Just finished adding new T-molding to my Avengers Infinity Quest LE. Looks great! So I thought I document the process for others. Interesting to note that the T-Molding I received was 0.015 oversized AND some of the head dimension of the Stern machines have changed over the past few years – so understand that (at least with my AIQ) the 3/4″ molding from T-Molding.com installed in your new AIQ will be about 1 MM proud (sticks out) on both the inside and outside edges. Still looks great though!

After posting this, I saw another Pinsider mention using 11/16″ T-molding instead of the 3/4″ size. You most certainly can order that size and it’s exactly 1/16″ narrower than 3/4″ and will likely fit with less or no overhang.

This write up will be done in mostly images with captions. Total install time including clean-up was just at 45 mins. Buy materials at T-Molding.com. You will need to buy 20 feet because that is their minimum. It takes 6 feet per side to do a modern Stern head (12 feet total game) – so you will end up with some extra (8 feet or so). Save that extra piece for the next game (it’s enough to do one side)

Big Buck Hunter HD Reloaded Mini – first impressions

I’m not a “video” guy. I played Centipede in college (and was good enough to compete in tournaments). I played ColecoVision Dragster when it first came out. Heck I remember playing an Olympics style game on my buddy’s parents Apple computer around 1980 or so – monochrome screen and stick figures! Even though I own a modern gaming console – I just have ZERO desire to play it. It’s so bad that I bought a Nintendo Switch, but despite also purchasing a half dozen games for it, I ONLY play Pinball on it and ONLY when I’m travelling (OK, so that means roughly never).

I look at my “barely broken in” Switch and wonder “what’s wrong with me?” I thought that at this point I was hopeless when it came to playing any vids – until recently. About a month ago, I stumbled across the BBH (Big Buck Hunter) video/arcade thread on Pinside. That’s it! I was sure of it. I had finally found something I liked in a video format! I had played it extensively at the local “Main Event” family entertainment center. I really, really enjoyed it. Why not! It’s got guns – another love of mine.

So, in typical fashion, it was off to the races to learn as much about these games as I could. Could you buy them new? Were they available on the used market? How did you get games on them? Where were all the dealers? What kind of variety existed in cabinets/games?

It didn’t take long to get all the answers. They could be purchased new AND due to the COVID outbreak, the company that makes them (Raw Thrills) had ventured deeply into the home arcade market. You could by a more compact version of the ones you see in bars and FECs. Their new offering was called “Big Buck Hunter Reloaded – Mini”. The BBHR mini came in a dedicated cabinet with a built in 42″ monitor and 2 stacked backlit headers. The T-molding on the edges of the cabinet were backlit as well – a first in the industry and an eye catcher in a bar for sure.

I discovered that Kingpin Games was the most frequent poster on the subject of BBH on the Pinside website. They were knowledgeable, friendly and had an assortment of used games as well. Convinced that I wanted one, I reached out to the owner (thanks Christopher!) via Pinside mail. Through a series of conversations that went from “send me a used one” all the way to “changed my mind, how much is new again …?” I finally settled on buying a new Mini from Kingpin Games and having it shipped in the “online” ready condition.

So how does it all work? Once in place, the content management is seamless. Getting it all working properly is not. This is the NOT an issue on the Kingpin side – it’s all on the Raw Thrills side of the equation and we will cover that later. No matter, Christopher helped me through it like all great distributors do. Raw Thrills is just a little new at the home market and the instructions, owners manual, Coin-up website, Big Buck website ALL leave a lot to be desired in presenting a seamless onboarding UI/UX for the end consumer. The good news? The product is simply fantastic! I’ve owned it exactly one day and these are my early takes on it.

I’ll keep the function/content management explanation simple. If you own a functioning cabinet – new or used, there are a base set of games installed that you get to keep “forever”. Don’t need to be online to play, don’t need to pay for them ever again. These are the base games on the new BBH HD Mini

• Whitetail Deer
• Moose
• Elk
• Kudu
• Wildebeest

If you want to permanently own ANY OTHER content, you will need to buy it outright. And, it’s not cheap. One add-on pack can be $1,300 per pack. By the time you buy the base game and all the add-on packs, your total outlay will be around $10K. That’s not THAT big of a deal seeing that a new limited production Pinball is around the same price. See the following list for exactly how much per add-on pack they currently cost (approx):

• Wild Pack 1 (3 animals) $750
• Wild Pack 2 (Buckzilla and Zombie Deer) $750
• Duck Dynasty $650
• Zombie – Doe of the Dead $1300
• Monster Island – $1,300
• Terminator Salvation $1,300

Now, say you don’t want to spend all that money up front to “own” the game packs … BUT you do want to play this additional premium content. No problem, just take your system “on-line” for the price of $39.99 per month and you get access to ALL of it, Terminator, Zombies, Duck Dynasty, Extra Animal packs, Bonus stuff – all of it. Again, seems like a steep price but with the difference between a base “Mini” game and all the add-on packs being around $4K … that adds up to almost 10 YEARS of subscription fees! In other words it takes around 10 years to “break even” if you buy all the incremental game packs vs subscribing monthly. In this scenario, it makes sense for more reasons than just financial. Why not “rent” all that premium content at just $39.99 a month and then decide what games you actually love? If, after a year, you find yourself playing that particular game often – buy it outright, or buy several. Then you can (if you wish) turn off the monthly subscription.

So to summarize, a new Big Buck Hunter Reloaded – Mini will run you around $6K for the cabinet loaded with the base games. You MUST however, subscribe for at least 12 months after purchasing the unit (doesn’t even need to be 12 consecutive months). During that 12 month subscription period, you will have access to ALL of the BBH premium content! Terminator, Zombies, Extra Animals, all will be available to play – as often and as many times as you like – all for $39.99 month. Note that one of the only things you can’t do is to participate in online tournaments. These are exclusive to operating locations only – not home use machines. AFTER that minimum 12 months subscription requirement has been met, you can move your machine to an “off-line” status, stop paying the $39.99 per month and simply keep the base games that ship with the unit.

So what’s it like to own one of these? Cool. Very, very cool. And fun too. Very, very fun! BBH seems to have a HUGE crossover appeal. Both men and women are drawn to it’s simple, challenging, easy to understand and hard to master gameplay. It’s even got some humor baked in too- corny but in a good way. I finally got mine into position in the Loft and booted up to a playable screen and I literally could not get my wife to stop playing. She rarely plays anything in the Loft. She claims ownership of 3 or 4 of the 40+ Pinball machines in there but hardly ever plays them. To see her connect so quickly with this game was interesting.

I’m not going to go into gameplay because, there are tons of videos on YouTube to watch or you can just drive down to almost any local bar and try it for yourself. I will, however, share some thoughts on the content and a few ideas (small) for improvement. Let’s start with the user experience. The game is first and foremost a money making entertainment machine – built for use in bars, barcades, family entertainment centers, etc. The legacy of that design and its rapid move to the home environment brings with it a few areas for improvement:

• Pause. There is none. There needs to be. When playing a game I might get a call, need to use the restroom, etc. Home users need to be able to pause the game and/or quit the game gracefully.
• Sleep. There is no setting that I could find to take the game from full “on”, attract mode, etc. to a sleep mode (Monitor off, attract lights/sounds off, but PC running in low power). The cabinet fans on these sound like the props from a King Air – if the game could drop to low power, the fans could lower velocity accordingly

Buying this unit for home use starts with a homeowner looking to add some fun to their gameroom. They likely already know the gameplay. They also come to this moment with some expectations. I buy the game, it gets delivered (holy cow it’s huge), I plug it in, it works great – all my family has fun that night playing it. Well … that not exactly how it goes for most buyers and this is the section where I’ll point out what is likely obvious to the RT team and things that probably exist in their backlog of features to fix/add.

Before I start, and you read that I’m being hyper critical, understand this: I bought one, I love it and I think it’s a great entertainment value! This is feedback and it’s free … just about what it’s worth 🙂

First the things that Raw Thrills can’t control (but I can)

• It’s awkward just to receive it. I volunteered to go pick mine up at a trucking depot. HUGE mistake. Holy Toledo – it towered over my F150 sitting in the bed. My straps were barely long enough to go from one side of the truck to the other as they crossed over the top of the outer box. You also can ONLY lift it from the bottom pallet (read forklift). As I drove home on I40, never exceeding 40MPH because I feared it would blow out/over, I realized that I did not own a forklift. How the heck was I going to get this thing off my truck? Note to self – never pick up a game like this again. Once on the ground, getting it off the base pallet would be challenging enough, but when it sits 3 feet in the air in the bed of a truck, it become nearly impossible
• It IS huge. In a way that is more awkward that just “big” it is over 41″ at it’s widest point. This means MANY folks will struggle just getting it IN the house! I did. Sure you can turn it sideways to fit through a 36″ door, but be careful of the gun wires – they extend even further. This option was out for me because I had to make a hallway turn immediately after entering the door. Now what?

Now to the things that Raw Thrills could improve

• Instructions for removing the Monitor and ad header. My solution to getting it in the house was simple – I had to remove the Monitor and the “reloaded” header. No choice. First was the hallway turn, then the fact that although I have a wide staircase, it was only 1″ wider than the 42″ presented by the BBH mini. Even using my Escalera, it would be impossible to get it up the stairs without destroying it. Having instructions taped to the monitor on how to remove those 2 pieces would have been a lifesaver. They are VERY easy to remove (just 4 bolts each!), once you know how. After removing the bolts each item has just 2 plugs to unplug. I removed BOTH of them in under 10 minutes.
• Home Use “Start Here” button. Just like the Staples “easy” button. Whatever steps you want me to perform to get this up and running need to start in ONE spot. The good folks at Stern Pinball have recently added a “guided start” process to getting your new Pinball game up and running for home use. The analogy is close. It’s a commercial machine but now it’s in my home, so what do I do. Stern Pinball provides both a written and display based instruction set to get you up to speed quickly. I understand that they don’t (as of yet) have to deal with connectivity issues like RT does, but the process call out remains the same. The “start here” button should take you all the way to setting up a Coin-up account, swiping your credit card, to going into the “online” settings to request to “update software” – to a screen that asks you to power cycle the game. There were “bits and pieces” of this process baked in, but not the entire thing end to end.
• Home use FAQ website, sub-domain. Carve out a branded and specifically targeted area for your new home users. The onboarding and user experience is different enough that it’s needed. No worries about fracturing your brand impact – in fact you may expand it. The RT and BBH website is so operator focused today that it offers me almost nothing in the way or information or service.
  • Show me how to get my machine online, show me the pricing for purchasing add-on game packs.
  • Demonstrate how the home user can run local or on-site tournaments (can they?).
  • Show me the game packs that ship as native to the game (base games) vs the premium “online only” content
  • Share with me what I will need to do at the highest level to prepare for “getting online” day (the day the machine arrives for most folks). Name, address, credit card to swipe “right on the machine” (this was foreign to me but very cool), Wifi connectivity
  • Explain to folks “how” the connectivity works – weather it’s Wi-Fi, Ethernet or Cellular. How often does it connect? How much data transfers? Do games “stream”? Some folks have fragile internet infrastructure and are curious about these things
  • A heavy dose of detective work is needed to find this info today. Too many emails, texts for information that today is “known” by the RT team and is fairly static so no risk in publishing it
• Specs. Or, in long form “specifications”. Get them documented. Details, details and more details. This is a HUGE machine (yes, even the mini) that was originally designed for a commercial market – now going into a home that is probably averaging 2,800 square feet. A home is also much more chopped up than a commercial space. I had a dozen questions about the size of the machine that could only be answered by other owners. One day at RT spent with a technical writer and an engineer and you would have a great set of engineering drawings that could be posted to the website as downloadable PDFs. (if you’re a potential buyer, see my measures)
• Fans. Or, as I affectionately call them – turboprops. Good lord they are LOUD and I mean noisy loud. In a bar, you are never going to hear them. In my gameroom, they scream above the low hum of my Pinball machines and are very noticeable. I’m not sure if thermal management is built into the cabs or not, but if it is, there are no user adjustable settings that I could find and I never hear the fan spin down (see sleep function above)
• Words matter. Brand this home experience. Go all in.
  • BBH @Home
  • Home Hunter
  • MY BBH
  • Big Buck Basements
    • Pick a name/tag line to brand the Home User experience as unique from the Operator experience, then …
• Scour the Home Use machines that you are sending out (force the identification of use type at point of purchase) for any verbiage AFTER the “start here” button that refers to an “Operator”. Take it out. I am a home owner. Home user. Homeboy (sorry – carried away). It felt very odd to have the congratulations screen pop up that said “Congratulations, your Operator ID # is 1234
• Forward/Cancel button. Just like a double flipper move during bonus calculation in the Pinball world. RT should provide a small target at the ending of gameplay segments – shoot it and the screen moves to the next segment. If you don’t want to see your score pop up, shoot the little target and move on. Don’t want to see the next game explained or hear the “humor intro” – just shoot that little target and skip it. This would allow home users to move a little faster through gameplay.

