Changing a 2 prong power plug to a 3-prong

[Mactek]

Hi. Can anyone direct me on how to change out the two-prong power cord that came with my Marvel Heroes machine with a 3 prong? It looks simple enough, but I thought I would ask. I did a search here, but didn't find exactly what I was looking for.

Thanks.

[mudfud]

the power plugs are the flat blades, and those still go to the flat blades on the 3 prong.

polarity should not matter on a pachislo, but if you want to make it to code, the smaller of the two flat prongs is the hot wire, and the wider of the two is return wire.

you can skip the third prong, the round ground prong, or you could hook the ground wire from the pachislo to it, to have a path to ground in the small chance your machine tried to electrocute you.

I don't think, however, that most of us ground the machines.

[pinball wizard]

slot-pachinko usually seems to send a 2 prong plug on their machines,leaving the ground unattached.experience from my years in the coin op amusement business told me one thing-keep all machines grounded,or you will eventually have problems with the cpu board.a modern pachinko uses a computer system to make it work,and you would not hook your home computer up to a 2 prong outlet.i do not see why slot-pachinko would think their way of wiring is good enough,but you are right about wanting to add a ground wire.it is the smart thing to do.i have purchased some machines elsewhere,and those sellers saw that it was only correct to have 3 prong plugs on their games.there is probably a green wire which was probably cut off,leaving a small piece showing.if there is,that is more than likely the wire that the parlors in japan used for the ground.i do not know the wiring schematic for your particular game,but the ground connection from each circuit board should be attached together with the bottom round pin on a 3 prong plug.the other 2 pins,which are flat,are the hot and neutral.

[daverob]

Pachinko machines don't actually need a ground connection to operate correctly. The green ground wire present on many machines is only there to drain away any static charge that the balls might have picked up while they are circulated round the parlours ball handling equipment. If you have a three prong plug, then it's a good idea to connect this wire to the ground pin, but it's not a reason in itself to swap a 2 prong power lead for a three prong.

However, if there's a ground connection available, then it is always a good idea to connect the chassis frame of the transformer to ground. If the transformer suffers a serious meltdown, then this ground connection could protect you from getting a nasty shock.


The one thing that is usually missing, that I would consider to be a necessity (having been brought up with the UK electrical wiring standards!) is a fuse between the line cord and the transformer. I would fit an inline fuseholder in the live/line/hot wire (whatever you call it over there!) where it connects to the transformer and fit a 5A slow blow fuse in it.

Without it's own fuse, the only thing that will stop current flowing if the transformer melts down is the 15/20A breaker in the houses electrical panel. That's quite a lot of power and would cause the transformer to get a lot hotter (and be more of a fire risk seeings as it's usually attached to a wooden frame!) than if it was protected with a smaller value fuse.

Now some vendors may say that this extra fuse is not necessary, as if the transformer is UL approved (or CE marked in Europe) then the transformer should be fitted with an internal thermal fuse. But I prefer an external fuse as it only costs an extra few pennies, and it might save your transformer from having to be replaced. Besides, many of the transformers that are fitted in Japan do not carry these markings, so we cannot be certain whether they have a thermal fuse or not.

[FTKServices]

So far out of all the machines Ihave purchased or worked not. None of them have a 3 prong plug. They are all the standard 2 prong plug for the transformer. I do agree with daverob & not thought of that.

[pinball wizard]

that line fuse that daverob mentioned is a good idea too.

[Mactek]

So the common answer is that a two-prong is not necessarily bad, but if I CAN ground it, I should.

[new in town]

My sister has two Machines (Pachislo's, I don't remember the names) that had to have a 3 wire plug installed and grounded the case due to getting a shock from them. I believe they were 100 volt machines.