What did you do today in the hobby?

[semicolin]

Not too bad at all. It just needs a couple of reflows and it will be perfect…

[cait001]

someone's been snacking on the green Smarties.

What game/system is that from? Gameplan?

[semicolin]

Game Plan Star Trip cocktail. Needs some love. A lot of it.

[dr.nybble]

Working on the Bullseye Baseball repaint, finishing up the cabinet before the weather says no.

Painted with laser cut MDF stencils.

[Honey Badger]

Looks great Sean!

[semicolin]

Finished repairing this rotten game plan mpu board. Tomorrow I rebuild the power supply and we'll see if it will boot up.

[cait001]

I got this amazing print from a Japanese print maker and historian that I have been working with
http://pinballnovice.blogspot.com/2021/ ... iyama.html

And I collected a 1923 series of articles on carnival game scs work
http://pinballnovice.blogspot.com/2021/ ... re-of.html

[semicolin]

it's alive!!!

[WARLOCK]

I sat beside a lonely donkey; all the day long today, my friends.
And, I realized that this donkey: was more clever than ah me.
What he did was weighted and so true. Oh pooh, and boo.
He is far smarter than I gave him credit to, woo & hoo.

[WARLOCK]

My apologies for the rusty prose.
I am out of practice I suppose.

[WARLOCK]

Trying to figure out how to make some early 80's Williams to behave.
And comply; so we can play them once again. Cheers. Salut.

[WARLOCK]

Still working on games daily.
No other real things to report.

[cait001]

discovered they made an Akira pinball machine for a photoshoot by laying artwork on top of Buck Rogers and it's amazing
https://pinballnovice.blogspot.com/2021 ... nball.html

[Mrhide]

Kaaaanneeeedaaaa!!

[R.A.B.]

I don't usually post on this thread since I am not really in the hobby anymore, but rather preside in the coin operated amusement business and occasionally in some select philosophical cigar parlours. Forget that, sometimes my job is great fun, and sometimes it gets ugly, but hell, everyone has to earn a living somehow. In the end, it has been a cool way to do that barring a few wrong turns I took at Albuquerque.

I found myself doing stuff last night that could be an indication that the hobby and I are still on speaking terms. I decided that my 1936 Bally Bumper (which was given to me by a didactic no nonsense senior years ago) needed a topper. You see, Bally had a sort of red wooden oval cube (if I can put it that way) as the original topper, maybe a way to mark out the machine on location. But since mine has not been on location for at best the past 80 years, the original topper has gone missing. Knowing this, I permitted myself to connect the dots to the past sort of speak.

First, I placed an old & heavy mantle piece ornamental lamp (circa 1930's) that my grandfather had purchased new and which somehow ended up with me on top of Bumper's small backbox, (not me, the lamp). I was thinking that it would make a cool topper next to my other hobby artifacts, - smoking and writing, one of those I have given up for the time being, I will let you guess which one. Read on.

Bumper's Toppers

When a nickel is insert into Bumper's pushslide, the machine resets the digital counter and lights up the score for a 5 ball game. A little after the game has ended, a timer in the machine turns off the AC at the source in order to save electricity, a “good night Nellie” sort of thang. I decided that my grandparents old lamp should follow suit since the Nellie on top of the lamp is holding on to some weird ornamental flower vine or snake or combination thereof, regardless, I wired her likeness into Lady Bumper, that's how Don Shepherd would call her.

Big Snake & Flowers

Then I decided that the technologies we have used in the past 100 years or so needed to be displayed via the objects I happen to find around me. I may have had too many cocktails last night.

Don Shepherd's B-day card

Found a Stern game rom circuit board in my junk and symbolically “wired it” to a Gottlieb relay bank that I like very much.

Beast of a Relay Bank

Roms to Bank

Put that whole contraption under Bumper and saw the jones connector going nowhere..

Under Bumper

So I decided to send that connector stemming from that beast of a relay bank up to the backbox of Bumper in order to just have it hang there symbolically, as if the jump from Bumper to the 1950's was a great leap, I guess it was.

Up to Lady Bumper's backbox

Nothing like a worldwide war or crisis to make technologies leap ahead and build a new reality for folks to keep up with. It is a good thing that most of us don't live past hundred, because it is getting tougher to hold on to all our marbles as time marches on, derailing many via an accelerated pace.