It’s fun. It’s addictive. It’s Big Buck Hunter HD!

OK, enough feedback. Let’s talk fun factors!

• Games are pretty “time predictable” – nice change vs a Pinball game that can be insanely long (45 mins) to absurdly short (2 mins). BBH has a fairly predictable amount of time that it takes to get through a hunt/game and when time is something all of us are desperate to manage better, this is a nice feature vs Pinball
• Graphics = engagement. Unlike Pinball, the screen on BBH is something designed as the main feature to LOOK AT. The assets are rendered beautifully. Just stunning work. Lifelike animations and natural animal movement make it feel more “real” than it obviously is. There is also a level of engagement that steps it up a notch vs “most” of my games (with a few exceptions like Stern Star Trek, Jurassic Park, JJP Wizard of Oz). You really feel like you’ve been transported to a different world, if even for just a few minutes. All that animation in HD – close to your face is pretty engaging – and always blood pumping exciting.
• Approachability. I can’t tell you how many folks have visited the Pinball Loft and seen 40 games in one spot, then encouraged by me to play some – just back away in trepidation. Afraid of not knowing what to do. Maybe worried they will embarrass themselves. Not sure but I DON’T see that with BBH. Most everyone has played it and would love to play it more. My wife, case in point.
• Sound is well done, well executed. The sounds on BBH although subtle, are delivered well, never annoying and “fit” the scenes well. The new mini has a top mounted speaker that sounds great and a few subs buried in the base of the cabinet. Great sounds adds to a great experience
• Lighting is killer. Maybe retina killer but killer nonetheless! I’ve never seen anyone attempt to light up T-molding but the RT team has pulled it off. I’m sure that this helps a ton in a bar environment to attract players but it has a valuable purpose in home arcade as well. It demonstrates how many players are playing and who turn is up. I went into the menus and reduced the output of the LEDs to 75% to lower the amount of light scatter hitting my face when I’m trying to shoot. Still … I like them, a lot.
• Cabinet art “works”. What a challenge the team had to put: Terminator, Zombies, Duck Dynasty and Animals all on the same cabinet art package. To be fair, they “cheated” by having 2 backlit headers, but hey, it actually looks fantastic, in a step right up, guess your weight at the carnival sort of way – I kid … it’s better than that and I really could not offer advice on how to improve it. Coming from a Fine Art grad, that’s saying something!
• More realistic = better. There have been some real positive cosmetic changes to make the game appear more realistic as well. A simple example are the guns. They now have some wood grain on them. The goal will never be to “make them look like guns” – given today’s climate I’m surprised they are not shaped like pillows, but when the guns used to be solid colors (orange and green plastic), they just made the game look cheap. Not any more. This game says “quality”
• Space in place. Once you pick a “spot” for your mini – it works. I know I’ve gone on and on about the shear size/weight of it but that is more about loading, unloading, moving it into position. Once “there”, it’s not too bad at all. It’s less than 3 feet deep (much shallower than a Pinball game) and with the secondary BBH header on top it reaches around 90″. I get it that for some basements, that may be too tall. You can remove the top header and bring the OAH down to just around 77″ a much more ceiling friendly height.

This is where my (current) experience ends. Although I could speculate or pontificate more on BBH, I think I’ll just go play some more! Bottom line for me is that I’m very pleased with my purchase, I’m super excited to play more and discover all the game has to offer. I also think the game is a value as it’s priced. The initial cabinet cost is reasonable – even though I had the same negative reaction as others did when I saw the $39.99 monthly subscription price point, I now think it’s not only fair, but a great way to be introduced to all of the premium content in the MOST inexpensive way. To be honest, if I dislike it I can simply buy all of the add-ons and STILL be under the price of several of my Pinball games. I love the variety that Big Buck Hunter brings to my gameroom AND the instant brand recognition as well. For my non-Pinball friends it will be a welcome way to add some fun to their visits. Buy one from Christopher at Kingpin Games – I did!

Collected Measurements:

• Monitor width 39 15/16”
• Reloaded header width 41 3/8”
• Big Buck header width 40 3/16” at widest 
• Total height all components 89 5/8” (measured above buck horn, from floor with casters installed)
• Height to just the Reloaded header 76 13/16” (Measured from floor with casters installed)
• Cabinet width 25 1/8”
• Cabinet depth at deepest 30 3/4”
• Cabinet height from floor (casters installed) 75 7/8”
• Cabinet height to bottom of monitor (casters installed) 42 3/4”
• Casters add 1 7/8” to OAH

Man oh man … I couldn’t just leave it at that! We spent the evening playing the game and just had a ball! What fun to watch my wife and daughter play. Getting too close to the screen. Not really aiming. Not pumping to reload. Crowding each others space. Then – each realizing over a few games how to get better and be more accurate. Haven’t laughed like that in a while. Chris and I played through the entire Terminator Delta series and were exhausted when we finished. Great game but it will wear you out!

Figured I would add a few more “gameplay” comments and some pictures to show just how much fun the game is. Here is my off-the-cuff general gameplay commentary:

• For sure the home use version needs a “pause” button! We had 3 or 4 occasions last night to use it. (needed a drink, restroom break, etc.)
• The game is not meant to be “easy” – throughout all the various content I found that as you progressed the shots got more challenging and demanded more accuracy and speed – good for keeping the game challenging in a home environment long term
• The animal movements are not as “natural” as I first noticed, but …who cares? It’s “real enough” and although I thought I’d mention it, there is no negative impact to gameplay
• I enjoyed the bonus material more than I thought. It tends to get a bad rap on the discussion sites but I like it – Beavers in Duck Dynasty especially!
• Would be awesome to add MORE mini-gun capability to the Terminator game – especially for home environment. My arms are sore today!
• Pacing between games, scoring screens is pretty good. I’m impatient so would appreciate a little faster transitions, but I did not get frustrated as I finished a session, got my score and moved to another. An idea that would help would be similar to what happens in Pinball – the double flipper “cancel/forward” function. Raw Thrills could provide a small on-screen target that when clicked, cycled the screen forward to the next one.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NN6BDF_XS9A?feature=oembed&wmode=opaque&w=500&h=281]

How cool is this! The team a JOBLO reached out to ask if I would like to have my Pinball collection featured on his JOBLO Videos YouTube channel.

Oh, heck yes was my answer! The various JOBLO channels have MILLIONS of subscribers and this was a nice opportunity to showcase my collection and give some more exposure to the hobby. He is starting a new segment titled “Collectors Corner” and my Pinball collection would be featured on the inaugural show!

I spent a few hours on Saturday (after returning from the Highlands trip) shooting the footage for the piece. I uploaded the vids via Google Drive, submitted some answers to a few questions that would be used in the segment and just a few days later – boom!

Check out the one-and-only Pinball Loft at around the 10:30 mark in the below YouTube video, or enjoy the entire segment because it’s all about Batman 1989!

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4PnADKKtuMQ?feature=oembed&wmode=opaque&w=500&h=281]

If YOU are interested in having your gameroom, games or extraordinary collection featured, follow this link to Pinside to get connected!

This is not a review of the new Avengers Infinity Quest Pinball game from Stern. It’s more of the story of the obsessive “getting ready” process that happens every time I order a NIB game (review will come later). I’ve noticed that the process repeats itself, I learn something every time and enjoy it as much as the game itself. I thought I’d document it and share it.

I’ve got a nice mix of both old and new machines. Each purchase “type” follows a unique path. So far I’ve bought 10 “new in box” games. Each game was unique but the process during the wait was very much the same:

• Discovery
• Get excited, and fired up about the game
• Find a way to pay when your out of town
• Research the subject until you know it cold
• Buy some books on it as reference
• Find some autographed items to add
• Pre-order the mods to make it custom
• Endlessly watch the Twitch streams of gameplay

The very first thing that happens is finding out that there IS a game. Followed quickly by … “do I care”? I can usually remember where I was when I heard about the big title games. This was no exception.

So I was sitting in my home theater watching a movie when I got a text from my buddy – I heard the new Stern is awesome, and I’m getting an LE. You should too! At this point that game had not been announced but my friend knows pinball so I dropped a line to my distributor and asked to put my name on the list

I received a response back almost immediately (same night) with directions on how to make a deposit and was assured I was “on the list” – for what exactly I had no idea, but if it was good by gosh, I was going to get one. Talk about FOMO – I had it bad!

The following weekend, Tami and I planned a trip in the Carrera out to Highlands, NC. Man, if you haven’t been there, you’re missing out. It’s wonderful and one of our fav places to visit. Right in the middle of the mountains and away from all the bustle is this jewel of a town. Killer restaurants, stunning waterfalls, great hiking, amazing shopping. We love it and visit often – even though the trip takes us around 3 hours … the route brings us to Highlands via the infamous “Dragon”.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EiUQxMTKyg4?feature=oembed&wmode=opaque&w=500&h=281]

The huge benefit of getting there is the insane trip down both the Dragon (US 129) and the Moonshiner (US 28) both are what I would call a “roller coaster” built for cars. The Dragon has 318 curves in 11 miles … and to call them “curves” is a VAST understatement. Even to call them “hairpin curves” under describes the fact that some of them are even tighter – crap that road is fun to drive. Drifting the rear end of the Porsche and pulling “Gs” into the corners will get your pulse up and mind sharp.

The Dragon is populated by photographers on every weekend and our trip through it was no different. You can wave, smile or ignore them but your picture will be taken anyway. Later the next day, a trip to their website will reveal your image – ready for purchase and download. I buy one EVERY time. Support them and the images are a great memory.

On your way into Highlands, you will find amazing waterfalls and even more amazing roads and vistas. Just before getting to town there is a waterfall that you can literally drive your car under. Recently the road going under it has had a barrier installed but you can still pull over and walk under it if you wish.

