Rebuilding E.M. Pinball Stepper Units & Score Reels - Williams Pat Hand Repair Part 2

[@mikekelly9129]

I don't always comment but always watching from start to finish 👍

[@LyonsArcade]

We appreciate you spending time with us Mike, thanks as always :)

[@SheaRibbster]

Dielectric is a non-conductive insulator ALWAYS. Connection comes into play once the two surfaces swipe or press together, like this stepper wheel or a spark plug connector, and the spring pressure and/or swiping motion displaces the grease at the metal to metal contact points. Love this channel, awesome videos!

[@LyonsArcade]

Thanks for watching Shea, we appreciate it!

[@d.s1209]

I had the fortune of buying a pointy people Williams Gulfstream last night. It plays but has several glitches. My expertise on Pinball machines was 0. Watching your videos has been so informative and am very grateful of your work.

[@LyonsArcade]

I haven’t had one of those yet but it should be very similar to other Williams games we’ve covered in the past!

[@loriloucks4560]

Hey Joe, I think your videos are super. I recently aquired a Williams Pat Hand and then a Balley Kick Off. I love the fact you have videos for both. You are a great teacher and I appreciate you taking the time to make these helpful videos. You seem like a fun guy too. 🙂

[@LyonsArcade]

Thanks Lori, I'm glad you enjoyed them! I enjoyed both of those games, you've got a couple good ones there! We'll see you on the next video, have fun with them!

[@SpearM3064]

One commenter said it yesterday, and I'm going to repeat it: It's amazing just how much engineering actually went into these. I bet a lot of people think of pinball machines as simple, but find out that "behind the scenes" (so to speak) it's anything but. As for those mud daubers: I feel you. Those things will build a nest in places you didn't think even an insect could fit. (I remember a power strip where they plugged up every single power socket. Took me a half hour to clean it out so I could actually plug something in.)

[@-abacchus]

I guess that was my comment you're referring too matey..!? 👍

[@LyonsArcade]

Yeah it's really incredible what they were able to figure out with them, it's really easy to analyze it later and say "oh I see what they did" but these folks had to INVENT it. Just simple stuff like, the 5 rollovers in the middle make some lights come on... but the second time you hit them, they do something completely different. Yes, you can see how they did it NOW, but if you'd never seen that, it would take some ingenuity to make that happen!

[@SpearM3064]

@@-abacchus Probably! :)

[@gabrielgoldwoulfe2277]

I had them build a group of nests inside the back of one of my boxes of comics... wow. The boxes were on a shelf in my garage but I never saw them in the area or inside, but I would find their nests all around my house outside. It was a surpise to find them in the box of comics.

[@gabrielgoldwoulfe2277]

Thank you so much! This helped me figure out and fix my Williams Aztec which was not playing correctly. This is like going to school and you are the teacher. I absorbed everything you showed us... but I would like to have seen exactly what you did with the Credit Unit. I thankfully had figured out the reels just by looking at the working ones but to see how you take it apart was great. I will be reluctantly looking forward to taking apart and cleaning my 16 reels as well. Keep the videos coming! Thank you for sharing this knowledge so the hobby will continue on and on.

[@LyonsArcade]

Thank you Gabriel, my least favorite part is cleaning the reels but it's not that big of a deal, i'm sure you'll get it! Thanks for watching!

[@robj5752]

I literally just finished taking apart, cleaning, and reassembling the score reels, replay unit, and player unit in my '65 Williams Big Chief. You videos have been a great help as I work to restore my first machine and have gotten me through rebuilding the flippers, cleaning and adjusting the playfield switches coils and relays. Thank you for taking the time an effort to document this, especially working through the schematics, and showing a systematic approach to troubleshooting. This has helped turn me on to a new hobby.

[@LyonsArcade]

Very cool Robert, I'm glad you could use the info to help save another one, I'm trying to get as many people around to fix their games instead of parting or destroying them, I can only work on a few a month and there's tons of them out there, so hopefully more people will save some of these old gems! I've basically created a business model where it works for me to fix them and to film myself fixing them for people on youtube so it's working out great! Thanks for watching.

[@mcostafernando]

That's not thankless work, it's a labor of love! And I'm sure you do love fixing those machines! Cheers!

[@LyonsArcade]

I do enjoy them for sure, glad you do too Fernando, thanks for watching!