Game Over Lady Bumper

Rabble Babble

[OTTOgd]

I played a Stern Godzilla LE tonight and it was awesome. Excellent fun and flow, imho. I'm a connected Stern Insider now too. I want more.

[cait001]

I am so so so impressed with what Elwin has done. I'm sure the Pro is an amazing game, but the Prem/LE features blow me away far beyond any other Stern

[OTTOgd]

I am so so so impressed with what Elwin has done. I'm sure the Pro is an amazing game, but the Prem/LE features blow me away far beyond any other Stern

Keith Elwin's games are excellent, imho. I did not want to stop playing after a couple hours of exploration. Iron Maiden is still a fav but JPLE is great too. I have yet to play AIQ, darnit.

[semicolin]

Built some adaptor boards so I can put LEDs in Star Trip.

[R.A.B.]

Went to my new shop after work at Alouette today and spent a good three hours there by myself organizing this amazing space while letting Montreal traffic subside, and in those free wheeling moments of re-organizing my stuff for the next chapter of my life, I felt like a kid again and that is something I haven't experienced in ages. It scared the shit out of me even though it felt so good. So I am very happy today, and will probably be in the same space tomorrow as I take on four home service calls, which is a lot for one day, but the demand is growing as more people acquire these things for their homes and I am more than ready to respond with the experience that can only come with time, trial and error over so many years. I felt good knowing that my new space is dedicated to the business of home service which I have been answering to since 1990, and now this shop is definitely a place to grow from and share with the real friends I value and who are likeminded.

Last Monday, an acquaintance of Cybercid's brought me a Gottlieb "Target Pool" on his way up to Mont Tremblant. This couple had planned a two night getaway up there and hauled up this pinball machine that had been seriously fucked with and had never played properly since they purchased it from the owner who said it was just a fuse. Well. it wasn't only that. This couple is from Victoriaville and Pierre had spent hours trying to get their pinball to play right and probably cursing in French under his breath. He did not succeed to resolve the hassles and finally told them to bring it to the Montreal Pinball shop since it was their best chance at getting it to play as it should. Target Pool is a fantastic game by Gottlieb, and the problems I observed were just as extraordinary. Without the schematic (I had two copies in my files) I would have taken much longer to resolve the problems. They picked it up on their way back down from the Laurentian wilderness.

But back to this day.

Just sorting out this massive parts inventory and seeing some really cool things I haven't seen since I left Pitt street in 2015. Made me feel like my world had a good chance at coming around again. All this history and all these parts and industry artifacts that I have unintentionally accumulated over 30 years of flirting with the hobby and then working in the industry throughout my life hit me hard tonight. I even found my long lost crazed monkey ring and stuff from trade shows when Bally/Williams ruled. I was besides myself and felt sad for the noobies who are paying such a high price to get into pinball now with all this hype and marketed bullshit. And even though I am 58, I felt crazy happy and free from the world of screwballs and the corporate clowns who make us think that the world is theirs to sell to us. The human condition remains eclectic and wild, controlling it reduces the creativity that is innate in all of us. Did you ever get the urge to punch a salesperson in the throat when they talk the talk and assume that you for a moron who doesn't know what you want ? I have that urge every time I see any form of advertising.

I don't think there is any other place I would rather be than where I am at present. I will defend my happiness from those who want to make things one dimensional and limit the possibilities and choices that we are blessed to acknowledge as intelligent sentient beings.

"Fuck it dude, let's go bowling"

Rab

[cait001]

I compiled pictures + the data from a 1938 Bally Operator collections book and put it online for people to download https://pinballnovice.blogspot.com/2021 ... -book.html

[OTTOgd]

Got a Pop-a-Puppet pin ball and thankfully it's slightly smaller than a classic Stern because my basement is full! I scored 11,100 on my first game.

[WARLOCK]

So much accomplished today.
So little to report until much later.

[semicolin]

lol come on

they actually put in longer and longer lane guides instead of just filling in the damn holes once

[Guard]

Cleaned up and led'd an old friend. Today I try and unstick the backglass from the lightboard. Can't get to the bulbs in the head right now....