The Coin Op Pachinko Lives Again!
Thanks to one of our members the machine has been repaired.
As many of you know from my earlier threads on the machine. I spent many weeks searching for a place or person that could do the job and always came up empty handed.
It seemed as if our country was losing its educated populous. (Our members aside I still feel that it is)
To give an example of the task required. The machine is mearly a converted Pachinko Parlor machine for Arcade use. Very few of the machines were made and for the most part converted by small specialty shops for the countries that they were sent to.
In other words, nothing mass produced and no records kept. ie Blue prints.
Schematics, Diagrams etc Most machines didnt even share the same electrics as they were just sourced from whatever parts were available in the shops.
These machines were made in the 70s and now almost 40 years later one needed to be repaired.
To make matters worse I was not in the position to send the machine out for the repairs. The risk of damage and high cost of proper packing and shipping made it a non option.
Not having the complete machine to figure out how the board operated made the task completely out of the question from Electronics shops ranging from Pinball repair, Coin Op machine Repair to Grumann Aerospace,Bell labs, Rayethon, IBM etc the list of Companies that I contacted was in the Hundreds. All wanted Schematics,Blueprints AND or the complete machine!!!
None of this was required for one of our members however as he solved the functions, Read the cause of the problems and Found solutions to repair them with nothing more than board in hand, some Photos and 23 emails to and from myself.
A sample of what he had to work with by using only email
> > Subject: Re: Another Update
> >
> > Let me try to answer the best that I can from my poor memory.
> >
> > Q1 Whenever I depressed the Replay switch the score counter set to > zero,
> if
> > there was a score showing and the solenoids would open dispensing
> > balls to the play tray. The 2 Flower Tulips would open.
> >
> > The solenoid would open 3 times to dispense 6 balls at at time
> for a > total of 18 so maybe you have to send a signal 3 times?
> >
> > This same sequence happened when a coin was inserted. Credits
> were > never shown as the there were no LEDs for that.
> >
> > There are 2 micro switches that the balls trigger. The first
> switch > in the harness line from top to bottom is triggered
> whenever a ball > is pocketed
> so
> > maybe that is the score counter signal? In the photos you can see > that
> that
> > switch is connected by 2 blue wires and one brown and on the board.
> > Reading the board tracing photo reading from left to right would
> be > Blue wires to tracings #4 and #5 and Brown to Tracing #7 (In
> the > photo the
> black
> > wire drapes over tracing #4)
> >
> > The next Switch down the line is triggered by the balls getting
> a > Jackpot payout or Startup via Coin or Replay as the balls go
> through > the same
> chute.
> > Its wires are 2 blue and 1 white and on the tracings are Blue wires
> tracings
> > #4 and#5 and white wire tracing #8
> >
> > There are no switches, at least that I can see on the back, that
> determines
> > no balls or low balls in tray.
> >
> > I sent the only pre worked on Board photos hope they are big enough?
> >
> > I also sent you pics of how the harness is sent through the machine > from
> the
> > power to the plug then branching into 2 harnesses one going to the > left
> and
> > down the left side of the board and in this order are whats > connected
> > 1 jackpot light switch
> > 2 Microswitch
> > 3 Microswitch
> > 4 tilt solenoid
> > 5 Replay switch
> >
> > the other Harness drops straight down from the plug leading to the
> > 2 solenoids.
> >
> > the left Solenoid contols the jackpot butterflies the right is
> the > ball payout solenoid.
> >
> > The wires to the tracings on the board are
> >
> > Left or Butterfly Solenoid 2 red wires 1 Yellow wire
> > 1 Red wire to tracings # 17 #18 its soldered to a few red wires >
> going to those tracings. 1 red wire to the Jackpot solenoid ,
> Yellow > wire to
> tracing
> > #9
> >
> > Right side or Jackpot solenoid 1 red wire, 1 gray wire
> >
> > Red wire is the same that comes from the butterfly solenoid, Gray > wire
> goes
> > to PCB tracing #10 which turns out is the same gray wire connection > from
> the
> > Jackpot light.
> >
> > I also sent pics of the various switches and solenoids. If you need
> specific
> > pics let me know.
> > Hey Eddie..
> >
> > Solenoid control is an output signal. I saw where those signals
> > were generated on the board. That wouldn't affect what I'm
> seeing.
> >
> > The fact that balls came out as soon as you put a coin in, makes me > think
> it
> > doesn't always bank your credits even though the LED wasn't
> working > at the time. You know what I mean? Like an American
> pinball always > gives you credits when you put in a quarter and
> you have to push the > play button for the game to start. This
> pachinko seems to just start
right away.
> >
> > Now the microswitches that get triggered by balls...this may be
> > what I'm looking for. The first switch is definitely the scoring
> > sensor. That's
> the
> > signal I am pulsing to get the score to count.
> >
> > But the second switch might be the one. Is this switch located
> in > the payout path? In other words, does this switch get pushed
> by the > 18 payout balls and not by the 1 ball that triggered the
> jackpot switch?
