I'm gonna go out on a limb and say his missus picked that wallpaper 
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In Progress Rocky & Bullwinkle Shop Log
- Thread starter Wiredworm
- Start date
Indeed she did. I leave the decor to her and I focus on the important stuff like Pinball.
To be honest Dan the rear end of the cabinet wasn't that much of a concern for me. Sure there's some filling and patching needed near the corners but the back section ain't so bad and I was just planning on sanding it, priming it and then repainting it again, along with the rest of the cab.
We'll see. I might end up doing more but there's a few other jobs higher up the list for now.
To be honest Dan the rear end of the cabinet wasn't that much of a concern for me. Sure there's some filling and patching needed near the corners but the back section ain't so bad and I was just planning on sanding it, priming it and then repainting it again, along with the rest of the cab.
We'll see. I might end up doing more but there's a few other jobs higher up the list for now.
Yeah, but needs a hoover first I think.
I actually got a telling off for not hoovering before I took the pictures. I told her that noone would be looking at the carpet as they're all pinheads; maybe I was wrong.
I actually got a telling off for not hoovering before I took the pictures. I told her that noone would be looking at the carpet as they're all pinheads; maybe I was wrong.
M
Mark
That powdercoating looks great, and like others have said the red really suites the game. Definitely something I will think about doing too 
Trouble is, the legs for mine are packed away and my R&B is up on its end so it is a bit of a waste me doing it until I find somewhere for it to be set up permenently.
Really enjoying this thread, it is not often someone goes to so much trouble for a "lesser rated" game, however saying that I love R&B and prefer it to a lot of A-list titles. Another thing, everyone seems to know what to do when they play it, and the kids love the hat trick mechanism!
Cheers, Mark
Trouble is, the legs for mine are packed away and my R&B is up on its end so it is a bit of a waste me doing it until I find somewhere for it to be set up permenently.Really enjoying this thread, it is not often someone goes to so much trouble for a "lesser rated" game, however saying that I love R&B and prefer it to a lot of A-list titles. Another thing, everyone seems to know what to do when they play it, and the kids love the hat trick mechanism!
Cheers, Mark
It's the only table I have space for right now so I figured i'd invest some time and money on it.
My objective is to get it as minty fresh as I possibly can which is something of a challenge in itself because a lot of the repro parts for this table that you might want simple don't exist (cabinet decals being a good example).
It will probably take me a long time until I exhaust the list of things I want to do but in the meantime i'm finding it an enjoyable experience. Thanks for the kind words though; it's nice to hear that people find it interesting reading.
My objective is to get it as minty fresh as I possibly can which is something of a challenge in itself because a lot of the repro parts for this table that you might want simple don't exist (cabinet decals being a good example).
It will probably take me a long time until I exhaust the list of things I want to do but in the meantime i'm finding it an enjoyable experience. Thanks for the kind words though; it's nice to hear that people find it interesting reading.
So last night I lifted the playfield and hoisted all of the wiring back into the backbox and connected it all up. Was absolutely amazed that I managed to connect it all up and everything works fine. An odd side effect of powder coating the metal parts is that it feels like you're playing a new table and it just seems to play nicer. Makes no sense to be honest.
Anyway. Updated list of things done and things to do.
Things Done
To Do
Anyway. Updated list of things done and things to do.
Things Done
- Stripped the playfield and cleaned it using the Treasure Cove cleaning kit. It did a reasonable job but I don't think i'd want to use something as abrasive on a non-clear coated playfield again. Need to try something else next time.
- Cleaned all metal parts
- Replaced the GI and the majority of inserts on the playfield with LEDs. Only a handful of bulbs under the playfield remain and these will get swapped out in the next few weeks.
- Replaced the broken Lion plastic in the back box.
- Replaced the rubbers. Now using white rubbers on the playfield and red on the flippers.
- Cleaned all mechanisms and replaced the coil sleeves.
