Williams Police Force Pinball Cabinet Restore (to working condition anyway)

[dougan78]

After mostly completing my Hyperspin setup I figured I would move on to a virtual pinball machine.  I figured get a cheap pinball gut it throw some monitors, speakers and a computer in it and life would be great!  I had the opportunity to attend a arcade auction and figured, hey I would get something cheap and if I could score a Theatre of Magic (my all time fav) I would do that too.  Well I did not do enough research and the auction was not one I was use to and you could not view the machines you were bidding on ahead of time the day of the auction, which was a bummer.  The day before you could go to where the machines were and view them (I had to work so that was a no go).  So Theatre of Magic was like the third auction or so after a Addams Family pin just went for $10,0000.  Theatre went for $4500, and I was rather disappointed as I wasnt looking to pay retail.   So up came the auction for the broken Police Force cab with a "power issue".  Well never having seen it I bid the thing up to $850 and won.  My friend says man you are paying alot for a broken machine.  Well I go to pay for the thing and they charged me $550 plus seller fees for a grand total of $687(got to love a screw up in your favor).  Now the cost is important to me at least as I am not a gazillionaire and wanted to throw some TVs in it and get some vpin going ASAP.  I don't have a place at my house for it and will be moving soon so put it at my office.  Well some people at my office saw it and I told them the plan was to gut the thing.  To which they said oh my god what are you thinking!!?!?!  You should see if you can get it working.  Well I figured may as well get it working so I can at least sell the parts as working from a known good system.  Which this leads me to the restore project.   After thinking it through and actually seeing vpins in person you really want to build the box to fit the entire TV so you do not have those gaps it would seem so now it is on to a full restore of the cab(or what I would call a full restore).  Special note:  I have no electronics background, I only own 1 arcade machine my Gauntlet Legends that I bought in working condition. I have no experience what so ever with pinball machines.

 

 

Well anyway I looked at it finally and it did not even have flippers!  So I gave it a once over and saw alot of disconnected wires off coils and a burned out fuse (F4).  Started the machine  up with a new fuse and it blew.  So I found 1 of the flipper coils was burned out so I got a new one of those.  It was still blowing the F4 fuse so I tested all the coils with my multimeter and found another one that was bad(the plastic sleave was melted stopping the pin from moving).

 

 

Here is how little I know, I thought the playfields on these things were made of glass, little did I know it was just wood.  After that more stuff started happening when you turned it on however F4 fuse was still blowing.  Well, I watched some youtube vids on testing all the components and traced back what all is connected to the F4 fuse and I found it is about 10 coils, Bridge Rectifier 2, some caps, and diodes.  Ok so i tested all those(well all the components on the aux power board) and found a bunch of bad components, so i ordered from digikey:

 

2 Bridge Rectifiers -   1 is good 1 is bad so figured get an extra just in case I hate waiting a week for parts

All the caps on the board - some tested bad

new diodes for D12,15,16,3,4,6,7,23 - only 50% of them were not working

All new transistors - 50% of these were not working

the resistors tested good.

 

Oh and I forgot to mention I already replaced the relay on the board as the old one burned up and I have a spare one of those too.

 

 

 

Well now I got the parts in so it is time to remove all the old and put all the new on.  The main reason for this thread is to get feedback (I am hopeful that someone here has done some system 11b repair or general pinball repair) if I continue to have issues.  After I get this all back together, I will test the main power board components to make sure those are all up to snuff.  Last thing I want to do is turn this thing on and have it fry all my new components.  Wish me luck!  In the end at least I will have an original pinball cab and a vpin some day.  However I am sure all the stuff I am doing here will come in handy for setting up my vpin with replay nocker and other pinball components.  

 

Wish me Luck.

[dougan78]

Got all the components back on. Main power boars seems fine. Fuse took longer to blow this time after a relay or motor fired up. Checked some diodes underneath the playfield on various thing and some of those testing as bad. So will order more diodes and have a replace the diodes party.

[snaggelpoes]

Hope it will work this time mate, good luck and keep us updated.

Send from my Sony Z3 with Tapatalk!

[dougan78]

I am no expert. However to need much repair on the aux power board. The fact 2 coils were bad. Now there will be more diodes to replace. I am sure it will be a long road to get working. Just makes me wonder how all this got destroyed.

[HazzardActual]

good luck man, looks like a good way to learn a little about electronics.  Im sure the thing was surged or something.  It was probably in a bar and some one spilled a beer on the plug

[dougan78]

Here is an update. I am short on time and I found a guy near my house who is 20 bucks an hour to fix my electrical problems. So I am going to take it to him. I can clean it and do the rest if he gets it to boot. That stuff seems like the easy part. Now to find time to dump it off.

[dougan78]

Dropping it off on Thursday this week see if we can bring this baby back to life yet!!

[dougan78]

Dropped off today. Dude tested a bunch of stuff and seemed fine. He is going to get it working and seemed enthusiastic. Will see. Was planning on cleaning it myself but this guy seems excited about bring this thing back to life so may just let him if electronics repair isn't too expensive.

[Metalzoic]

Awesome, having someone else fix it seems like the economical choice (in time spent and getting it done right).

I'm really glad to hear you're fixing it instead of gutting it. Gutting a pinball machine is an unforgivable crime against humanity in my book. I'm pretty sure there's an actual circle in hell just for them.

I'm unfamiliar with this tablew, but that sideart is pretty damn cool.

[dougan78]

Week 1 in repair shop:

Power supply voltages look good.

Still blows fuse.

Should not have taken car off as it seems stuck on car back and forth boot sequence.

Cpu, aux power board and power board being tested for bad components.

Stopping by next week to put car and pulley system back on the table to see if that helps boot sequence.