> >
> > Also looking at the second switch, can you see how it works?
> What I > mean is, would it get pressed once per ball, resulting in
> 18 presses > after a jackpot? Or is it once per group of 6 balls?
> This switch > could be what's holding up the machine after I do a
> Replay. I might > have to trigger this signal (pin #8) once, 3
> times or 18 times. The > reasoning being that the machine wants to
> make sure the player got > the balls. Maybe it was an
> initial
> > desgin from the manufacturer and they just decided to remove that
> > reset feature.
> >
> > The pre worked on photo of the component side of the board is
> fine. > I can see that the missing resistor and cap were missing
> when you first
got it.
> > That means those guys didn't cut them out. Like I said, I
> believe > the inclusion of those components will make the counters
> get reset > every 100 points - kind of stupid.
> >
> > The photo of the back isn't clear enough. I can't tell if the > solder
> bridge
> > is intentional or not. It might be because it wouldn't be good to > just
> cut
> > out that resistor/cap and leave the pins floating. I think I'll
> put > the jumper back.
> >
> > Ok one last question...was there any solenoid to prevent the
> shooter > from working? Or is there a mechanical gate that would
> prevent > balls from feeding into the shooter mechanism? I know my
> vintage > pachinko has such a gate...it's just a little metal gate
> that covers > the entrance to the
> shooter
> > when the ball hopper is empty.
> >
> > At this point I agree...I should just hold on to the board. I >
> probably won't have a chance to mess with it much over the next >
> couple days. I really want to verify the counts to work after a >
> replay. As long as you aren't in a rush.
> >
> >
> >
> > Ok to answer your questions from the other day...
> >
> > Whatever you think is fair for the work is fine. But if you're >
> stuck with repairs on your bike at the moment, you can hold off for
> now.
> >
> > As for that ugly connector...it's a standard type and I could > replace it
> and
> > wire up some wire stubs on it...but you'd still have to attach the > wires
> to
> > the harness. It's not THAT bad. But I'll definitely put new wire > stubs
> on
> > the ones that connect directly to the board. Those solder joints are
bad.
> > When you reconnect it's easier to solder two wires together than
> > soldering to traces on a board.
> >
> > You can probably replace the LEDs themselves or get similar
> spares. > I'd have to take the time to figure out the pinout,
> spacing, size > and specs on the ones there. But this would be the
> last thing to do > now. I got you a spare for that counter just
> because they are harder to
get.
> >
> > No idea what the heck they were doing with that looped line that
> you > cut off. There are two wires there. I think one was 5v and
> one was
ground.
> > Are you saying they took the 5v one and just made it into a loop?
> > Was the other wire (gnd) just connected to something? Looping
> 5V > onto itself does nothing. IT may have gone to a certain place
> before
and they disabled it.
> > Rather than cut it off entirely, they just looped it to itself so
> a > live wire wouldn't be dangling. I'll look more carefully at
> that. > It may be something else.
> >
> > There are modern electronics that could replace it. In fact, you
> > could replace pretty much 80% of the board with a single chip.
> But > that would
> be
> > expensive and make it hard to work on in the future.
> >
> > No, the LED drivers aren't hot...warm maybe. They were hot
> because > they were fried probably.
> >
> > Yeah you could move the transformer off the board. IT would be best > to
> use
> > some quick connectors for it. I don't have any myself...I've
> been > using banana jacks and receptacles for my transformers
> though. But > if it mounts ok, this is not critical.
> >
As you can see it was a matter of his correct questions and my dumb answers that set his mind in motion.
I placed no pressure or time constraints on him yet he put in many hours and lots of work into the project and completed it in very short time considering the challange.
Never did he ask for or mention anything about money unless I brought it up.
Every letter sent every question he asked was very meticulous and professional unlike mine of course which probably got him scratching his head sometimes.
Am I praising this member you bet your A_ _ I am. It was an honor to correspond with such a fine talent and knowledgeable person.
I have a great respect for such people as they are few and far between.
Anyway here are some pics and the first 2 vids out of 3 that I am making about the machine.
The first vid is just a quick overview of the machine and the problems that were associated with it.
The 2nd vid gives a rundown of what was wrong with the board and the steps taken to correct it by non other then the Man himself. I used the personal vid he made of his work for his records with his permission.
( He sent me a copy) How cool is that? The vid is technical and very interesting for those who like that sort of thing. Others may fall asleep.
Originally the first 2 vids were combined but would not fit within the Youtube time restriction so I was forced to make 2 smaller vids and had to edit some of the 2nd in order to avoid making a 3rd.
The 3rd vid should be done sometime soon and it will be similar to my Taiyo Electron vid Depicting the Machines functions and operation.
Hope you like!!
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Originally Posted by logicprobe
幸運わんわん Luckydog or Yukiwanwan in Japanese 
. At times it was like a CSI episode. This poor pachi was abused.
I for one am very impressed.