- Fitted Cliffy Protectors on the Spin & Win Ramp and the Aesop Hole. There's already a protector (custom made) on the WABAC ramp so i'lll leave that as is. At some point later I want to replace the WABAC ramp so i'll fit the proper protector when I do that.
- Did a coil mod which drops the voltage on the Lion coil. This is to stop it getting smashed up (although the new PETG lion is much more robust anyway)
- Fixed the Nell Log Motor which seemed to have become siezed. Refitted with a new meccano wheel which means the saw blade now spins. Just the spring to source now so I can get Nell moving.
- Replaced the flipper springs
- Fitted padding underneath the hat trick plastics to give them something soft to land on. The original padding had pretty much entirely worn away.
- Fitted new support legs on the playfield.
- Replaced the balls
- Waxed the playfield
- Replaced missing screws on the lane return guides
- Replaced missing screws from ramp flaps
- Fitted foam behind the BOMB targets and regapped leaf switches
- Fixed a few of problems of my own making.
- Replaced a switch which I managed to knacker
- Replaced Q51 after I managed to wire things up wrong and blew it
- Stopped the orbit gate from making a hideous noise when activated. Only started doing it after I rebuilt the table after cleaning.
- Labelled up all cables in the head of the Pin
- Upgraded the software to 1.3
- Shot blasted and powder coated the legs, side rails, lockdown bar and backbox brackets in fire engine red.
To Do
- Replace the missing screws in the backbox. Some of the boards are only held in with one or two screws.
- Replace the playfield glass
- Fix up the woodwork on the cab. The section below the head needs replacing as it's badly split
- Shot blast and powder coat the habitrails in yellow, blue and green (better than just repainting them)
- Fill in the shark bite at the rear of the cab.
- Drill and fit a cord cup so the power cord can be routed correctly
- Re-instate the original roto-lock locking mechanism.
- Scan the cabinet artwork and touch up so I can produce vinyl decals.
- Fill, sand and repaint the cabinet. (This is subject to the decals of being good enough quality and me biting the bullet and removing the original screen-printed artwork)
- Fit the above decals (subject to them being of good enough quality - will most likely start with the head as a test run)
- Recreate any broken plastics which aren't available as either NOS or repro. Where NOS or repros are available i'll buy replacements.
- Get the Nell Assembly fully working (including fitting the proper connector for it)
- Fix up the paint on Bullwinkles Nose
- Replace the final inserts under the playfield with LEDs (+ Button LEDs)
- Replace the Back Box GI with LEDs
- Fit a NOS playfield (dreaming here probably)
- Remove, clean and repaint visible bolts on the cabinet
- Remove the lockdown bar (or rather the bit into which the lockdown bar goes) and remove the stickers and have it shotblasted to clean it up. Then get the stickers recreated on adhesive vinyl before refitting them.
- Strip the inside of the cabinet, clean and rebuild. Rebraid at the same time.
- Rebuild the flippers. I only replaced the coil sleeves last time I had them stripped so I think a rebuild might help make it easier to make it up the ramps.
- Replace the Boris Button and the housing.
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Finally managed to get my **** in gear and picked up the spray paints I needed - white, grey primer and satin black. Just finished my first attempt at recreating the shooter cover plastic. Just applied the first coat of white paint to the back of it. Need to leave it a few hours now and then apply a second coat before checking out how it's looking.
The size is marginally larger (by about 1mm in width) but it's close enough and I allowed some extra bleed to the edge of the touched up image anyway so it looks fine. Fingers crossed it'll be a near perfect recreation of the original. Will post some pictures once it's done.
This time around i'm using ink-jet printed vinyl but I will print up some laser vinyl at some point and will most likely do a run of both side by side so I can see how they compare.
Edit: It would appear from the check i've just done that the image is a bit more orange coloured than it should be. I'm going to do another coat on it anyway but I can see me increasing the brightness of the backdrop and doing another one. Never mind, i've got plenty of lexan.
