wpc coil didn't work

Long time since I posted something pinball related. Recently had a small issue I'd like to share.

One coil didn't work on this wpc pinball machine. Coil had voltage,  coil worked when I grounded it (connect the tab with the thin wire to ground  - never the thick wire !) 

So the issue had to be upstream.

Next step is measuring continuity between the backbox and the coil.

And there something caught my attention,  can you see it ?

The center wire had become loose!

An easy fix, if you have the correct idc insertion tool. A few taps with a hammer and it's fixed. The coil works again. 

I'm happy it was this simple and I didn't have to start soldering on the driver board. 

Bambulab free upgrade

Great news earlier this week, bambulab decided to give all P1P owners a free upgrade.  The camera and led strip are now included to new orders and people who bought it earlier get a voucher code to order it from the online shop.

I know what to install tonight!

BambuLabs P1P ordered

I had my 3D printer for over 7 years now.

Didn't use it often, should have used it more.

It was a Davinci 1.1plus. Not cheap, but easy to use. It came assembled, had nice options: fully enclosed, a glass bed and a camera.

Disadvantage was that it uses xyzprinting own filament, which had a chip in it. Unless you hacked it, you were limited to their cartridges with filament. Not a problem unless you really started to print a lot.

I didn't print much, always used the ABS filament. 

I mainly used it for prototyping objects. Didn't want to spend hours printing objects to ship to other people, and start a shop with pinball mods. 

I just design something I like or need for myself, and make it available for others on shapeways.

https://www.flippers.be/pinball_mods.html  here's an overview of what I have made of pinball mods.

After not using it for a long time, a few months ago I started making new pinball mods. And instead of white or black abs, I am working on a mod for Attack From Mars that requires transparent filament.

So I had ordered some yellow transparent PLA. It didn't work great though, the printer doesn't handle it well. The pla often broke, and print quality wasn't what I wanted to do with it.

Worst of all: after about a dozen prints the nozzle got blocked. 

It seems other people also have the same problem: the DaVinci 1.0/1.1 seems to work great with abs but if you switch to pla (which it can handle) it blocks. Filament doesn't load well, it doesn't get through. 

A new printer head is 100€, very expensive. 

And whilst trying to clean the head I shorted something.. serious.. So that was the unfortunate end of my first printer.

I had doubts if I should buy a new one. 

On one hand the printer sat here for a few years almost unused. 

On the other hand I recently started using it again and I enjoyed designing 3d models and printing things. Even if you don't use it often, it's useful to have a 3D printer in the house.

What I did not enjoy: spending a lot of time on trial and error: prints that didn't come out well, or when I tried making parts in two different materials that should be glued together, the sizes just didn't match.

Looking around what to buy. There are many options for 3D printers, from €250 to €2500.. 

As I don't use it much and would only use PLA, a basic printer should do..

then I saw the Geeetech printers and other printers with multiple heads. Those look nice, as I'm working on mods that use different colors of filament. Printing it in different filaments at once would be an upgrade, as I wouldn't need to paint it anymore.

The disadvantage seems to be that most of the cheap printers that offer this are cheap printers. The multiple colors are a nice gimmick but the overal print quality is less, and they require a lot of time to tune and adjust things. Which I don't want to do.

And some of the cheap printers are models that are already 4 years on the market or even older. I had my doubts on the quality they would give, if it would be much better than the old printer I had.

Looking at what is new on the market and offers great quality (hopefully!) I came across the Bumbalabs P1P. It looks to be the latest hottest thing. Either it's a lot of promotion or it's indeed a bit of a game changer. I'm not sure, we'll see: I just ordered one. 

 

It should ship from Germany in a few days.

I hope that it's great and gives me a better experience and quality than my old 3D printer !

It's not the cheapest, but if it's really as fast as they say and it keeps me happy for many years it'll be worth it.

Ben Heck teases new title

Some important news was made public on Spookys latest podcast : Spooky teams up with Ben Heck and CGC to make a new pinball machine.

Ben Heck has worked together with Spooky in the past and had plans to design a new game, but due to the success of TNA (and then the run of Alice Cooper and now the insta-sell out of Rick and Morty), Bens game just didn't fit into Spookys production planning.
So having Ben design his game in cooperation with Spooky, but outsourcing assembly to CGC (who already have a lot of experience assembling pinball machines) solves this problem.

There's some speculation about what the new theme will be. Not Godzilla, as that license was taken by Stern. I wonder if someone at Stern now regrets the decision of not letting Spooky get that license. It looks like the license they did get (Rick and Morty) is much more successful, and now Ben getting his new game (and helping CGC get more business), must somewhat cost Stern in sales.

Another company who won't be happy with this announcement must be Deeproot. Ben had worked together with John Popaduik in the past - the title they've shown in preview RAZA (Retro Atomic Zombie Adventureland) started out as 'Ben Hecks Zombie Adventureland', almost 10 years ago when Ben worked together with John.. A whole era later, and John and what's left of that design is now at Deeproot pinball and they'll have a big release event planned within less than 30 days.

It's probably no coincidence Ben now starts to tease his new design.. as this will take a bit of thunder away of DR. People have limited pinball funds, and need to make decisions.. but something available now or wait and hold that money for something that's being teased and might be a lot better.. do you buy DR's RAZA zombie game that was hot 8 years ago but the interest in zombie games is over (and Stern made the excellent The Walking Dead game to fill up the gap when no other zombie pinball machine existed), based on a design Ben was involved but which was reworked and watered down (I remember something about Ben having plans for a rotating mini playfield) ?  or do you wait for the newest, hottest brand new design by Ben which may be a lot better and do have exciting new mechanisms ?  I'm sure some people will wait and see what Ben and CGC releases before they make a decision on what to buy..

Receiving and unpacking a nib Spooky pinball machine

New article about how to set up a new spooky pinball machine.

I have some old articles in the pinball 101 section about opening a game, removing the glass, and so on.. this is a new article about setting up a new in box Spooky pinball machine.
It's especially for all those that are new to pinball and fortunate enough to buy a brand new game as their first machine.