Ahead of that (on route 28) you’ll find Dry Falls. This area has a large parking lot and is a highlight of any trip to Highlands. There is a dedicated walking path that directs you right UNDER a huge waterfall – it’s called Dry Falls but I’ve never seen it that way!

We arrived in Highlands, checked into our Hotel and started exploring the town. It’s beautiful with lots of high end shops (Rolex watches in the windows) but with a small mountain town feel (Ice cream shop on the corner). We walked a lot and enjoyed the cooler temperatures that the mountains provide

It’s September 2nd and within a few minutes my Facebook page lights up and I’m getting IM messages too. Here it is – official. It’s the new game and it’s called Avengers Infinity Quest. Holy cow it looks awesome. Perfect. Now my distro is going to (rightfully) want payment. ASAP. Especially because I wanted an LE. Sure enough, I start readying about them selling out is hours. I see posts on Pinside from folks that can’t find one. I’m in the middle of the mountains, 3 hours from home, it’s a holiday weekend and I couldn’t possible pay except by CC. Seems like every time a new game is announced the same thing happens – I’m out of town.

I heard back from my dsitrobutor and he assured me that I could pay when I got home (and the banks opened) on Tuesday. I’ve bought many games from him and I’m assuming he knew I was good for it

We returned from Highlands refreshed and on Tuesday I visited my local bank and got a cashiers check. Sent it via overnight FedEx and my distro confirmed he received it the next day. Boom – paid for.

It’s at this point there is a bit of a lull. A wait for the official reveal/gameplay stream. It was announced that this would take place on Sept 10th. When that day arrived, I made sure I was prepped and planned to get the Twitch stream by Deadflip up early. I checked on several of the Samsung Smart TVs we have only to find that Twitch was not available as an app – ugh. I could always stream it from my tablet but why not watch it on the big screen. I tried it in my home theater using Apple TV but struggled with buffering almost non-stop. After an hour – I gave up. When the stream was done, I downloaded the entire stream in HD (split into 5 parts due to size), dropped it on a USB hard drive and dragged it out to the OUTSIDE deck TV to watch. The inside (again SMART) TVs would not play the .MP4 files for some reason. The TV that sits outside is newer – worked like a champ. I sat there until midnight watching the stream in glorious – stutter free – HD!

OK – the gameplay looked KILLER. Keith Elwin had another winner on his hands and I was getting an LE – super excited now. But … I knew almost nothing about the Avengers storyline or history. Like most things I run into that I don’t know about I was determined to learn – quickly. I had heard that this game was based on the comics. It was also loosely based on the Infinity Gauntlet series (6 issues). This series was written by Jim Starlin and is revered by comic aficionados for it’s interesting and nuanced story line. I popped over to Amazon and bought the Kindle version. I read it it that night.

Key takeaways from the story is that the story is apocalyptic – so is the game “feel”. This was serious stuff and if not for Adam Worlock, Dr. Strange and the cast of the Avengers – the universe was going to “end”. Great story, easy and quick read. Highly recommend if you own the game

With a bit of knowledge under my belt, it was time to think about modding this new game. First, it was off to get the simple stuff. Like yellow T-molding. The LE game has bright yellow powder coat and needs something on the backbox to tie it together. $20 later and in a few days, I had my new T-molding in hand.

It’s no problem to switch out. Find the seam, use a small flat blade screwdriver to pop out one end and pull back at a sharp angle from the head. It will pull right out with a few bits/slivers of wood. I then save that old piece. Next I lay the old piece completely flat on the floor, then lay the new T molding next to it and cut go length. I use a sharp razor knife to cut the same angles into the new piece that allow it to fold around the head without binding. Now reinstall the new piece by starting where the old seam was and press fit it back in! 3/4″ is the size you need and the 20 foot minimum will be more than enough to do a game

Now it was on to what I would call the “peripherals” – things that are cool but are not critical to the game and can’t be called a mod either. In this case the very first thing I search out was something autographed by the original author of this Avengers story – The Infinity Gauntlet. I found the perfect item on Ebay and it will be displayed proudly next to the game when it arrives. A gauntlet coin bank signed by Jim Starlin. Perfect

I saw this goofy ring on Amazon and thought – why not. Ordered a large. Maybe I’ll mount it in the game. Maybe I’ll wear it to work and let everyone think I’m losing interest in being an adult.

After reading the Gauntlet back story, I ordered the Marvel Encyclopedia. I had wanted a copy for up in the loft (coffee table) for a while but didn’t have the deep interest to buy one. Now I wanted to more about the world that Stan Lee helped create. It’s a cool book – especially the visuals. It’s set up alphabetically so you can research any hero or villain that you stumble across without paging through its 448 pages and almost 6 pounds of heft!

We’ve arrived at the end of the story – at least the part that happens BEFORE I get the game. It plays out the same almost every time. Just before posting this to the blog, Stern announced that the LE versions of AIQ (Avengers Infinity Quest) were “on the line”, and I was the very first to post on their timeline – “looks like mine”. Soon it will be. Time to assemble!

I can hardly “not” be interested in the 1993 Gottlieb system 3 Pinball game titled “Wipe Out”. Why? Simple, because just before this game was released I was living in a tiny town in upstate NY (population 337) that had its very own ski area. I moved to Turin, NY in the late 70’s and the ski area that was situated in that tiny town was called Snow Ridge. The annual average snowfall when I grew up there was over 300″ per year – do the math … that’s 25 feet of snow. For much of the time I lived there, Snow Ridge had no snow making equipment. Didn’t seem like it was needed.

By the time I was old enough to get a job there, they had already installed snow making guns on the main hill. Snow making was added to extend ski times. Even in upstate NY there are days where it might be unseasonably warm and we would begin to lose our snow-pack. The equipment allowed us to maintain the base during those times. It also helped to extend an already long (we usually kept skiing until the first week of April) season by a few more days.

I did not take ski lessons until I was around 17. Once I learned the basics it was off to the races – literally. I skiied over 100 days per year, raced on 2 teams and loved every minute of it. After graduating college in the early 80’s I went straight to work there running the ski rental and repair shop. My staff and I would rent skis in the morning, ski all day, then get back in time to receive all of the rental return in the evening. Once it was dark, the main slope opened for night skiing and we would repeat the procedure!

In between skiing and renting I would mount bindings, repair skis and sharpen/wax them as guests requested. In the lulls between rentals, my team and I would clean and organize the rental shop and … when the mood struck us we would horse around like young guys are prone to do. Indoor snowball fights and ski pole sword play were common events. When the day ended it was off to the bar (100 feet away from the rental shop) for an evening of laughs and good times that sometimes went all the way until the next morning.

In short, I loved that life and I loved to ski. Skiing is thrilling, fast, adrenaline pumping – scare the pants off you fun! So … do I still ski? No is the short answer. I have enormously fond memories of it but I quit skiing a long time ago. I realized the pay for working at a ski area was never going to support a family. I clearly remember standing in the parking lot on “closing day” with the spring snow melting all around me and holding the last check stub from the company – it was less than $10,000 dollars in total for the entire year – ugh. Time to find a “real job”. I left the skiing world in 1984 and have not skied a day since.

So here we are, 35 years later and I notice that my go to guy for inexpensive machines has a Gottlieb Wipe Out listed for sale. I make the 45 minute trip out to see it and find that it’s in “OK” shape. I see a tiny bit of wear on the playfield at the ball drops. There is a sizable chunk missing from the ski lift ramp (the lower portion of it). The flippers are in need a a rebuild. The glass needs to be replaced. Inserts should have LEDs added as they are all incandescent and many are out. The slalom course is not moving left and right as much as it should. The cabinet has a few dings and finally … it’s dirty. Not disgusting, just generally dirty. All in all – my kind of game!

We talk price, settled on a number and I leave with it knowing that it will be months before I can get to shopping it properly. We were in the middle of building our new house and I had at least 6 games ahead of this one. I decided to put it in my pole barn until I could get to it later. I failed to share with my wife that I was “picking up another game” ( … as if they are laying alongside the road and they cost nothing and I am saving them). As luck would have it she was busy in the farmhouse and Chris was available to help me unload. We got it off my pickup, moved to the back of the pole barn on a pallet and covered in a tarp alongside Big Strike and Gold Wings. The poor thing sat there for 3 months until the Pinball Loft was completed and it finally had a permanent home. Tami saw it for the first time all setup in the Loft and said “where’d that come from?” – I answered honestly “I’ve had it for months!”

Fast forward a few months and we are approaching Thanksgiving. I’ll be home this year and will want to spend some of my downtime getting this machine up to snuff. To be ready to “work” when I have the time requires that I have all the supplies and parts I need on hand ahead of time. So it was time to do just that BUT … just getting ready to shop a machine can be a challenge. This is especially true for titles that get little attention or are rare. The answers to very simple questions are not easy to find. For instance, you want to order new rubber for the game. Simple, right? Just go to IPDB web page and download the manual to get all the specific sizes, then head on over to the Titan website and put your order in. Except for Gottlieb machines, you can’t just download the manual. These can only be purchased from Steve at Pinball Resource or from another licensed seller.

What about the lighting? That’s pretty straightforward when you are re-doing a game like Theater of Magic. Lot’s of folks own the game and many have replaced the lighting with LED. Some have even documented what colors they used and where. Not so much with a title like Wipe Out. Documentation is sparse. I got lucky on the rubber because someone had uploaded a kit to the Titan website. It was not correct in that they ordered Bally/Williams flipper rubber and the Gottlieb correct rubber is significantly different – so I edited that part and moved on. I also wanted to customize the rubber color and there were few images on Pinside where others had done it so I ordered 2 complete sets of colors – I could then mix/match as I saw fit – Orange and Purple.

The lighting presented another challenge in that no one had shared the specific light kit they used when swapping in the LEDs. The closest I could get was a question I asked on Pinside months ago in the Gottlieb System 3 Club thread about a game that looked “well done”. That gentleman shared that he had used Comet 2 SMD “white” LEDs for the whole game. That honestly did not help much because … 1) I would have ordered Comet anyway as it’s my go to for LEDs and 2) It was obvious they were white, but “what white” were they?

Comet sells: Warm white, Sunlight white and Natural white. Natural is the Stern look, Warm is the incandescent look and Sunlight is a nice compromise if you do not need the incandescent feel but dont want “hospital bright white”. I popped a few in the game and determined that I was going to use Sunlight in the GI and would hold on my decision between that and warm white for the inserts. I would not be color matching inserts in this game. Once that decision was made, I could head on over to Comet and place my order for a couple of 100 packs of LEDs as buying in bulk cuts a dime off each bulb. In a few minutes the LEDs were ordered in preparation for the coming time off

Now onto the flippers. Flipper rebuild kits have a wide variety of parts associated with the entire flipper assembly. Because there are a lot of parts, they are expensive as a “kit”. I always try to assess exactly what is wrong with the flippers ahead of time in order to buy “just what I need”. You would be surprised at how much this can save you. For Wipe Out I ended up needing MORE that a standard kit would ever contain.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-MaIV6agSBw?feature=oembed&wmode=opaque&w=500&h=281]

So the assessment that I did was helpful because I could be assured that when the parts arrived, I was ready to go. The flipper bats and shoes were in bad shape. The bats were cracked and there was no saving them. The shoes looked original and although they might be OK, I wanted to ensure nothing would stall my shop job so I ordered a set. I always order sleeves for the flipper shafts – they are cheap and important to keeping the flipper perfectly vertical throughout it’s entire rotation. I also ordered coil stops and sleeves as when worn, these can cause all kinds of issues: slow response, sticking and sluggishness. I ordered a new set of shafts and links because a worn set causes weak and sloppy flipper responses. Pawls, EOS switches, mounts, coils, screws and springs were not ordered as they appeared functional.

