complete disarray and I had completely forgotten how it went together until I randomly saw someone mention the silver is the grounding circuit on automatic launchers, requiring physical skin contact for the machine to work -- my first aha was screwing the metal facing and grounding wiring back together

6. However, the rest of the system left me in a blank for almost 5 weeks until my photographic memory finally got a dose of film developer and I magically (who knows -- ye fates of Pachinko smiled upon me???) was able to somehow rember how to piece the assembly back together and completed the process in less than 30 minutes. perhaps some of this issue was that I had misplaced some of the screws (which are not threaded like standard American screws, seeming factory unique screws) and with fitting part slots together with similarly fitting screws, I finally saved my machine

My biggest saves:

1. Use a %$#*@* camera when you dissect machines!!!
2. Draw how parts fit together to help jog your memory!
3. For the love of all that is holy, never NEVER dissect a ball assembly without having a place to save all the pieces and also drawing which parts fit in what specific grooved pieces!

Long story short ---> dissecting the modern ball assembly turned out to have a silver lining on its dark blunderstorm cloud:

After I figured out how to reassemble the handle and motor, I taught myself how to fix my 2007 very modern Taiyo pachinko when its launcher and handle did not work, doing so over a metal box to allow any small pieces to fall within to prevent my losing them!

[Rival]

My worst is a machine I am currently restoring for a client. When I went to separate the frame from the playfield the wooden spacers disintegrated. They had been completely consumed by termites leaving only a paper-thin shell. Even some of the front frame had been eaten through, they must have been really hungry. I could not believe my eyes when it turned into sawdust and splinters. Picked up a donor machine for parts and I am currently moving forward, but that really sucked. You never would have been able to tell just looking at it.

[MrAl]

Well...... I have never made a mistake......... ever :-)

[luckydog]

your mistake was posting to a "dead" year old thread