Wierd Machines

[lindowman146]

I was reading a post about someones machines not working properley and it turns out it may have been down to the cold. I have two working in my conservatory, Star Wars and a racing one which I think is CR Lets Go Circuit. When I plug them in Star Wars always works fine but the racing one doesnt always come on. In fact if I plug/unplug a few times each time a bit more action happens until eventual power up on about the fourth or fifth attempt. The conservatory is heated but this problem is in correlation with the temperature dropping and as the heating is on a timer the machines can get quite cold. I am now considering placing a heat tube in there to keep the temp up at a minimum of 10 degrees. I know that if you get an old computer system out of a cold attic and plug it in before it has had time to warm up to room temp, it can "blow" so could we damage our machines delicate circuitry by letting them get cold and then plugging them in ? I have checked the power conections and they are fine so I can only really put it down to the temperature as this machine has always powered up in the past.

[drcrippen324]

i always recomend bringing them up to temp if they are in a garage / games room or a conservatory / games room or a celler /games room that is only heated periodicaly

[arbycoffee]

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[daverob]

This issue only seems to effect Sankyo/Bisty machines that use the 'Samurai Force' graphics chipset (ie Victory frame machines after LotR, and all current Lumina frame machines), and as far as I can see is due to the Hitachi SH3 CPU chip that drives the graphics chip.

My last test for this was to squirt a tiny amount of freezer spray onto this chip while protecting everything else on the board by surrounding the chip with a cardboard shroud.

All three games 'crashed' within a second, and then exhibited the same startup issues they do when it's cold.

I've tried a simple hot air reflow of the solder joints on the pins of the chip, with no change to the problem. Next step would be to completely remove the chip and resolder it to the board, but it's a 208pin flat pack surface mounted IC, and my soldering setup at home is completely inadequate for something like this.

[slothappy144]

I remeber that discussion, here wouldn't a space heater behind the game solve the issue? or a light bulb below the cold circuit?

[alstonj1]

I wouldn't recommend doing this with your pachislo either .taking machines from cold to hot in short amounts of time produces condensation not a good thing for any electronic item computers included .......

[daverob]

I wouldn't recommend doing this with your pachislo either .taking machines from cold to hot in short amounts of time produces condensation

Turing on a machine that's stored in a cold room is unlikely to cause condensation, as condensation is caused by a cold item being introduced into a warm room, where the moisture in the warm air surrounding the item is cooled to below the dew point and so the moisture condenses on the item. If the item is of an equal (or higher) temperature than the surrounding air, condensation will not occur.

It's still not a good idea if the temperature is close to freezing as the thermal shock of rapid heating when switched on may cause damage to electronic circuits. Also artwork damage might occur to screen printed glass as the heat of the light bulbs can cause the glass to expand at a different rate to the inks and cause cracks to appear in the artwork.

[compirate]

I think it's something you have to live with, Sankyo's just do that. Even their Pachislos with screens do it.