Before I started I laid out a plan of attack. This would not be a full on restore like my Bride of Pinbot.

The plan here was to do a deep shop job that would fix all mechanics and make the game beautiful to look at – not perfect.

I would do the following:

• Strip down the entire topside of the playfield
• Polish all metal/chrome using a bench polisher and media tumbler
• Polish the playfield using my high speed drill, pads and Meguiars polishes
• Repaint the worn ball drops and cover with mylar
• Clean all drop and stationary targets
• Fix the slalom run to move left and right
• Fix an issue with ball hangs at ski lift
• Vaccuum and wash the cabinet interior
• Wash exterior of cabinet
• LED the entire GI, back box and inserts
• Replace the playfield glass
• Rebuild the flippers and bats
• Replace all coil sleeves and tighten stops
• Replace all topside rubber
• Wash the playfield plastics
• Add the Hallmark hot dog mod
• Add new balls and play!

Of all places I could have started the shop job, I chose the ski slalom. I thought it would be fairly straightforward to replaced the incandescent “colored condom covered” bulbs with LEDs. This involves removing the standard Gottlieb finger rivets and them pulling the blue “snow” plastics from each side. The process went without a hitch other than a pesky bulb on the upper right that was not making great contact. I used a pencil eraser to clean up the contacts in the socket and it worked again. Gottlieb finger rivets are a wonder and a challenge if you don’t know how to remove them. To loosen them you gently but firmly pull up on just the center pin/post. You may need to apply pressure on the surrounding sleeve as you remove the post. Once the center pin is removed the rivet sleeve will remain but now the 2 parts that were joined can now be separated will little effort. If the parts still seem tightly bonded, you may need to grab the edge of the sleeve with a pair of needle nose pliers to remove or loosen the sleeve. Either way it’s always a good idea to keep a few spare rivets on hand as they are cheap and they do break (not often). I finished up the slalom LED job and put away my tools for that day.

Time passed. Lots of it. Like months. Then COVID-19 hit and more time passed because I was literally working 7 days a week for 2 months before I could catch my breath. We were doing whatever it took to keep the company running as an “essential service”. It was a huge challenge but we rose to meet it and kept our company running and serving our guests during the entire period. When the pace slowed a bit, I had a Sat/Sun off and started the “real restoration” process! I started early Saturday morning with my wife still sleeping. I stripped the entire top of the playfield and carefully noted where each piece went and with what hardware. Wipe (like lots of Gottliebs) has a TON of hex posts. Some are huge and some short with a bit of variety in between. Best to record each height and where so you don’t get it wrong later and have to remove parts you already installed.

Going into the full blown restore, I knew there were going to be a few things that MUST be corrected. First and foremost was the right ramp. It was cracked. More than that it had a huge chunk missing from the left side – almost large enough for the ball to go through! My plan was to create a poor man’s “Cliffy” (stainless steel ramp protector) from scrap stainless that I had purchased a year ago from a local metal company. I dropped by one day and they let me peruse the scrap bins and I left with $20 worth of scrap and enough stainless to build hundreds of Cliffys! Well, now it was time to put these scraps to good use.

Once I got the ramp out of the game it was clear that a simple Cliffy fix would look good and cover the damage but without further engineering it might actually promote more damage to the ramp. After all, the end of the stainless protector would touch the ramp (farther up of course) and if hit by the ball put pressure on a new (currently un-cracked) portion of the ramp. So I adjusted my plans to include a playfield post with a full height rubber on it. That post would sit directly behind the new stainless ramp protector and be the singular thing that would take the brunt of all ball strikes. Simply put, the ball would hit the protector and with the new post/rubber tucked in tightly behind it, NO forces would be applied to the ramp plastic at all.

I grabbed some printer paper, make a rough template and headed to the pole barn to hand bend/cut my stainless protector. Bending it first (as many bends as you can) is always best because you are levering a larger portion of the materials. After bending I used my jigsaw to cut the larger pattern, then a hacksaw for the fine cuts.

A few minutes on my grinder took care of the rough edges (key here is to go slow and gentle with the grinding wheel). When finished I ran it back to the Loft for a test fit. It was perfect! Now I was able to determine exactly where the support post needed to go behind it in order to drill through the playfield for installation.

I built a tab onto the front of the protector so it would have permanent support on the left ramp post – other than that connection, there is no other spot where it bolts to the game. When I installed it, I pushed it tight to the newly installed post behind it and then tightened the post screw on the left ramp post to lock it in – done!

Now that the engineering was worked out I had to repair the physical cracks that existed in the ramp structure. There was only one but it was a problem. It was cracked right at the rivet hole. As you know, it’s usually not possible to move the rivet location so now was as good a time as any to test a new ramp glue that someone (@wantdataeast) had suggested on Pinside. It’s called “Weld-On” or “Sci-Grip #16” and it is made by IPS out of Compton CA. The Pinside thread I found this on can be discovered HERE. Applying the Weld-on adhesive was easy. I used a syringe to control the amount and flexed the cracked to make sure the glue was “between” the edges of the break, then aligned the pieces for 3 minutes and let it sit for an hour. The repair (as you can read online) is actually stronger than the surrounding material. I was able to re-rivet the ramp without cracking the repair or any other spot. When I tried to get the “old crack” to re-open by flexing the ramp, it simply would not. LOVE this stuff. If you read the entire Pinside thread you’ll see it’s even a strong enough repair to fix a ramp tab that has broken off. I’ve never seen any adhesive that could do that – but this can.

With the weak side of the ramp fixed, it was time to address the ramp flaps … or should I say, what was left of them. The wide flap on the playfield side was so rusty it was almost solid brown. The shooter lane ramp flap was a flap in name only as it had rusted through in 2 places and was only held on by one rivet. Did I mention you can’t buy them anymore? So I grabbed my supply of flap material (Pinrestore.com) and traced the outline of the flaps on the virgin steel. I used the tin-snips to rough cut the flaps and then VERY gentle application of the grinding wheel to smooth the edges.

Then I was stuck. How do you put the neat/clean and perfectly round holes in this material? Each ramp flap needs 4 holes (2 for the ramp screws and 2 for the rivets to attach it to the plastic ramp). The rivet holes are also very close to the edge of the material. I am not afraid to tackle anything but this looked like a challenge.

I grabbed my cordless drill, a block of wood and a scrap of flap material and went outside to “practice”. Holy cow! After almost losing my fingers, I gave up and came back inside. No way could these be drilled. I went online to see how others were doing it and found the perfect tool. I went to Ebay and quickly ordered one but it was coming from California and I needed my flaps done now! Oh well, in a few days I could knock it out.

The next day I got to thinking about the tool I had ordered on Ebay and wondered why it looked so familiar. I raced upstairs to my pinball tool room and pulled open the big bottom drawer. Sitting there (still unopened and in the original box) was the exact tool I had just ordered from Ebay – crap, the tool I so desperately needed was right in the house all along. Then I remembered that I had ordered it over a year ago and had completely forgot about it. I popped open the box, quickly read the directions and 20 minutes later had completed 2 perfect ramp flaps! The punch/press tool is amazing and is made exactly for this purpose – and now I have 2 of them!

Before I close out this section, I really need to call out the Pintonka tool. I bought my tool a few years ago and have now used it on 3 or 4 games. The last game was Jokerz and I (stupidly) used the wrong length rivet (too long) which required me to put undue pressure on the rivet press. Unfortunately I bent it. It still worked just fine but the bent clamp bothered me – so I emailed Rob at Pintonka. He replied with an apology and asked for my address. Just a few days later a brand new clamp frame showed up in the mail! I tried to pay but Rob said it was “on him”. Wow. Great riveting tool and great service too. Order one of these from Rob – you’ll be glad you did.

The pop bumper lights were not working correctly and it was on my list was to get those fixed ASAP. It took about 60 seconds to see why. There is a resistor board (Part #MA-1417) near the top of the playfield that reduces the voltage coming to the pop lamps from 20 VDC to 6 VDC for normal operation. When they are activated, the resistor board allows a brief spike in voltage (20 volts) and the pops “brighten up” upon ball impact. Cool idea. Almost like a controlled lamp and GI combo. Unfortunately the implementation is technically weak.

That resistor board is full of resistors that are reducing 20 VDC on a steady state basis as most of the gameplay is with the pops running a normal GI voltage of 6 VDC. That means one thing – it gets hot. Hot enough to melt the circuit board and brown the playfield above it! In fact this is exactly what my board looked like.

First I reflowed all the solder joints and added a few wire bridges where the board had gotten so hot the traces had melted away. That got my pop lights working again but I worried about long term dependability. So I replaced the existing resistors (5 watts) with larger 10 watt versions and, if anything they got even hotter. I measured the temp during operation and they quickly hit 175 degrees Fahrenheit.

This issue with using the larger resistors is that once installed on the board, they just don’t have enough space around them for cooling like the smaller ones did. To remedy this I ordered a brand new OEM Gottlieb board from Marco (Part #MA-1418). Gottlieb used this board template in a lot of games and simply swapped out resistor specs as needed.

This board is essentially the same as the MA-1417 board BUT it needed to have the jumper that was soldered into it “clipped” before using it (see image) once I did that it was ready to host the new (smaller sized) 10 watt resistors I ordered from Mouser. This time I took no chances and mounted a 12 volt computer fan that blows directly on the new board. The computer fan is running off a AC/DC 12 volt converter that is plugged into the service outlet. When the game is on, the fan comes on.So far so good with no overheating issues and the pops lighting is working like a charm!

Next on the list was the slalom toy. I HAD to get this working. It’s really the star of the show. What other game allows you to “ski” using a pinball. The problem with my slalom mechanism was that it only “skied” one way. I checked the voltage on each coil (left and right) and there was voltage available.

That meant the game wasn’t energizing the coils for some reason – usually because of a blown transistor. Sure enough after reading the schematic, Q8 was the transistor that controlled slalom movement and a quick inspection of the circuit board revealed that the transistor was blown and had taken the R69 resistor with it. The traces on the R69 resistor were blown out so I soldered a short jumper in place on the back side of the board. An hour later I had the board back in the game for testing and I’m happy to say my slalom moved BOTH ways now!

Just before I started stripping the top of the playfield for the restore, I completed a lamp check. It was obvious that a bunch of GI bulbs were burnt out but in checking the flashers I found that almost all were out. I made a note as to where and began to strip the machine. I replaced the burnt out flashers (Gottlieb used a #67 flash bulb at 13.5 volts instead of a #89 at 13.0 volts) and the light show got tons better right away. I had the top of the playfield stripped for a couple of days when I remembered that the flasher in the middle right of the PF was not flashing during my prior testing. Interesting – because there was not a lamp socket for it to flash from! Then I remembered a molex socketed wire harness that I found laying in the cabinet when I was vacuuming the machine. Betting they were related I looked under the playfield for a matching molex connector and sure enough – it was right there. Long ago, someone had removed the lamp holder, then unplugged the wire harness to the lamp. I’m guessing because that flash lamp holder is right in the way of normal servicing of the slalom run. Anyway, I ordered a new lamp socket and soldered the harness back on there and boom – back in business again.