The size is marginally larger (by about 1mm in width) but it's close enough and I allowed some extra bleed to the edge of the touched up image anyway so it looks fine. Fingers crossed it'll be a near perfect recreation of the original. Will post some pictures once it's done.
This time around i'm using ink-jet printed vinyl but I will print up some laser vinyl at some point and will most likely do a run of both side by side so I can see how they compare.
Edit: It would appear from the check i've just done that the image is a bit more orange coloured than it should be. I'm going to do another coat on it anyway but I can see me increasing the brightness of the backdrop and doing another one. Never mind, i've got plenty of lexan.
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Applied the second coat of white paint to the back of the plastic before heading to bed last night. And here's the results this morning.
Original (slightly damaged) plastic on the left and the new repro on the right. The colour is every so slightly off but considering that the original has probably faded over time and i've got no way to know the precise original colour then I think i'll accept this as 'done'. Heading to work shortly but will hopefully get the holes drilled out tonight and get it fitted back in place.
There's the tiniest amount of overspray on the bottom of the reproduction which i've already carefully removed.
After checking it would seem most of the plastics are in good order. The slingshot covers are available as reproductions from Marcos so i'll most likely grab a set of those at some point. The only damaged one I can find now is the one directly below Nells log so i'll strip that out tonight and get a scan of it.
Original (slightly damaged) plastic on the left and the new repro on the right. The colour is every so slightly off but considering that the original has probably faded over time and i've got no way to know the precise original colour then I think i'll accept this as 'done'. Heading to work shortly but will hopefully get the holes drilled out tonight and get it fitted back in place.
There's the tiniest amount of overspray on the bottom of the reproduction which i've already carefully removed.
After checking it would seem most of the plastics are in good order. The slingshot covers are available as reproductions from Marcos so i'll most likely grab a set of those at some point. The only damaged one I can find now is the one directly below Nells log so i'll strip that out tonight and get a scan of it.
Replacement shooter cover has now been drilled and refitted in place. Nice.
The only other plastic i've come across so far which is damaged is the one that sits below Nells Log assembly. I've stripped that tonight and scanned it; found that the piece is too big to fit on the scanner platen so I ended up scanning in two pieces and then merging in Photoshop. Over the next few days i'll get the artwork prepped but the other problem i'm going to have is that the image is too big for a single A4 sheet so i'm going to have to print in two pieces and somehow join them up when laying them onto the Lexan. That's going to make for some real fun. Plus this plastic is much more complicated in terms of shape so it's going to take some real careful jigsaw work to get it looking right.
Ahhh well, noone said it would be easy.
I'll hopefully get some of the bolts stripped in the next day or so as well so I can get those prepped and repainted.
The only other plastic i've come across so far which is damaged is the one that sits below Nells Log assembly. I've stripped that tonight and scanned it; found that the piece is too big to fit on the scanner platen so I ended up scanning in two pieces and then merging in Photoshop. Over the next few days i'll get the artwork prepped but the other problem i'm going to have is that the image is too big for a single A4 sheet so i'm going to have to print in two pieces and somehow join them up when laying them onto the Lexan. That's going to make for some real fun. Plus this plastic is much more complicated in terms of shape so it's going to take some real careful jigsaw work to get it looking right.
Ahhh well, noone said it would be easy.
I'll hopefully get some of the bolts stripped in the next day or so as well so I can get those prepped and repainted.
Ok, so tonights job was to strip as many of the bolts that need painting up from the table as is possible. Final count was around 22 I think as I removed the coin door bolts and those holding the Boris Button and the housing in place. Figured the latter were worth doing as I needed to know how the assembly went to together as both the housing the button need replacing and I think those two will be up on the list shortly.
