I have a Bear Claw machine, which appears to be the same as a Clean Sweep crane machine. The claw was not working and ended up being a couple of problems wrong with it. The first thing that I noticed was the string was wound backwards and the claw wouldn’t lower. I undid the string and wound it the correct way. Now the claw was lowering, but the claw was not closing.
I took the claw apart and noticed that one of the wires connecting the coil was starting to come apart. I stripped back some of the wiring and resoldered the wire to the coil. This allowed the coil to engage but still did not close the claw. I noticed at this point that claw was bent in a couple spots and was binding when the claw tried to close. I bent these points back, and now the claw is working again.
Off to go catch me some more beanie babies!
I did add a free play to the machine sometime ago. I usually don’t add these, but wanted to for this machine. I just took the credit switch and ran it to a credit button on the outside. Easy to switch back if I want to use credits or not.