Finally. It was time to polish the playfield and then put it all back together. I used my normal selection of Meguiars car polishing compounds and a high speed drill to bring the mylar back from it “hard to see through” state to something a bit more presentable. Then I reassembled the entire topside of the playfield in reverse order of my notes. It went well and I had only minor hiccups during the re-build. One of those was getting the slalom hill situated just the right distance from the starting gate. Too close and the slalom cant move back and forth – it hits the gate because the top portion doesn’t just move left and right, it move in an arc based on the fact that the hinge in a single point at the opposite (bottom) end. This means that even if you have clearance at the actual ball exit at the gate, it might not be enough during gameplay. In order to create enough clearance I had to notch the right ramp that runs under the gate mech to create about 1/8″ more room to move the gate rearward. No worries, the part of the ramp that needed a little dremeling was just a tab from the mold when it was created. Got that fixed and the gate mounted and (importantly) played like a charm!

Gameplay and Conclusion

Now that it’s done, here are a few takeaways from the project. There were NOT a lot of units made of this title. Although not highly sought after, it’s still not easy to find because there were only 2,150 produced. The playfield is chocked full and it has 2 very cool mechs that occupy the left and the right side. On the left, there is without argument one of the coolest ball lifts ever put into a pinball machine – the ski lift. A simple rubber belt with “ball sized” holes punched into it do a great job of simulating a chair lift. On the right hand side the slalom run is the largest and most successful implementation of a moving playfield that has ever been done (the other is the tilting/moving playfield in the Indiana Jones machine. The “Rip the Crude” shot is challenging in an otherwise “easier” to shoot game. The game is colorful, the call-outs are just about perfect for the ski theme of the early 90’s – even if they have not aged so well (“Look at the moguls on that ski-bunny!”)

The game was surprisingly easy to shop out. Keep track of those hex posts and you’ll do just fine. If buying this title, be mindful of the right ramp (that large one that goes under the slalom ramp). It’s un-obatnium and if it’s busted up you’ll need to be skilled enough to repair it. Same for the rubber ski lift belt. They CAN be handmade but are very difficult to find NOS. Also watch for the ball drop areas at the inlanes – every game that I’ve ever seen has paint wear in these spots. If you can match the purple, it’s easy to fix and then cover with a mylar patch to protect it. Run the machine menu test for the slalom to see if it moves properly right and left. If it doesn’t you can check the the transistors in the backbox to see if blown. If you can do board work, it’s an easy fix. Finally, check the resistor board that sits under the playfield near the very top. Most are burned badly from overheating and lead to the pop bumper lighting not working properly.

Game play is pure and simple fun. If you’re a skier that was active in the 80’s and 90’s – that’s just a bonus! The game is fairly easy for any accomplished player. The right ramp is as wide as an LA freeway and the shot to the ski lift is the same. The VUK on the right is a bit more challenging to hit and as mentioned before the “Rip the Crud” return wireform is a nice challenge.

Most players will complain about the “Hot Doggin'” round (mode) due to the fact that (like many other Gottlieb’s) when accomplished will double your current score. The complaint is surrounding how unbalanced the scoring can be because of it. I get it but don’t care. I love the challenge and the opportunity to double my score! If I’m playing against another player, it’s a nice wildcard. The game is not likely to make it into any tournament play but again, I don’t play competitively.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=indimmN49Ns?feature=oembed&wmode=opaque&w=500&h=281]

One of my favorite parts of the game is the increasing value of the right ramp – it moves from 1MM to 20MM after a non-stop series of consecutive shots. It’s exciting to watch the score grow as you hit that ramp over and over. You would think that you could hit it “all day long” but as the score builds, so does your anticipation and inevitably it leads to over-confidence and a miss.

It’s right about then that the Austrian accent guys taunts me by saying in his condescending whiny voice “Maybe I should call your mother, have her help you ski.” 

I will typically respond by actually yelling back at him another call-out from the game “See that ski pole – I’ll shove it up your “beeeeep”. 

I’m an audiophile. No, you can’t go to prison for that. Means I like good sound. Been that way since the late 70’s when my neighbor came over and asked if I would like to listen to some of his “records”. This was 1977 and I didn’t know music from a hole in the ground. I listened to what he had – Thin Lizzy, The Commodores, Toto, Steve Miller Band and Queen (he had good taste) and I fell in love with music and the gear. Before you know it I had purchased a Sears “all-in-one” record player, preamp, amp unit. It sounded terrible but I was (for a while) in heaven. I became interested in better sound and became friends with a guy that owned a stereo shop.

I spent hours helping him with installs (OK, getting in his way) and learning the “business” of Hi-Fi. The next summer I worked in the hay fields at $1.10 hour to earn enough cash to mail order a set of Kenwood LS-408B speakers from a company a thousand miles away – Wisconsin Discount Stereo. They were delivered via tractor trailer and I was again – in heaven.

I’ve spent an insane amount of money on audio equipment since then. In 1984 I had a little under $7,000 in a car stereo setup that won the first ever “sound off” car stereo event in Syracuse NY – in the unlimited wattage division (660 watts per channel at that time was unheard of). I won a radar detector and a plaque. 10 years later similar contests netted winners $10K and up!

Home system upgrades followed and in every house I’ve owned there has always been a form of a “listening room” in each house. I started collecting records again in the early 2000’s and by the time I sold the collection I had amassed over 7,000 lps. Today, I have a few hundred albums, thousands of CDs and a huge library of digital music. The albums are played on a JA Michell Gyrodec SE and are still my favorite way to listen. I’ve wired a half dozen cars, 2 large boats, 6-8 houses and at least 3 entire home theaters for sound. I know good sound when I hear it

So what on earth does all this have to do with Pinball? Everything. Pinball fidelity sucks – pretty much across the board. There are some exceptions. JJP’s Wizard of Oz for example is excellent. Nice crisp highs, mid range is smooth for voices and not “peaky” or strident and there is enough bass to satisfy (although a sub on that title is a must). Generally though, the sound quality, the frequency response and dynamic range on most pinballs is not good – OK at best. I had just bought a NIB Stern Jurassic Park Premium. I was impressed with the game to say the least. You can read about it on this blog. As good as the T-Rex sounds were, they still lacked impact – I wanted him to shake the room when he roared and to really be able to hear the nuances in “roar” – it should raise the hair on your arm if done right!!

So what to do about it? Well the short answer is “buy a Pinwoofer kit”! Why you say? Because it is a huge upgrade, it’s fully contained within the pinball (unlike adding a sub), it’s very affordable, it’s not a horrifically complicated install, it’s adjustable to your sound preferences and … it sounds fantastic!

Full disclosure here. I’m an external subwoofer guy. I normally buy a Pinnovators subwoofer output board, then wire up a Polk 10″ powered sub for almost all of my new pins. Adjust the sound a little – dial in the output and crossover of the sub and you are done. I’m up to 14 Polk subs in the Loft. I am also a “sound and brand snob”. My listening system would never include a sub, my home theater and party systems MUST have a sub (or two!) but no way will “just a Polk” do – those setups have dual SVS subs with big digital amps.

Back in the day (30 years ago) my fellow audiophiles wouldn’t be caught dead with Pyle or Jensen speakers installed in their cars – it was considered entry level gear for guys that didn’t know what they were doing (Alpine was the mid/high end brand at the time). Pyle may still be considered entry level gear but I can vouch for the fact that what Dan has done with these speakers and his custom amps simply works – whatever the label on the speaker says

I received my order pretty quickly and popped the box open. Packaging and sorting of the components was well done. The backbox speakers came in the original box – well protected of course. The sub/cabinet woofer came with the spacer ring pre-installed. This saves a bunch of time – thank you Dan. The amps were packed safely in bubble wrap and the wiring harnesses, bolts, washers, nuts and electrical connectors were all sorted into 5 bags as follows:

• Sub amp bag
• Backbox amp bag
• Power connector “A” bag
• Power connector “B” bag
• Glass shake tape bag

I had 2 small niggles on the entire Pinwoofer experience. First, there were extra small parts – nuts/bolts, etc. It’s hard to blame Pinwoofer for adding extra small parts because it’s probably easier to create a master small parts list and ship that instead of constantly trying to create a custom “nut & bolt” list for the dozens of variety of pinballs out there. Anyway, when there are extra parts – there is confusion.

Secondly, the way the install instructions are delivered is a little “unwieldy”. You must go to Google Drive to retrieve them AND they are supplied in 6 different (individual) documents – some of which don’t apply to your install. Way better (and way harder) to print and include (in the box) the install instructions specific to my game. This isn’t academic. I’m up in my Pinball Loft trying to install this kit and scrolling back and forth on an iPad screen while tabbing between docs. I got it done, the instructions were good AND accurate, but it could have been easier. You get it. Paper print-outs win every time – rant over

On the kudos to Pinwoofer side, is the fact that Dan reached out to me via email to offer any assistance I might need during the install. A gracious offer and one that he offers to ALL customers. Reviewing comments on Pinside would suggest that lots of people take him up on the offer – good on him as that is not an easy task.

Before I ordered the Pinwoofer kit, I spent the better part of 2 weeks convincing myself that the sound on my new pinball was “good enough” … I knew it could be better than it was, but there are so many paths to get there. I decided to start with an external sub like I had done 13 other times. Done – added a Polk sub using the Pinnovator board attachment. I could have simply left it at that but the mids and highs were never going to get any better. I considered replacing the backbox speakers (done it before) but the last time I did that the change was barely noticeable. So … off to the Pinside forums to see what others had done. The name Pinwoofer kept popping up and all the feedback was positive. Some reviews were downright glowing and others were over-the-top holy cow, you’ve got to buy this thing ’cause it’s the best mod I’ve ever bought! I discounted the latter but couldn’t ignore all the rest. After considering it for a few days, I pulled the trigger and ordered the entire “Super Kit”

• What you get in a Stern JJP “Pinwoofer Super Kit” is:
  • New 2 way Pyle backbox speaker pair
  • New Pyle cabinet woofer
  • Pin-Specific 12V Power Cable
  • Subwoofer Amp Kit 50W x 2
  • Backbox Amplifier Kit 50W x 2
  • 8″ Dual Voice Coil Subwoofer Driver
  • Playfield glass shake reduction tape
  • Mounting Hardware and Electrical Connectors

Some of the marketing verbiage on the Pyle products is neither relevant to the product nor “real” – this is no fault of Dan or Pinwoofer. This stuff has been going on forever. I was not shocked that the Pyle sub box said it was “rated” for 800 watts max power. Upon review of the Pyle website, it actually rated for 400 watts RMS. So what. It will likely never see more than 25-30 watts RMS from the little Pinwoofer amp because it simply doesn’t NEED it. I’ve got the amp in my game set to 30% of max and it shakes the game as hard as my shaker does! Like pinball games that have (over time) driven scores up into the “billions”, the wattage game played by speaker and amp makers continues. Here is what you need to know. Ignore the wattage rating – you will never “blow” that Pyle speaker unless you over-drive it with an amp that is TOO SMALL. That being said, there is a feature on the Pyle sub that is very useful for this application – the dual voice coils. When wired in dual mode, the sub presents a 2 ohm load (read easier to drive) and thus improves power output and lowers distortion throughout the amplifiers range.

