Introduction
One of my favorite customers bought this game as a project to see if he could restore it. This game did not weather well (pun intended) as it was in a house that had flooded last spring.
Here are some of the original photos that the customer shared with me.
He did a great job cleaning it, redoing the backglass, and cabinet. Once he got it back to a reasonable state, he called me to see if I would go over the electronics of the game. He did quite a bit of cleaning on all the mechs and switches, so this significantly helped. I have worked on a number of Gottliebs now and finding them to be a love/hate relationship. Sky Jump, Strange World, King and Queens, and El Dorado are a few I have done in the past.
Mother board
I started going through all the relays on the game. I took apart each one, cleaned the contacts, and adjusted any switches.
Dirty relays Cleaning relays Clean relays 1/2 way done
I then did the same process for the control bank. The switches were clean and transitioning correctly.
Control Bank
The last part of the motherboard was going through the motor and ball count unit. Once again, every switch was properly adjusted and cleaned.
Score motor Ball count unit
Backbox
A visual check showed that the replay unit, advance ball rack unit, 0-9 unit, and the score reels were gummed up. I took each mech apart and cleaned and adjusted.
Backbox Stepper getting cleaned Replay unit (misadjusted and missing spring) 0-9 Unit Rusty bracket Broken coil stop Clean score reel board
Powering On
I connected everything in the machine and added power to the game. I manually added a credit to the game and hit the replay button. However, the game started its reset sequence, but did not reset the scores. I traced this back to DB relay, which is part of the sequence bank on the playfield. I cleaned and adjusted the sequence bank and then tried starting a game again. This time the score reels did reset and the ball kicked out.
I was able to play a game and noticed most switches were not registering. This was due to dirty contacts and misaligned switches. The game was back up and running!
Conclusion
I figured this was going to be a real challenge to get up and running and in the end wasn’t too difficult. I have had a few other machines that were more difficult than this one. Once the cleaning and adjusting were done, it really didn’t have any other problems.
I still can’t believe that this game is up and running. The owner shared the original photos and didn’t give this game much hope. It just shows our durable these machines are and were built to last a lifetime.
Before and After
