Power Flash Arrival Part 2

[emmadog]

Well the good ole UPS guy just dropped off this "thunderbird" PF. It's got the usual grime on the playfield but it's intact other than that. Interestingly this one was bought from "The Pachinko Factory" where one of their offices at least, was in Houston. This company shipped them from Japan and recoditioned them to include setting them up for U.S. current. The guy I bought it from (for 25 bucks!!!) was the original owner and included the original bill of sale dated 1976. As well as an owner's manual (see pic). Ok, gonna go plug it in and see if it's all good.

[emmadog]

Here's some pics. I plugged it in and the toggle switch (look to the left of the orange knob on the overflow tray) is indeed a power switch and it even lights up. Pretty cool. I played and it worked fine and jackpotted no prob. Now to take it apart and start the deep clean!!!

[luckydog]

it looks like you got a great deal

[emmadog]

A couple of better quality pics. BTW the original purchase price was 79.95 plus 2.50 for a bag of 100 balls. The total price came to 114.86 according to the bill of sale which also included the transformer and a dust cover waaaay back in 1976.

[emmadog]

The pics:

[emmadog]

Sorry these posts are disjointed but as I figure more stuff out and read the paperwork then I post. Here is a pic of the bill of sale. The flyer that "The Pachinko Company" provided with these machines says that they were less than two years old when they were shipped here.

[Lt Teddy]

I bought one the other day but will not be able to pick it up for another month. When I get it I will try and post some pictures. Damn nice looking machine you have their.

[compirate]

Let's see a close clear pic of the license stickers.

[emmadog]

Yep definitely post pics of yours when you get it.
I'll post the pics of the licenses tomorrow morning as I'm at work right now. I managed to clean some of the playfield off with some Windex. It's pretty grimy but the dirt came off with no residue. I was worried the cell would be stained but so far it has come off clean.

[emmadog]

Compirate, here's pics of the license stamps. The one at the top left of the playfield is hard to read. The numbers that I can make out are 2627 with 49 6 10
underneath that. The blue sticker of the three on the lower left of the playfield has 050 followed by a 6 with Japanese characters in between. Sorry they are sorta blurry. Lemme know if you want better pics and I can email them to you. Those are the same numbers on the same sticker on my other two PFs and the same on some of the other members PF's on here as well.

[compirate]

That 50 is Showa 50, so it expired in June of 1975. My guess - it was made in 1972.

Does anyone have this game with the upper label in better condition?

[wrkey]

Oh Emma! You got a better deal on yours than I did on mine ($5 better) and it appears yours is in better shape to boot! Thanks for posting the photos of the power switch! Mine has the same switch but I thought it was put in by an owner and not from the distributor. It's really cool to know that it's pseudo original!

I'm assuming your machine works like mine. I'll have to go find an original post of mine to see what the date says on it. I'm thinking it's a 50 too.

That is a super fun machine to play and the aggravation of the jokers closing the tulips really adds an extra twist to it.

Great find and thanks again for posting all the information!

[emmadog]

Well as far as the price goes yes that's a heck of a deal for a PF but I offered a little more than what he was asking to compensate for the trouble of shipping somewhat. It's in great shape as far as all the parts are concerned. Everything is there. I could tell by the way the extension cord was reluctant to unravel that this machine has been sitting unused for years and of course the cobwebs attest to that as well. The playfield was pretty dirty however and after a couple of hours and lots of wooden q-tips I got it clean. Now to take the rest of it apart and get all the hidden grime out of there. I'd like to pull off all the tulips and center jackpot so I can polish out the ingrained dirt but not sure how to get a tool behind those nails and pull out without damaging the plastic parts and the nails.
Anyway, thanks for the compliment.

[johnnynormal510]

Is the cell on the "Thunder Bird" the same color as the "China Man"?

I did not realize it until i got them side by side, but my Tbird is Green, and the ChinaMan is Blue.

Wondering if this is standard, or if the cell has faded.

Thanks

[mudfud]

looks green on Tbird. blue on little man.

your cabinet/frame looks great. nice job.

[emmadog]

Yep my t-bird is the same greenish color as all the rest I've seen on here. I have decided to leave the tulips and jackpot in place. The plastic polish I am using is working well so I see no big need for their removal. I'll finish up cleaning those items tomorrow as well as disassembling the front ball tray and back components to start their cleaning.

[emmadog]

Well I actually ended up taking 3 of the tulips off since the nails holding them in were a little loose anyway. The little bit of playfield that the tulips cover up and therefore sees no light is indeed the same color blue as the "C-man" PF version. For some reason the
"T-bird" version seems to fade. Maybe different dyes were used for their production run...

[johnnynormal510]

Wow..
I'm really shocked that the blue cell fades to green. I thought for sure that the green would fade to blue.

Very Interesting.

Note: From here on, I am going to do my best call the NON-Thunderbird PF the "Little Man"... Werent these machines made in Japan anyways?

[emmadog]

Ok sounds good. I'll refer to them either as the "T-bird" or L-man".
Here is a pic of the color difference. The photo doesn't do it justice as the color is washed out somewhat. Basically the color difference is more dramatic in person. Also here are a couple of pics of the grime level present in the innards of my t-bird. I'm glad I decided to break it this far down otherwise I would not have seen nor get to all the gunk the balls would have been rolling thru.

[mudfud]

very interesting about the color fade. at least it faded evenly, eh?

that is a lot of gunk back there... good thing you are doing the deep clean.

and thanks for the re-name of "little man"... I can remember being called a "C man" growing up, and it wasn't fun.