The supplied “class D” amps from Dan are absolutely sufficient to drive both the backbox and cabinet speaker within their expected use range. The Wattage rating on these types (sizes) of amplifiers is always dependent upon supplied voltage but 50 watts running from 12 volts is in the hunt and it’s probably delivered with around 10% THD. Again, they work fantastic so it matters not.

How’s it sound? Fantastic. It really does. Not just better than factory – this is a HUGE improvement. Especially if you are going from “just factory” and do not have an external sub wired up. The difference is night and day. Voices and call-outs are clearer. The high/mid-range sounds are sharp/distinct and have impact (spinner sounds for instance). I am certainly hearing stuff I never heard before. The cabinet sub does something an external sub could not – it physically moves the cabinet.

• During the T-Rex Chase mode, you can feel the T-Rex footsteps and he runs you down.
• In the ball drain animation segment, where the jeep skids off the cliff you can hear the screams from people in the jeep – I never heard it with the factory set up.
• The timpani drums of the theme music as the game starts have punch and the crashing cymbals have the appropriate splash and high end – Dum, Dum dumdy-dumdy Dum Dum – Duh Duh Dum, Dum dumdy-Dum crrrrashhhhhhh! It sounds like your a hand full of rows back from the orchestra pit and dead center in the sweet spot. Love it.

Dan really put some thought into making certain that you can get the best sound out of his system. He includes output pots on his amps to allow you to dial down the output and reduce/remove noise in the system (should there be any). I did not have to use the adjustment pots at all. The sound was outstanding with the factory (Dan) adjustments.

Guess what – the Polk external subwoofer is unplugged. It’s off. Not needed. I pulled it because I was trying to get more clarity from the bass, more definition in the mid-range – voices specifically. It worked. It was pretty dramatic too – enough for me to leave it that way. Dan’s Pinwoofer Super Kit does the job BETTER by itself, than having an external sub alongside. I “might” be missing a tiny bit of the very bottom end … say around 50/60 Hz or so, but the sound just got cleaner and tighter. Now, as I look at the row of Stern machines sitting opposite JP, I wish I had found Pinwoofer sooner. The system sounds great!

So what settings did I use? I keep my master volume at 30. Then I use these settings for the backbox speakers – and I utilized the 10 band EQ that is included in the menu. No way would I ever set an EQ this way for a home listening setup but – hey, it sounds good this way so here you go. I set the “sliders” as follows:

• 31 Hz -15
• 62 Hz -7
• 125 Hz -2
• 250 Hz 0
• 500 Hz +2
• 1 kHz +6
• 2 kHz +7
• 4 kHz +8
• 8 kHz +8
• 16 kHz +13

Admittedly, these are “hot settings” on the mids and highs. I like it that way as my hearing around these frequencies has been dulled by a half century of walking the earth (and too many of those years listening to music much too loud!). As I made adjustments I noticed that there was not much impact at 250 Hz and below and … not much change in sound at the 16 kHz band either. If there is too much “sizzle” for your younger ears just drop the 1/2/4 kHz down to your liking. The cabinet speaker is still set to flat. I believe that Dan’s amplifier includes a built in low pass filter anyway to remove most of the highs so I just left that setting at factory.

The volume knobs on each amp have a roughly 270 degree range of motion. To mimic my output settings simply turn the amp on, then turn the output/power knob as far as you can toward “off” without actually shutting it down. For the backbox speakers, turn the knob 135 degrees (about halfway). The cabinet speaker setting was roughly 90 degrees (about 1/3rd of the total range of motion). These speaker outputs are a very personal setting and you may want it higher output or lower. The point is you can tune it just the way YOU like it. Want more bass? The amp can handle the power output needed. Trust me – it’s there if you need it. Feels like enough power to break the playfield glass. I found about 1/3rd of the available output was plenty.

Want to hear how it sounds? Check out the video and crank it up!

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iyXIct5pdAU?feature=oembed&wmode=opaque&w=500&h=281]

I would be remiss to not at least throw in a plug for John Williams score for the movie that was used in this game. It’s an outstanding piece of music. John Williams was a “given” for Steven Spielberg even before the filming started – he knew he wanted John to score it. Thankfully Williams accepted the challenge and we are grateful for it. Here’s a great link to a review of the score where it is listed as one of the top 100 greatest movie scores of all time https://moviemusicuk.us/2019/02/25/jurassic-park-john-williams/

Final verdict? Buy it, buy several. I’m going to.

Buy your Pinwoofer kit here

Hard to go through something like this and not write about it. From high national drama, personal and professional impact not much else in my life has ever changed everything around me in such a short time. Today’s post won’t focus on all the negatives but rather on what I’ve learned in the past 14 days or so …

First a little background. I got back to work after 2 days off from some minor surgery to find the Coporate office a beeehive of activty surrounding planning and mitigating the impact of COVID-19. I then learned I was (in absentia) elected to to join the Senior Leadership team to help run the response plans for our company. I was, of course, happy to help but already a bit behind the team of 10 folks that had been working on this for 3-5 days ahead of me. Over the weekend I caught up and during the next few days assisted our team in game planning how to pull 98% of our staff out of the corporate faciities across the country to a “work from home” environment. We pulled it off due in no small part to our excellent IT team and within 48 hours of emptying the offices, we were working off-site and doing it well.

As we exited the building and began our new work lives at home, my role shifted to a steady stream of conference calls (4-6 per day and an hour or two long each) and long days spent documenting, questioning, suggesting and planning. I would send a daily Executive Briefing every evening and attend the calls that the material was created from. I have a large number of direct report Team Members and my responsibility to them did not wane. It has been a challenging balancing act to do both – especially as this first 2 weeks has been 7 days per week and almost non-stop action. If you are in an essential business like I am, you know what I mean. If you are not you probably have no idea what it’s like (and I hope you don’t need to!)

As I write this, the pace has slowed – not much but some. By now, we have documented and shared many of the new policies and procedures our team members will be need as we move through this crisis. Most of us think that the pace will change (increase again) as the number of cases grows (at about 120,000 in the US right now). But while we are planning for the worst, we pray for the absolute best.

Tonight is Saturday. I have to look it up. The days have all blended together. Even time is difficult to keep track of. Thankfully, the owner of our company is a fantastic leader. Our call with the Senior Leaders this morning started and ended with words of wisdom from him to each of us: This may not be over as fast as all of us would like so … take care of yourself, take care of your families. Get enough rest, eat well and work out. He instituted a “blackout” time period when no one should schedule calls (5-7pm each evening) so dinner, family time and exercise could happen without interruption. He understands the demands and also knows we can’t help our company if we are worn out.

So … I’ve got some time. This Saturday evening I can take a break – think a little, write a little. Heck the CEO told me to. I thought I’d capture what I’ve learned the first 2 weeks working from home in the middle of what appears to be the largest worldwide threat since I’ve been here on earth – COVID-19

Here’s my laundry list

• Let me start with … I’m grateful, and thankful
  • I have a home, plenty of food and I’m still working. So many others are not working and it’s through no choice of their own
• When I retire, I think it will be “OK” here at home.
  • I like the routine here each day. Up and shower, dress, coffee, a bite to eat and on the laptop for my early call with the response team. I don’t mind the “goundhog dayishness” of it at all.
• I love peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, every day
  • Tami makes me one for lunch. The same way, the same bread. I’ll not complain one bit. I’m thankful for her to make it and thankful that I’ve got something to eat
• My wife and I are getting along better than ever
  • My patience sucks. Pressures of work and the ranch can lead me to be too short with my wife. I’m much less so now. I like me better this way – I think she does too
• The dogs are getting clingier than they have ever been (I love dogs)
  • We are around them 24/7, they are liking it a little too much and so am I for some reason
• It’s hard not to be able to hug the people you love
  • My daughter lives 200 feet away from us on a smaller house on our ranch property. She tries not to spend too much time here because her fiance has regular contact with the outside world. I miss them being over here on a regular basis
• It hurts to hear loneliness in your Mom’s voice
  • Mom is in NY – the epicenter. Thankfully she is just inside the Adirondack Park where the population is sparse. She lost my Dad 18 months ago and was just building her new life of new friends that she now can’t go see – ugh.
• Some politicians are showing us why politicians are not liked
  • I won’t name them but those that are not focused on getting this country back on its feet again range from petty to downright disgusting. Hope they pay by getting “un-elected”
• When we HAVE to do something – somehow we get it done
  • I’ve had to re-wire my pump house and run deep electrical diagnostics on a pinball machine. All because there is no one around to come help right now – learn, then do is my motto. Looks like we are living that lesson with ventilators as well.
• I’m being much more careful working around farm equipment
  • I can not even imagine being pregnant, or having a chronic condition that required hospitalization right now. Staying OUT of the hospital seems the best approach at the moment
• Nature is even more important to me than I thought
  • Tami and I have been taking way more walks than in the past – and we liked to walk. Being in the woods melts away stresses of the day
• Prepping (I am/do) is no longer considered fringe
  • I’ve been prepping for years. When this hit, we were ready. Beans, bullets and band-aids and more were already packed away for just this kind of rainy day. We don’t look so crazy now
• I appreciate small favors in a big way
  • With my pre-existing heart condition, I really should not leave our ranch property. As such, my daughter has been a saint in picking up my prescriptions, ranch supplies, etc. It’s an extra burden for her – even a pain sometimes but she’s doing it without complaint
• Have the best tools for working at home or suffer accordingly
  • When it hit the fan, I began to think what working from home would be like. I needed a good set of wireless ear buds. Ones that worked not just for music or “taking” a call but ones where the person on the other end could hear you. Apple Air Pods Pro won the day and I ordered them just ahead of the wave that had them out of stock on Amazon for days afterward
• More than ever I need to inject creativity into my job
  • I’ve got to build, fix, write, create or I will explode. I’m finding ways to do it in my work and thankfully, have this blog
• I’ve never worried about getting sick, now I do
  • I didn’t even worry when I was scheduled for quadruple bypass. I AM worried now. I see the news reports. I know my age and health history. I’m not scared or hysterical about it – I’m just structuring my life to ensure I stay virus free
• Playing pinball is fun, playing alone for days on end sucks
  • I’m an introvert and even I’ve had enough at this point
• The office we built into our new home for “occasional” use is not perfect
  • Ugh. I could share the whole drama surrounding how the cabinet company didn’t have a clue what they were doing but … I’ll leave it at this – as I type this I’m sitting in an elevated drafting chair because the workstations they designed were “kitchen” height, not office chair height
• Humor is important to me and it has vaulted way up the list
  • We did an “outdoor” movie last night to maintain social distancing with my daughter and her fiance. We all insisted on a comedy – It was Robin Williams in the classic “RV”. Wet-your-pants-stupid type of funny. We needed it bad

Things were going so well … then they weren’t, then the COVID-19 virus hit, then (like many others) I was on my own for repair. First world problems I know. During these very difficult times, the LAST thing anyone is worrying about is broken pinball games. However, I had one. It was brand new a few weeks ago, it broke and then I fixed it – maybe this post helps someone else. Warning – this is a highly technical post (read boring) and unless you have a Stern node board issue or node board fetish, move on.