I don't think I needed to remove car. I did and by that time figured oh well. Now he needs it on there. Hopefully I remember how it goes back on as I took it off back in feb.

Yeah I am a dumbass. Progress anyway and stuff getting done I couldn't do so happy so far.

[dougan78]

Week 2:

 

Guy said no worries on the car now.  So that is good.  He has a friend I guess that tested all the boards and the aux power board I worked on was perfect! (what a relief my electronics repair skills are too bad at least).  The main board had the battery pack replaced with a off board battery pack so no more leakage and there was some!  There was a bad chip for the game on it.  The crystal on the board had been replaced with the wrong one so that was fixed.  The power supply is getting looked at as he said there was some voltages off.  He is hopeful that I can have the machine back this weekend.

 

I think I will still clean it all up and put it back together.  Had I not pretty much cleared the entire playfield of everything I would let someone else do it but the gent said he has never seen the game so it would be hard for him to do the rest.  Putting it all back together should not be too bad (If I can remember where it all goes back together I did rip it all apart months ago.  I will need to fab some metal guards for the ramps.  The play field only has 1 wear spot that is down to the wood so think I will just clean it up and leave as is.  I was thinking about doing a LED kit but have reconsidered at this point and will start with the regular bulbs and see how that goes.

 

Hopefully the 2 display boards work as I have yet to see those light up yet.  So fingers crossed.

[Metalzoic]

Here's the link to the game if anyone wants to check it out. Looks like a decent table and is fairly well rated.

Interesting that it was originally supposed to be a Batman game, but they lost the license.

http://www.ipdb.org/search.pl?any=police+force&search=Search+Database&searchtype=quick

The more I look at it the more I like it. It looks like it would be worth a full clean-up/restore, then clearcoat the playfield and give it the full LED treatment.

[dougan78]

Well it works!!

Got it at home. Will take it back to office this weekend and I can start cleaning and doing minor repairs. Love the audio. Really pleased with the work done so far!

She will play yet again!!

[dougan78]

Got the flippers reconnected. One must not be hooked up right or something it is lacking power. Or maybe the spring is week. I thought I put 2 new flipper rebuild kits on. Replaced one of the pop bumpers. Connected the big speaker. Threw some balls in and wowsers!! Forgot how loud pinballs are. Will need to be an after 5pm thing. Tough for people to talk on phone with someone playing this.

As a side note. Will probably take my gauntlet legends 4 player to office too!! Easier to get it in and out of office then basement when I move. Plus it will hopefully get more use at office. I will need to convert my existing control panel to a pedastal then for my new place and use a tv. Oh well.

[dougan78]

Swapped some wiring around on the weak flipper and it is still slow. Rapidly hitting the button makes it work better so not sure on that yet.

Fixed the 2 bank targets on the right not working. Apparently they are hooked up in series and a wire was disconnected so that is all good.

Cleaned up the bulbs and put a bunch more in. Play field lights up nice on the bulb test but a section behind the translite is out and none of the larger strobe bulbs light up on the back or on the playfield so not sure why that is.

List to fix:

1 drop target slow needs cleaning

Bulbs not all working

Lazy flipper

Make spin target for ball exit have decals

Make metal protectors for broken ramp entrances

After that I guess it's on to cleaning, waxing, rubbers. Then maybe put back together?

Wow list is getting smaller and can see the light at the end of the tunnel!

[dougan78]

Well all of the regular bulbs work fine now. The flashers are not working. I suspect those may be in series and having the play field ripped apart has some disconnected. Will circle back to that after everything is back together.

Focusing on the drop target and flippers next then on to cleaning. Will post some playfield pics for some before and after goodness.

[dougan78]

Ok, well I stand corrected.  Flasher work much to my surprise so scratch that off the list.  The left flipper is still a lazy bastard and will circle back to that later.  Drop target is all cleaned up and works like a champ now.  Now for some playfield pics.

 

[dougan78]

[Metalzoic]

The turtle has a butthole. Pretty funny.

[Metalzoic]

A Police Force just popped up on Craigslist in my area. He's asking $2350

http://seattle.craigslist.org/see/vgm/5148974101.html

[dougan78]

That one is in better shape than mine. Don't think it is worth 2300 but if it is the 1k I have in mine Doesn't sound so bad then. Makes me feel better anyway.

[dougan78]

Cleaned up playfield and plastics with some novus 2. Came out good. Some of the art isn't but I am happy with the results. Got all the ramps and plastics cleaned. This week is some never dull on the steel ball ramp and 4 coats of wax on the playfield. Then put it back together. Gonna have a new firing lane spin target made and should be set except for the lazy left flipper. Oh and I need to put some metal in the one ramp that is broken, I guess it is common for the center ramp to get busted. Will post updated playfield pics later in the week.

Side note got my gauntlet legends cab dismantled from using as hyperspin and put back to gauntlet legends, well dark legacy right now. Man are those 2 games fun! Will be putting at office next to the police force. Done with giant cabs and will do a pedastal and tv at new house. Just easier to deal with at a office with an elevator.

Cheers.

[dougan78]

I think it looks better. Got 3 coats of wax. On it. Thinking I will just put it back together at this point. I am running up against some time constraints and I have a table full of parts to figure out how to put back together. Unless more coats of wax will make a difference let me know otherwise back together she will go.

[Metalzoic]

Looks good, nice job. I've never restored a table so no idea what the best to do is. I imagine there are FAQs on it at Pinside though.

[dougan78]

Well. It's been a long road. But worth it. Made a metal protectors for the middle ramp that was missing a hunk if plastic. Adjusted the eos switch on the left flipper and now that works. Got new glass coming for playfield and a new spin target coming for the shooting lane. But she is working great as is.

Another machine saved from the dumpster and vpin conversion mayhem!! Time to play some silverball!!