I don't have a tumbler here so i've just used some wire wool and white spirit to clean the heads up as much as possible and to remove any surface dirt and grease. First coat of undercoat is applied and i'll give it an hour or two before doing another and heading to bed. Final coat of satin black will be done tomorrow morning so they should be good and dry to refit tomorrow night.
Only bolts I haven't done are the 4 holding the playfield supports in place. I'll do them at a later date when i've got the playfield removed.
I don't have a tumbler here so i've just used some wire wool and white spirit to clean the heads up as much as possible and to remove any surface dirt and grease. First coat of undercoat is applied and i'll give it an hour or two before doing another and heading to bed. Final coat of satin black will be done tomorrow morning so they should be good and dry to refit tomorrow night.
Only bolts I haven't done are the 4 holding the playfield supports in place. I'll do them at a later date when i've got the playfield removed.
Looking awesome Wiredworm. I'm a huge Data East fan so it's nice to see one of these getting a good refurb as it doesn't happen very often. It's all about the Bally/Williams for most.
Very nice work. Looking forward to seeing the end result.
Very nice work. Looking forward to seeing the end result.
Thanks Fintan. Having a lot of fun doing it and i've still got a fair bit left to do. Plenty of time though so i'm in no rush.
Tonight i've dropped my first major clanger.
Came home from work and figured i'd give the bolts another coat of black. Made the mistake of not reading the instructions and found the paint started to 'wrinkle' almost as soon as I started to apply it. So it seems you either have to recoat within 4 hours or after 36 hours. No good applying one coat and leaving for 12-16 hours and then applying the next it would seem. :-(
Anyway, cue me using wire wool and plenty of white spirit to remove the lot from the bolts. I'm just waiting for them to dry out and then i'll start with the first coat of primer again.
Whoops.
Tonight i've dropped my first major clanger.
Came home from work and figured i'd give the bolts another coat of black. Made the mistake of not reading the instructions and found the paint started to 'wrinkle' almost as soon as I started to apply it. So it seems you either have to recoat within 4 hours or after 36 hours. No good applying one coat and leaving for 12-16 hours and then applying the next it would seem. :-(
Anyway, cue me using wire wool and plenty of white spirit to remove the lot from the bolts. I'm just waiting for them to dry out and then i'll start with the first coat of primer again.
Whoops.
I feel better about the mistake now that i've done 2 coats of undercoat and the first of the satin black. Will leave it alone now until Friday morning before applying another coat. In other news i'm looking at getting a new button housing for the launch button. They seem to be hard to come by but i've tracked one down. Bad news it's going to be £25 to get it and have it shipped. £25 for a sodding housing!!
This any good to you? http://bit.ly/18ADj7l
Been a bit quiet in here of late. It's not that i've lost the urge to fix stuff but simply that two of the key parts I need are proving hard to locate right now. New glass channels are out of stock at Marcos and the button housing I needed has also just sold out at the Pinball Center. They're key parts that I really want to get sorted so i'm sat on my hands until I can source them.
I still have some LEDs to get fitted and these will be done at a later date. And I also want to re-instate the original locking mechanism for the backbox, but that will also mean ripping out the back of the cabinet and redoing it again. All work which in my view would be better done during the summer months so i'll most likely hang fire until July or August for that.
However, one bit of goods news is that a guy in the USA has managed to source a NOS set of plastics for the table which he's kindly scanned and sent over. I'm not sure what's included in the set but I may well use them to make some repros for mine. Not ideal but better than nothing until I can find my own NOS set.
So, yeah, still working on it and playing games fairly regularly.
I still have some LEDs to get fitted and these will be done at a later date. And I also want to re-instate the original locking mechanism for the backbox, but that will also mean ripping out the back of the cabinet and redoing it again. All work which in my view would be better done during the summer months so i'll most likely hang fire until July or August for that.
However, one bit of goods news is that a guy in the USA has managed to source a NOS set of plastics for the table which he's kindly scanned and sent over. I'm not sure what's included in the set but I may well use them to make some repros for mine. Not ideal but better than nothing until I can find my own NOS set.