Jurassic Park is a super fun, super challenging game. I was just seeing some significant improvement in my gameplay on this title. My scores were increasing as was my enjoyment of the game. On March 15th I was playing when I noticed the top left side of the game was dark. The pops were not working as were a bunch of other switches non-functional. That following Monday I emailed my distributor who put me in touch with Stern. What follows is the (sometimes) complicated and challenging process to the solution.

I received a confirmation from Stern saying they understood and would ship the new board. A few days passed and during that time, the COVID-19 issue hit a fever pitch. My company exited the corporate office, my team was scattered to their homes (as was I) and I watched as state by state shut down with “stay a home” orders. I began to think that there was no chance the board ever left Illinois. That worry became real when IL issued their own stay at home order. I quickly shot an email to Stern …

I quickly got on the net to find an alternative supplier. As I suspected, there were not many BUT the Gameroom Guys had the part and I messaged them to see if they were able to ship given the circumstances, so I quickly ordered one from them

A day or 2 went by and I got a message back from Stern stating that my replacement node board DID ship out and was on the way!

Stern was spot on – the Node board #9 showed up on my doorstep on March 26th and … so did the board that I ordered from Gameroom Guys. I was buried up to 15 hours a day working on COVID-19 opportunities within my company. The situation was unprecedented and each day brought new challenges, processes and policies. The arrival of the parts was a welcome diversion and that evening I dug in to begin the repair

I started with the obvious, pull the old board and re-install the new board. The Node board #8 and #9 are both the same exact board, to make them behave differently is easy, for Node #8 -all 4 dip-switches are “off” and for Node #9 dip-switch #3 is pushed up for “on”. I switched the #3 to “on”, popped the new board into the game and … nothing. No change. The error code on the LCD screen remained “Node 9 not found”. Now that it was clear to me that the node board was not the issue, it was time to begin the process of elimination to figure out what exactly the problem was. I tried a whole bunch of stuff (all without impact) and then shared that with the Stern tech team.

What follows are my emails to Stern as I spent the next 4 hours chasing this thing down. It was late at night and I was not expecting Stern to reply. That last bit of info got me looking to find exactly which switches were impacted from Node #9. I had the manual so it was pretty straightforward to check each one. Just going to take some time. I just stayed on it and worked my way logically to a conclusion

Now I have TWO extra Node #9 boards … but hey, the Park is back open and JP is fully functional!

John Hammond needed Nedry. NOW! It was about to hit the fan and he had no idea what Dennis Nedry was up to. In a way, I want him too. I want a Stern Jurassic Park pinball machine – now.

So – it’s time to sell some games … and that’s saying something because it is RARE that I ever sell a game. Up until recently, the grand total of all games I have ever sold was 3. Out of 45 total purchased, I had sold only 3.
That all changed a few Sunday’s ago when I began to feel even more keenly how challenging it is to keep older games running well – or probably more accurate – keeping 40 games of all ages running well. To reduce my time spent maintaining and fixing games, I put 3 out of my collection up for sale. It quickly spiraled to me selling 6 in about 48 hours!

I listed Cactus Jack’s, Twin Win and my Atari Middle Earth for sale on the multitude of Facebook groups that do those kinds of things. The gentleman that quickly bought my Middle Earth and Twin Win is someone I know and he asked if I had any others I might consider selling.

Readers might know that I keep about 40 games up in the Pinball Loft and the overflow of project games stored in a secured but seperate outbuilding. When the buyer asked about other games, I remembered that I had a Williams Post Time and a Big Strike in storage. The Post Time was a nice EM in good working condition. The Big Strike on the other hand was simply a project machine that would light up when plugged in but needed a ton of work to function. I bundled those as a package deal and offered the buyer my best price if he took them both – he did

Interestingly, the machine that was the rarest (1,900 made) and most desirable (Cactus Jack’s) did not sell immediately. It was a real nice example that I had put a lot of work into getting both beautiful and playable. I bought the game locally from a co-worker and quickly put over $700 in parts into it. I added new legs, a new ramp, new flipper bats, cactus decals, LEDs, lithium battery holder, apron cards, drop targets/decals, rubbers and I’m sure a bunch more. The new parts were the easy part. The real investment was time. I rebuilt the drop target mechs, rebuilt the entire upper playfield with lexan, fixed the head lock mechanism, polished the playfield mylar, touch up some ball drop wear, washed and vacuumed the cainet and on and on …. In the end the game was not perfect by any means but it WAS a nice machine nonetheless. The interest and positive comments on the social media sites was high, but no one stepped up with the money or a commitment. Until late that evening.

I got a notification from FaceBook Messenger from an out of state collector stating he wanted the machine. No questions asked, just “is it still available?” I told him yes it was, BUT before he drove to come get it, I wanted to let him know all that was good and bad about the machine. I shared the issues with him and then sent him some more videos and pictures showing inside the backbox and actual game play. Satisfied that this was the game he wanted, he asked if I could hold it. Not a problem for me as I did not really need the space immediately. He sent the deposit via PayPal and we made arrangements to meet the following week.

At the same time this was going on, I got another FaceBook message from a local guy asking how he could pay for the Middle Earth machine. He was local and he wanted it. Hated to message him back to let him know that it was already (just) sold. I raced over to the listing page and marked it as such. While doing that I got an additional message from him asking about the Williams Space Mission EM that could be seen in the Atari Middle Earth photos. I told him it “might” be for sale. After a few emails back and forth I discovered he was a local that had just moved here and was connected to a few folks that I already knew. Couple of FB messenger chats later and I invited him over to see the game and play a few others.

A few nights later, the gentleman that bought the Twin Win and Middle Earth stopped by to pick up his games. When we closed the deal on the Twin Win and Middle Earth he asked if I might have any other “project” games I wanted to sell. In fact, I did have 4 or 5 stored in my pole barn and I offered him the Big Strike and Post Time titles to him as a combo deal – he agreed to take those as well. We used my Escalera to move the 2 machines out of the Loft and then drove over to the pole barn to load the others. He was loaded and gone in under 2 hours

I climbed the steps to the Loft to clean up and put my tools and packing materials away. It was strange to see the “blank spot” along the wall where 2 games used to be … I had to console myself with the thought that soon enough a new Jurassic Park Premium would occupy at least one of the spots.

Well – that escalated fast. I planned to sell 3 games and had already sold 5! At that point in time 4 were already loaded and gone. The only game that remained was Cactus Jack’s and I had a deposit on that machine as well. It took a bit to finally nail down a pick up date. The buyer and I had to work out a common and convenient time and at first struggled a bit to do so. I found out later why. He was driving 7 hours to get here! No matter, we settled on a Sunday evening at the end of the following week. True to his word, he pulled into the ranch right on time! We spent a few minutes getting to know each other and discussing his pinball journey as well as mine. We played a few games (he had a nice 51MM game on Metallica) and started the process of packing Cactus Jack’s for transport. 5 minutes on the Escalera and the machine was safely out of the Loft and slid into his vehicle. He shared that he was now headed to North Carolina to pick up a Twilight Zone before turning north to head home for the 7 hour drive. I handed him a bottled water for the road, thanked him and wish him luck with the new games and he was on his way.

All the while this was going on I was hot and heavy on the Pinside threads surrounding the Stern Jurassic Park game. I wanted to learn as much as I could about the game if I was to order one. My FIRST concern was quality. Playfield quality to be exact. I had just had a terrible experience with Stern Pinball on a KISS Premium machine I had purchased new a few years ago. It game with ghosting inserts that turned into cracked clear coat within 250 plays. I worked with my distributor (who, in turn worked with Stern) over the rediculously long time period of over 2 years, only to be told I would not get a populated playfield to replace my damaged one. You Pinball collectors know what that means … Stern was willing to send me a new playfield but it would be barren. It would be up to me to “do the swap”. Now I’m quite capable of doing this but, come on Stern. A playfield swap is 25 hours or more of work that I don’t need. When I received Stern’s “final answer” on the KISS playfield I was so angry that I had basically sworn off any NIB Pinball purchases on a go forward basis – then I saw Jurassic Park.

I spent hours pouring through more than 70 pages on the JP Premium/LE thread on Pinside. Within a few minutes it was clear that (at least early on) there WAS an issue with playfield quality. I found pictures of rippled clear coats where factory installed posts had pressured the soft clear. I saw images of chipped clear near posts and in some cases where that chipped clear had removed some of the artwork. Dissapointed and concerned … I read on. The good news is that as I moved forward in the thread (newer posts) the problem began to go away. Newer built machines had fewer issues. As I neared the end of the thread, it looked like all of the playfield issues had been resolved.

At this point I’m going to weigh in on the clear coat issue. Not many people can share opinions on this with authority. I can. I’m not an expert but I HAVE clear coated a playfield. I did the playfield on my Bride of Pinbot. I used a professional quaility 2 part (2 pac) clear coat, sprayed through a HVLP gun (High Volume, Low Pressure) hooked to a compressor in a dedicated spray booth (while wearing a hazmat suit and breathing apparatus). I sprayed several coats and finished the playfield with an air sander and then buffing wheels/polishing agents of various grits. It came out looking like glass. You know what? After 2-300 games, it STILL looks the same. No dimples, no chipping, no pooling/rippling – at all. The issues being experienced today MUST have something to do with the chemical composition or mix of the clear.

I have Stern machines that have heavy dimpling where the clear coat is the same thickness as the layers I put down on my BOP. It is very clear that the “dimpling” is in the clear and not the wood. That tells me it’s too soft. I don’t know why, but it is. This has proven to be one of the things that Stern discovered in their work to fix the issue. They simply put less clear coat on the playfield. Less clear coat equals less dimples. This still does not address that issue of why the clear used by their vendor is so “soft”. Hey at the end of the day, it looks like the clear on the newest games is staying put, has less dimpling and pooling so guess what? Time to call my distro and order one.

I zipped off an email to my distributor and got a quick response that they would be “back on the production line” in late February. I asked about sending a deposit or the whole amount and was told to send the full payment and that by the time the check was cleared the machines would likely be made. I got that done the very next day and let him know the “check was in the mail” (I always take a photo and send it along via email). Now there was nothing left to do but wait … or was there?

OK … there were a LOT of things to do before the game arrived! In fact, you probably know by now that I’m a obsessive “modder” when it comes to pinball. It doesn’t stop with modding either. I like to compliment my machines with autographed objects, artwork and even life size replicas of associated characters if available. In the case of Jurassic Park, I went right to Pinside and started researching the “must have” mods for this new game. I did not take long to blow a grand.

