where to store your keys

I learned today not to store my pinball keys in the coin return box of a coindoor..

Usually I just leave the keys on the game in the lock. This works for all my games.
But on my Cactus Canyon, there's a lock installed with a round key. The problem is that the key pops out when the lock is in the locked position. So I had to search for another place to store that key.
My first idea was to put it in the coin return box of a coindoor. Behind the metal plate it's hidden out of view, and you can easily reach it when you need it.
I'd seen some other collectors also store their keys in that place.

When I wanted to lower the volume on Cactus Canyon earlier this evening, I discovered my idea to store the key in the coinreturn wasn't that good..
I have a big box of tokens, and my daughter likes to drop coins in the games.. even when they're switched off. So I had a coinreturn that was filled with jammed coins.
Had to remove them one by one until the metal plate could be moved back enough to remove the key and the rest of the tokens..

did Stern become Gottlieb ?

I have to admit I don't often play new Stern pinball machine. Wait, make 'almost never'. Lost interest a few years ago in them, and even while I can visit the local Stern distributor when a new game has arrived, I almost never do. Last time I went there to write a review of a game was for the Stern Grand Prix pinball machine.. so that's many years ago..

I did visit this dealer later when Wheel of Fortune and BDK where new, but didn't bother to write a review (as other sites like pinballnews are faster and write a more in-depth review that I could do after playing two or three games on a brand new machine). A while ago I also played a few games on a brand new Iron Man machine, but I was always more checking out things on the playfield (what to shoot for, how's the artwork, ..) than ie looking at the display.

Anyway, this weekend for the first time in many years I went to a local pinball competition. It was organised in a very impressive looking gameroom, with a sweet setup of games. I hadn't entered the competition so was playing for fun on a few of the latest Stern games (there was Iron Men, Batman Dark Knight and Spiderman next to eachother).
After playing IM and busy playing BDK, my brain finally started to work.
Wait.. all these games have a red display and not the regular orange dmd displays as we're used from Williams/Bally.. and those fuzzy animations, movie clips that have been captured and playback very badly on a red dmd.. I've seen this before !!

I've had a game like this many years ago, a Gottlieb World Challenge Soccer ! During gameplay it would show movie clips (of a soccer player passing a football, scoring a goal, ..) in a really crappy digitised format.. WCS isn't the only game, other Gottlieb games with dmd's had this too..

Stern has been doing this for a few years already, don't know how it comes I only really noticed last weekend how similar it is to what Gottlieb had been doing all time.

remote battery holders

I've started again to make remote battery holders. Easy plug-in type, no soldering or other technical knowledge is required. 8 euro each.

Protect your expensive game from damage because of a leaked battery !

Many people don't know this but every electronic pinball machine has some kind of battery in them. Because of age (as the batteries have never been replaced) but also because of a malfunction, they will start to leak and do irrepairable damage to your mpu board (making your game break down - and it may be an expensive repair to get the game working again). Usually when your pinball machine does not start up anymore it is way too late already to repair it..

The last months I've seen more and more games with leaked batteries.. so be careful.
Until a few years ago I didn't see battery damage a lot. When I saw it, it was usually because of a bad battery or technical malfunction, and only 1 had started to leak (sometimes only a few months after it was brand new installed).

As most WPC games are not getting 15 to 20 years old, those batteries installed from the factories all have had their best time and start to leak. All three batteries leak, first only the battery holder had some corrosion on the contacts, but if you're not quick to detect and repair this, the damage will spread to the ics on the cpu board itself.

So if you have a Bally / Williams game with a dmd (or older 80ies game), replace the batteries and install a remote battery holder to prevent a costly repair in the future !

Back from holiday

Back from holiday, time to start working on pins again.

Removed all top parts from the Gottlieb Majorettes, will clean the playfield. Then it'll go to Henk De Jager for technical repairs, he'll put the game back in original condition (remove all the 'extra' wiring) and get it working again :)
Can't wait to play that machine !

Took most parts off the playfield (still need to desolder and remove the bumpers), gave the playfield a fast cleaning (to remove all dirt on the surface) and still need to use a polish to make the playfield shine and really clean.


Our pinball fridge is for sale.. we need to make space in the gameroom. So if you are in Belgium or the Netherlands and need a cool retro fridge for your pinball gameroom, let me know..

And I finally have to clean up the gameroom as now it's totally a mess.. a lot of toys where my daughter plays with in the garden are in there, there's an empty cabinet (and all the hardware of it) from an IJ of a friend that he'll redecal at my place, and much more..

new custom pinball machine for Metallica

Added Beatniks Koolsville to my list of custom pinball machines, it's a conversion of Elvira and the Party Monsters, commissioned by James Hetfield