[@DaveCorbey]

Nice and clear on the stepper units, especially the coverage of the EOSS and the importance of it fully pulling in.

[@LyonsArcade]

It all makes a lot of sense once you figure out what they were trying to do!

[@Ajaxaxxess]

I almost enjoy watching you fix these as i do repairing them myself. lol. I was taught that lube super or not attracts and holds dirt on all pins. Learn something new everyday. Thanks as always buddy.

[@LyonsArcade]

You might not want to use any on yours! See you on the next one.

[@williamsudbrink4187]

I love seeing this level of repair! Very interesting to see the details. Thankless work? Thanks for doing this work!

[@LyonsArcade]

Thank you William for watching!

[@clintevans6643]

I’ll be watching this again. Great video.

[@LyonsArcade]

Thanks Clint!

[@engmcgill]

Hey Ron, I would call that switch that closes when the score reel reaches 9 the "carry" switch. When you add, say, 30 to 90 to get 120, you carry the 1 over to the hundreds digit. When you design solid-state counters with decade counter ICs, there is a carry output pin that tells the next digit to advance with the next clock pulse. Of course the EM pinball machines came before the digital IC circuits!

[@LyonsArcade]

That's a good way of describing it, thanks! I've seen that on counters before, like 74161's?

[@izzynutz2000]

Back in the day we used to use the old red block erasers or a pencil eraser to clean contacts like that but they don't have that same property today and I sever al credit cards that I would cut up into little sticks to use as my cleaning files and glue 800 grit thousand grit 1500 grit 2000 grit sandpaper to and I used to have a little metal squeeze type oil can that I could put on all my pivot points when doing steppers... Really enjoying the videos looking forward to the next one

[@LyonsArcade]

Tomorrow we attack the Playfield :)

[@simonphelon7221]

This brings back memories, one of my first jobs as an apprentice was to clean thousands of contacts with a little emery board in a Strowger Telephone Exchange.

[@LyonsArcade]

Someone else was mentioning it is very similar to telecommunications equipment down below!

[@pezjohnson]

This is a good thorough video of those units. Good series so far (as always!)

[@LyonsArcade]

Thanks Pez we appreciate it!

[@cliffburridge]

Nice work, mate! She looks cool inside! 😎😎

[@LyonsArcade]

It is!

[@maccustoms2295]

Love these videos and how you walk through the repairs you do. Can't wait to see it all fixed up. Have a great week

[@LyonsArcade]

Thanks Robert, see you on the next video!

[@svgalib]

Lovin’ it as always! That super lube is good stuff. Used it on industrial equipment also. Nobody seems to have this answered yet: dielectric means it doesn’t conduct. The reason it works, is when the contact scrapes over the rivet, there will be some metal to metal contact or the layer is soooo thin, it will finally conduct in that spot only.

[@LyonsArcade]

That makes sense, I know it's an insulator but I never could understand how it also makes it conduct better, lol.

[@ovalteen4404]

Yeah I don't think it's made to make the contact conduct better. Instead it's made to minimize oxidation by coating the contact, and minimize wear from metal on metal grinding by lubricating it. Both of those are problems that lead to bad electrical contact.

[@ricardosiqueira743]

Muito bom ver o mecanismo dessas máquinas. Pura criatividade.

[@LyonsArcade]

Obrigado por assistir, sim eles são muito bem desenhados!

[@truck9moon100]

Very informative, Thank-you very much.

[@LyonsArcade]

Thanks for watching Mr. 007!

[@kennymorton2416]

Great video 👌

[@LyonsArcade]

Thanks Kenny!

[@-abacchus]

More great stuff, buddy. I'd love the opportunity to work on all these machines. I was waiting for your WD-40 warning about it gunking stuff up - since watching your channel I'm much more cautious as to what I use WD-40 on (and why a lot of stuff I worked on years ago is now properly Gunk-o-maticaly fooked!) 🤣

[@LyonsArcade]

It's not your fault they market the crap like that, and you know the same company makes 3 in 1 which doesn't do the same thing, I don't know why they don't try to shoot it to people straight, they could sell more products if they let people know WD40 doesn't lubricate worth a crap!

[@DavidLee-zd6te]

At 13:38 - how do you prevent it from spinning when removing the center nut? When I put my wrench on the nut, the whole wheels just spins with the nut. Am I supposed to jam something somewhere to prevent the disc from spinning, so I can free the nut?