So, yeah, still working on it and playing games fairly regularly.
have you tried any other suppliers?
How much did the powder-coating cost?
Managed to source a replacement shooter cover and base for the Nell Assembly from the USA. They same guy has a load of other plastics that have no cracks but a few minor marks on them. Figure they're worth having as spares so i've bought the lot.
Result, and saves me having to mess around making repros.
Pete
Result, and saves me having to mess around making repros.
Pete
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- Jul 21, 2011
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Is this any use ... http://bit.ly/1ankqpJ
I know you wanted a gear or similar, and I want the Nell plastic, so happy to go in with you if it is of interest to you.
I know you wanted a gear or similar, and I want the Nell plastic, so happy to go in with you if it is of interest to you.
Aaaarrrrghh!!! Sorry Macro but I didn't see your message and now it's too late :-(
I'm finding it a bit of a nightmare to be honest - it seems that often these parts come up but they're nearly always in the USA and the shipping costs are crippling.
I currently have the option of buying around 15 used but non-broken plastics and the guy has offered me a fixed price for the set. Great I thought. But unfortunately one of them is the Nell Base Plastic which is pretty long and the USPS want > $60 to ship them to me. So basically the shipping is going to be more than the item. I'm still on the verge of saying go ahead because they don't come up so often.
Another option was to order a few other bits I need from Marcos and get them shipped to him and then have the lot sent on in a single package.
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- Jul 21, 2011
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So basically the shipping is going to be more than the item. I'm still on the verge of saying go ahead because they don't come up so often.
I don't suppose there is a Nell in there - I can share some of your pain then. Failing that, get them sent to a friend in USA (cheap post) and then get them to send them to you (also using cheap post) - since they don't have to send it signed delivery for paypal reasons, I used to do it quite often, sure I can find a friendly place in the states to send it to if needed.
I don't suppose there is a Nell in there - I can share some of your pain then. Failing that, get them sent to a friend in USA (cheap post) and then get them to send them to you (also using cheap post) - since they don't have to send it signed delivery for paypal reasons, I used to do it quite often, sure I can find a friendly place in the states to send it to if needed.
I don't think there is a Nell Assembly unfortunately. This guy has just ended up with a set of plastics.
The issue is the size of the package. Even sending it US Postal Service is > $60. :-(
Given the wife has announced she wants to move i'm thinking I should give it a miss and save my cash. We had our first meeting with the financial advisor and it's looking possible we could be moving in the next few months to somewhere with room for more Pins. I'd rather hang fire on this if the money is likely to be needed to go towards the move.
The issue is the size of the package. Even sending it US Postal Service is > $60. :-(
Given the wife has announced she wants to move i'm thinking I should give it a miss and save my cash. We had our first meeting with the financial advisor and it's looking possible we could be moving in the next few months to somewhere with room for more Pins. I'd rather hang fire on this if the money is likely to be needed to go towards the move.
I had to cancel on the plastics in the end; car troubles ate into my pinball fund and I just couldn't justify spending the money on shipping them from the USA.
Work has pretty much come to a halt as i've reached a point where most of the stuff I need is in the US and the cost of shipping is stupid. I still need some glass tracks and the cost for them is $20 and then shipping is another $40.
Other items I also need are currently out of stock and it seems each time they come back into stock other items I need are out.
Still need to rebuild the back of the cab but might well just leave it until the summer and look at doing it then.
Work has pretty much come to a halt as i've reached a point where most of the stuff I need is in the US and the cost of shipping is stupid. I still need some glass tracks and the cost for them is $20 and then shipping is another $40.
Other items I also need are currently out of stock and it seems each time they come back into stock other items I need are out.
Still need to rebuild the back of the cab but might well just leave it until the summer and look at doing it then.
