Ari [APz] SovijärviOct 19

One constant annoyance with bringing pins to expos is people starting a multi player game, playing a ball or two and then walking away. The next player gets a seemingly endless game, which they'll probably abandon too. Quick power cycles don't do favors for the game and pressing the slam tilt gently requires constantly opening the coin door, a thing that becomes problematic if the game is attended by the event's staff who don't have the keys.

So here's a prototype of a mod I made; a switch that can be slipped onto coin door structure to reset the game. It's actuated by the coin return's flap.

This mod was trialed this weekend in a game expo event and it worked perfectly! The game room attendants were quickly shown what to do if someone left a game running and I witnessed it being used multiple times successfully.

The mod can be removed or moved to another game with similar coin door easily and connected to the slam tilt switch with hook clips.

#pinball #mods #hacks #arcade

Show threadAri [APz] SovijärviOct 20

On several social medias this post has gathered numerous "well duh, you don't you just power cycle the game?"

Power cycles are pretty harsh on these things and they were never intended to be used that way. I know there's plenty of people out there, who'll happily tell they've always done that and have never seen anything bad to happen. In an unrelated matter, my great grandpa smoked like a chimney and lived to 93, so smoke away.

Show threadWildRikkuOct 20
@apzpins Not doubting you, but I'm curious what bad power cycles do. Is it harsh on relays? Lights? Is it turning them back on (probably testing some mechanics every time)? Do these machines have proper shutdown procedures?
Show threadAri [APz] Sovijärvi

@wildrikku It has huge caps right after the bridges, the caps get drained at powerdown quickly, and they pull enough juice at powerup to reach the bridges' limits. There's other places like that too, but in general the desing was made thinking they'd be powered on once and then left running for extended periods of time.

For the 2020s pins there's also the fact that it takes several minutes to boot Linux from its memory card, so the time you thought be saving by "just quickly rebooting it" is lost on watching the boot splash and self diagnostics screens before it becomes playable again.

All that compared to the slam tilt switch instantly ending the game and the game being playable literally a second later.

Oct 20 at 4:05pmWeb
Show threadWildRikkuOct 20
@apzpins Aaah, capacitors! Makes sense. Also interesting, I didn't know there were modern machines with Linux on them. Thanks!
And yeah, sounds like you found a really good fix there!
Show threadAri [APz] SovijärviOct 20

@wildrikku Seems like a lot of arcades nowdays run Linux or some kind of embedded Windows, so basically they became PCs in the end.

Here's what happens if you get the wild idea to "quickly restart" a Linux based pin to get rid of a running game.

As a pro tip, at least all the Stern made modern games that have a TFT screen have a build-in feature to end a running game, by just holding left flipper and start buttons at the same time.

Show threadWildRikkuOct 20
@apzpins Yeah, a regular time for an embedded system, a Pi might take just as long. Always curious when things like restarting are missing, but it makes sense considering that in the 80s or what era a lot of those are from nobody really cared much about power usage and then they just ran until someone needed to collect the coins (and maybe even that was possible without power cycling since it was expected). I guess problems with games left alone also didn't happen since players needed to pay.
Show threadAri [APz] SovijärviOct 20

@wildrikku There's no need to even power cycle it for coin collect, you just open the coin door and take the coinbox out. These games often ran 24/7 in the bars and arcades as you said, the power cost wasn't really a thing. Nowdays my games are only on when we're open.

When looking at the technical implementation, it's obvious they are designed to be left on. Everything that produces a lot of heat, like bridge rectifiers or regulators, have huge heat sinks to manage the heat in the long run. There's plenty of modernized power supplies for pins, often getting rid of the whole bridge-cap-regulator combo and replacing it with a modern switching PSU.

The abandoned games issue the mod I made is more of this era's thing. The game is on free play, so people don't know when it's over, they may just press the start until the player count is maxed out and then they think it goes on forever.

Show threadWildRikkuOct 20
@apzpins Yeah, considering their age, I'd guess a lot of those machines are not efficient in power usage either. Pretty interesting to see what goes into the design to make them robust though. At least for PCs, nowadays you'll have to pay a premium to get hardware that can run reliably for days.
Show threadAri [APz] SovijärviOct 20
@wildrikku I guess it says something that I have very early solid state pins from end of 70s, that run perfectly today. Naturally recapped, connector pins replaced etc. but other than that, running just fine, some of them pushing 50 years on a hardware that was intended for maybe 5-10 years of use at max.
Show threadWildRikkuOct 20
@apzpins Pretty cool. Remembering how people handled some pins at our local cinema I was sometimes surprised they even survived a single day. :D Do you have electrical or mechanical problems more often?
Show threadAri [APz] SovijärviOct 20

@wildrikku The electronics have always been pretty solid, the design issues are nowdays very well understood and there are upgrades to fix those.

Playfield mechanics have stayed pretty much the same throughout the time; if you have taken a 60s pinball machine apart, replacing the same parts in a 2025 pin isn't that different.

The playfield parts are mostly wear parts, which is what most of the maintenance is.

Show threadWildRikkuOct 20
@apzpins Ah interesting, so wear comes mostly from actually playing and that's factored in. Or you customers are more gentle and don't kick the machines as much :)
Show threadAri [APz] SovijärviOct 20

@wildrikku It's very hard to actually damage the game, even with rough playing. There's just a ton of stuff that wears naturally, like nylon sleeves of solenoids etc.

If I'd see someone kicking my games, I'd return to the favor on their ass.