[@LyonsArcade]

yes that's how I do it, if I can't hold it (which usually I can't if the nut was tight) I go back on the other side where the gear is, and wedge a screw driver down through one of the holes to keep it from turning while I break the nut loose. Good luck with it!

[@Kaavoort]

Do you take out the bottom board from the cabinet to work on it or do you all that with it still mounted in there?

[@LyonsArcade]

I usually just leave it down in the bottom but you can take it out if you want with a couple screws.

[@willrussell01]

Greetings! I have a old 1964 Riverboat pinball and I'm trying to find this part which is some sort metal square-ish coil spacer. I can't seem to find one, would you know where I could possibly find it?

[@LyonsArcade]

Not sure what that part is, but if you look in a parts book and find it, you can search for the part number on www.MarcoSpec.com , they have all kinds of things. Once you have the part number you can call PBResource.com and ask them about it too. Look in the parts book here: online.fliphtml5.com/vrtyz/pblg/#p=1

[@EngineeringVignettes]

There is a strong resemblance between these machines and old telco (telecommunications) gear. Back when the central office was a room full of strowger switches. The telco gear used the same type of wafer stacks of contacts as those Williams units. I would also classify the wiring diagrams as ladder logic, similar to that used in industrial PLC configuration. A lot of sequencer (simplified state machine) action going on in there, in the steppers! A complicated pre-CPU design for sure. BTW, I am familiar with calling that PCB material "phenolic" which is think is layers of paper and resin, the cheaper alternative to fiberglass PCB. I have not seen bakelite as a base for PCB's though it could have been for very early PCB's maybe from the late 50's... was Williams using bakelite as the substrate? Thanks for the detailed tour through the electro-mechanical beast. Cheers,

[@LyonsArcade]

Hi Eddy; I'm not sure why I've heard it referred to as bakelite it may not be... I did a little search around the net and it seems most places call it bakelite too, I learned most of my repair stuff from Clay at www.PinRepair.com and he always called them bakelite and often makes new pieces out of bakelite stock he's buying, so who knows?

[@EngineeringVignettes]

@@LyonsArcade - That's interesting, my background is not game systems but more standard electronics (commercial and industrial). Interesting to see how different fields have different naming conventions. Thanks for the response.

[@EsotericArctos]

If the rivets are not too bad, I often just use a bit of Brasso on them to polish them up to protect them a bit, but if the are bad I do have to hit them with some fine grade sandpaper.

[@LyonsArcade]

Yeah I try not to go too hard on them, I've seen them before where somebody has sanded them almost away....

[@EsotericArctos]

@@LyonsArcade Some people just don't care enough.... These old machines need that gentle touch 🙂

[@michaelrhodes9178]

Nice vid thanks for teaching what you have learned ✌🏾2020

[@LyonsArcade]

Glad you enjoyed it Michael!

[@dawbre42]

wish i had the money to buy one of your machines

[@LyonsArcade]

Start saving up!

[@AzCowboyOne]

For carbon build up I use a pencil eraser. Non destructive and leaves no marks.

[@LyonsArcade]

That's a good way to do it!

[@flightofapaullo72]

Let's do this!

[@LyonsArcade]

We Can Do It!

[@flightofapaullo72]

@@LyonsArcade 👍

[@Jeroen_a]

It so clean... you can eat your dinner on it :-D

[@Jeroen_a]

Thanks for the in depth of the score reels :)

[@Jeroen_a]

Binging to the next one... :D

[@LyonsArcade]

It came out pretty clean for sure :)

[@Codeaholic1]

Remember. This is for amusement only!

[@LyonsArcade]

Yes! NO wagering!!!

[@whiskyguzzler982]

What the heck is a mud dauber?

[@whiskyguzzler982]

Eeek - Wasps!

[@LyonsArcade]

They daub Mud!

[@VariXx]

I must have skipped some of the video. You fought alligators?

[@LyonsArcade]

Yes I did, go back and watch again

[@80sretrogamer]

lubrication shaft load what sort of depravity is this :) i bet the youtube algorithum was going mental

[@LyonsArcade]

Tell 'em to DEAL WITH IT

[@80sretrogamer]

@@LyonsArcade hahahahahahahahaaaa lol you tell them