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- Jul 21, 2011
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Unfortunately life does get in the way (otherwise I would have bought a CSI and a Hobbit pinball in the last two months - but mortgage comes first!)
If you get a chance to do one of your tarted up scans for Nell that would be very useful. (and if I see anything else in the states I'll let you know)
If you get a chance to do one of your tarted up scans for Nell that would be very useful. (and if I see anything else in the states I'll let you know)
Ooops, I need to apologise as this is still sat on the PC waiting to be finished off. It's in progress so as soon as it's done i'll get it sent over. Sorry for the delay.
Most parts I need are available but just not in the UK. The one thing that eludes me is a Launch Button Housing. They had some at the Pinball Center a while back but sold out just before I was due to order. I've been waiting for them to come back in stock ever since but no luck. So if you spy one of those anywhere then i'd be really glad to hear about it.
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no worries, I still need to fit the new CPU board I bought at the Pinball Party and then sort out the problems with the sound board, since I've totally failed to get a replacement so far
once it actually works, I then need to strip the play field down and clean and tumble it all
a you say, a summer job, although I may try and fit the board this weekend
once it actually works, I then need to strip the play field down and clean and tumble it all
a you say, a summer job, although I may try and fit the board this weekend
Things have kinda slowed down on this one due to a combination of reasons. Partly it's because i'm saving like crazy for a honeymoon. But it's also because I need some parts from the USA and they're either stupidly expensive to ship to the UK or when one part is in stock another isn't (and it doesn't really make sense to pay postage for a single button or component).
Today i've placed an order for a replacement Bullwinkle Arm that will go into the backbox animation. It turns out that the one i've got has been reinforced using pot rivets and a metal plate which is why cosmetically it doesn't look that great. Jeff over at Classic Arcades now produced a repro one using PET-G which is much stronger and should look much better. Once that arrives i'll compare and assuming they match visually i'll swap the old one out.
Other plans are:
1. To finally get the glass channels replaced. This part would have cost a fortune to ship from the USA due to it's size (about 5ft long). But i've found a supplier in Norway and although the postage from there is also expensive I have a plan whereby I get them delivered to Oslo and then have them shipped over to the UK using my Companys boats and road transport providers.
2. Finish swapping out the rest of the regular bulbs for LED's.
3. Buy the rotolock and wrench that I need to reinstate the original locking mechanism.
4. Replace the ground braid in the bottom of the cabinet.
In fact, the plan is that if I can get items 1 and 3 done then i'll probably strip the head off, remove the legs and take the main cabinet outside to give it a proper good cleanup inside, before then rebuilding the cabinet, filling it and putting the original locking mechanism back in place. As we're approaching the summer it seems like a good time to do it.
So hopefully some more posting in here soon.
Today i've placed an order for a replacement Bullwinkle Arm that will go into the backbox animation. It turns out that the one i've got has been reinforced using pot rivets and a metal plate which is why cosmetically it doesn't look that great. Jeff over at Classic Arcades now produced a repro one using PET-G which is much stronger and should look much better. Once that arrives i'll compare and assuming they match visually i'll swap the old one out.
Other plans are:
1. To finally get the glass channels replaced. This part would have cost a fortune to ship from the USA due to it's size (about 5ft long). But i've found a supplier in Norway and although the postage from there is also expensive I have a plan whereby I get them delivered to Oslo and then have them shipped over to the UK using my Companys boats and road transport providers.
2. Finish swapping out the rest of the regular bulbs for LED's.
3. Buy the rotolock and wrench that I need to reinstate the original locking mechanism.
4. Replace the ground braid in the bottom of the cabinet.
In fact, the plan is that if I can get items 1 and 3 done then i'll probably strip the head off, remove the legs and take the main cabinet outside to give it a proper good cleanup inside, before then rebuilding the cabinet, filling it and putting the original locking mechanism back in place. As we're approaching the summer it seems like a good time to do it.
So hopefully some more posting in here soon.