Jurassic Park PB Mods:
$130 – Ulek store (3D molded directional signs)
$200 – Mezel Mods (Raptor pen mod, Fossil signs)
$120 – Pinball Life (Shaker motor, upgraded coil stops)
$370 – Robert Stone (Orange powder coating)
$40 – Pinnovators (Subwoofer cable and circuit)
$120 – Amazon (Polk 10″ powered subwoofer)
$90 – Pingraffix (Interior side art blades)
$175 – American Pinball (Magic Glass)
$57 – Titan rubber kit (Clear rubbers, playfield color matched tapered posts)
$1,300 Grand Total

Over the course of the next 2 weeks the porch filled up with boxes from Pinball Life, Mezel Mods, Titan and others. I hauled the booty up to the Loft and stacked it in the store room until my game arrived. One of the very first things I ordered was a set of powder coated armor. Robert Stone does fantastic work and he was an easy choice. When I asked him how the process worked, he shared that you pay for the powder coating and he ships the parts when completed. Once you have the original parts removed, you ship those back to him. It’s an honor system that works well for the most part BUT can get wonky if there are delays (on the customer end). Almost exactly 2 weeks later I got a message from Robert that my powder coating was done. Wow – that was fast … too fast actually. I didnt even have confirm that my game was shipped yet! I started to worry that I would be one of “those customers” that does not return the original armor that Robert needs to complete the next job for the next customer. The message went on to say that he had posted pics of my finished powder coated armor in his Pinside thread “Let me powder coat your game”. I went there to check it out and was blown away. I couldn’t wait to see that orange on my game! The 3 artwork styles that the Pro, Premium and LE version present offer enough variety to warrant a unique powder coat color choice for each. The premium has an orange sky on each side driven from the sunset scene it depicts. The Prismatic brand Illusion Orange Cherry with gold flakes in the clear coat was a perfect match. It would be a while before I had my game in hand to make the swap … at least that’s what I thought.

I spent many hours researching mods, checking out the gallery images in the 2 major threads about the game on Pinside. All of that time paled in comparison to the time I spent searching Ebay for the perfect “non-Pinball” compliment item. I looked for life sized dinosaurs, wall art and tons of autographed Jurassic Park items. I wanted something HUGE or at least something with enough presence that it would be the correct scale when sitting on a floor sized display pedestal. I was about to give up when I found a Wayne Knight (Nedry in the film) autographed Jurassic Park orange safety helmet! It was perfect. It had a plastic IGen identification badge and, importantly came with a custom Lucite stand with the JP logo engraved in the bottom. I was thrilled and quickly made an offer. After a (just as fast) counteroffer, I accepted and within a few days the well packed box arrived. It was AFTER I had purchased the item that I realized just how aligned that kind of item was to the game. During my search I had considered many autographed items. Stuff from Laura Dern, stuff from Sam Neill and others but just couldn’t fall in love with it – some due to size, others due to (insane) pricing. The revelation came when I was listening to a podcast about the game where it was mentioned the ONLY reference to any specific film character in the entire machine was Wayne Knights character – Nedry. It was accidental, but I had bought the one thing that made the most sense to place near the game!

Then, I waited …
Then waited some more …
Before I knew it, the end of February came and I was hopeful, but waiting …

I left for a business trip to Arizona for a few days. The day I left I got to the airport early to find a pretty sizable line formed already. As I approached ticketing I reached for my license … it was gone. Not to be found. Anywhere. OMG. I’m going to Arizona to speak to 200+ people and they are expecting me. I have GOT to get to this meeting! I pulled out my TN Handgun Permit – the only other form of ID that has my image on it. I showed it to the ticket agent and asked if that would get me through security. He said sure – no problem. Then he asked if I had a firearm … to which I answered “no” (wondering why he asked). He was correct. I got to through security using that ID, but what he failed to tell me was that I was going to go to the front of the security line for “enhanced” screening. They tore my bags apart, they used the explosives residue wipes on every little thing. They hand screened me (OK rubbed me all over). Then they let me through security. When I landed in AZ, I began to worry (a lot) that I might not get home so easily. I was not so sure that AZ would agree that a TN Handgun Permit was an OK form of ID – I checked the TSA website and they do NOT accept permits so I had a good reason for concern. I was also scheduled for minor surgery the very next morning of my return so I really needed to get home on time. I contacted our company event planner. She is amazing and a friend. I asked if there were any seats left on the 2 company jets that were returning to Knoxville that Wednesday. Turns out there was ONE and she gabbed it for me. I’m forever grateful.

When I arrived home, I noticed a large and long box on the porch. That could only mean one thing – my armor had arrived from Robert. Now the race was on. He expected me to swap that newly powder coated armor with the original and then ship the original back to him. I was worried. I still did not have my game or a ship date.

I had my surgery the next day. Sitting around recovering stinks so I shot an email off to my distributor. Any updates? I asked … He quickly got back with YES! The game had shipped 3 days ago and was on the way! The next day I got a call from the shipping company asking if it would be “OK” to deliver on the coming Friday. Heck yea! Bring it on …

Friday came and the freight driver called sometime just before lunch and got here about 20 minutes later. I was just finishing up some work when he pulled in to the gate. I had him bring the game to the pole barn because the new house is not “turn-around” friendly for a straight truck or semi. We met out at the barn and I asked if he could unload directly into the Ranger. He said sure and he did. Easy as pie.

Now … getting that game OFF the Ranger was a little more challenging. I could not lift due to surgery so my daughter (who clearly thinks I’m certifiable for being so deep in this hobby) was kind enough to help me. We backed up to the front porch and tipped the machine so that the pallet made contact with the steps, from there is was pretty simple. Escalera to the stairs and then up we went – box and all. That turned out to be a bigger challenge than I anticipated. The box is a LOT bigger than the machine. We made the corner at the bottom but could not turn at the top. Had the pulled the Escalera out and then tip the box on the “truck this side only” side onto the floor and drag it up the last step. From now on all NIB get the “B” in NIB removed before going into the Loft!

Next steps were to cut the box, add the front legs, use my pinball lift to add the back legs, then go to town modding the heck out of it before playing a single game.

I got all the armor swapped without incident. It was stunning to see in person. Just beautiful.

Next up was the shaker motor – 10 minute install max. No issues

Next was the Pinnovators (one of my favs) subwoofer output kits. Takes about 15 minutes if you go slow and carefully strap tie all parts. I take time to do that so an inadvertent tug on the sub cable does not rip components out of your circuit boards in the head.

Next I added the Mezel Mods signage. Super simple with only the upper right ramp causing a slow down because you need to first remove the plastic Stern Pteranodon piece to install the new sign. Two nuts and it comes right off and into the coin box it went.

Time to add the Pingraffix side art to the inside of the cabinet. I first place the playfield upright. Then slide the decals down without getting them stuck to the cabinet side. You can do that by making a “V” out of them as you slide them down into the narrow crack between the playfield and the cabinet side. Then pull the ends of your “V” back toward the cabinet and get a rough placement. Don’t stick them hard yet. Go to the other side of the cabinet and check your alignment. Once they are aligned you can work the decal to make it stick. I install these dry with no issues. Some trimming is needed up near the flipper buttons around the washers that Stern uses to secure the Pal nuts that hold the flipper button housing in place. Use a sharp knife but know that these trimmed areas can’t be seen above the playfield anyway.

I still had quite a few “sign posts” to install from the Ulek store. These were very easy to install as they had a plexi base already affixed with a hole drilled to correspond to many threaded posts in the game. There are a half dozen good places to locate these and I used some imagery from Pinside to mimic placement. These are 3D and look super installed.

I saved the Mezel Mods “Raptor Pen” install for the end thinking it might be challenging. It was not. It took a few minutes but was very straightforward. Pull the 3M tape covering, and stick each half to the top of the Stern plastics. Be careful to locate the domes that allow flashers to shine through in the correct orientation. The piece on the right is sensitive to the washer that is installed on the wireform hold down nut – center that washer first, then install the right side piece. Following the pen sculpt install, you’ll need to add the wire. There is only one piece supplied and you can cut it exactly in half to create 2 wires around the pen. Go slow and don’t force the wire or you may break part of the sculpt. Once complete, nip the ends toward the back off using you wire cutters. Finally hang the 10,000 volt sign wherever you wish on the pen. It looks fantastic and the only issue I see is getting under it when maintenance might be required. That just means you’ll pull the parts and either re-use the 3M tape or place some new. Tired from the day (and the anti-biotics I was on) I called it quits for the night.

I started fresh the next morning by spending a little over 2 hours swapping all the black rubber for Titan clear rubber. Most of the swap was easy but of note for you all attempting this the back plastic behind the pops needs to come off to get to the 2 rubbers on the star posts back there. That was tricky and involved loosening the spiral wireform to remove the left pop cap. Then the plastic could be removed by bending it and pulling toward the backboard of the machine. Be careful or you’ll remove art from the plastic as it slips over the threaded post. The ONLY rubber I could not switch out was behind the right metal ramp that feeds the spiral wireform. When/if I ever need to remove that ramp, I’ll make that swap. You can BARELY see them anyway.

I had ordered 3 colors of Titan flipper rubber to test. Red, Blue and Green. I settled on green and installed those next – 5 minutes max. I had also ordered a complete set of Titan slim tapered (Stern style) post sleeves. I wanted to color match the playfield to the sleeves. I ended up using green at the T-Rex, Blue at the Jeep and Pteranodon ramps and left the black at the upper flipper and raptor pen area. Black at the upper flipper looked great and the black at the raptor pen was out of prudence … it looked like a major pain to get to those sleeves!

Finally … I popped open the box from American pinball that contained my fresh sheet of Magic Glass and slid that in to replace the stock tempered version. It looked amazing! Time to play!!

Chris and I played a few games and really enjoyed it. My daughter even popped in for 2 games. My wife showed no interest in the theme even when invited to the inaugural game. She loves her WOZ, Aerosmith and KISS and is super excited about the new GnR but Jurassic? Not so much. So we played several 3 person games and had a bunch of fun. Here’s why.

• The original score music is just awesome. It’s one of the things that ties the entire game back to the movie series
• The JP logos that are everywhere help to do the same thing
• The sound quality is better than I expected. It plays loud and clean. The Helicopter adds to the package, a subwoofer is a must.
• The T-Rex roar at 30 volume (or higher) is just sweet. You can feel it due to the shaker and the subwoofer combo – very movie-like!
• The artwork is really nice. Johnny Crap did an awesome job. Colors on the Premium Edition are beautiful – love the orange!
• Escape Nublar Challenge is a blast to play. What a unique way to add another dimension to the game
• The shots … OMG the shots. They are … challenging, incredibly fast at times, incredibly satisfying to hit in combos, incredibly diverse and varied, incredibly tight in some areas, incredibly smooth in the wireforms, incredibly unique – did I say incredible?

We finished a few games and called it a night. I went back to the Loft later that evening to have a few more games on my own. When playing I notice 2 things that did not “seem right”. First the left apron “art triangle” was not lit up like the right one was. Second, there were times where I would get a ball added to my ball in play. Most times during ball launch, right around the time the ball passed the helicopter blades. I pulled the playfield out to see if the LED board had a broken wire or something obvious that would cause it not to light up. I traced the power supply wires to a “Z” connector and quickly spotted the problem. Whoever assembled the machine had missed one of the connectors on the “Z” by one wire. I unplugged it and plugged it back in correctly. One issue solved. Too tired to investigate the extra ball being added to game play, I headed off to bed to worry about that the next day

With a fresh mind, I went back to the machine and watched the screen as I launched the first ball. Sure enough, almost instantly, another ball was launched into play. This time I spotted the screen saying “Ball Save”. Aha! Has to be an opto in the ball trough or an outlane switch. I went to Pinside to post for some help. The response I got mirrored my suspicions. So, I placed the machine in switch test and tested the left and right outlanes. Sure enough, the NEDRY (of course – trouble maker) right outlane switch was poorly adjusted and was not fully opening. Thus it was randomly telling the machine that a ball had just passed over it and (if within the allotted ball save time) to serve another one! 2 minutes to adjust and the game was back to full strength!

Final verdict? Too soon to tell. Read the laundry list of positive comments above. I clearly like the game. I may even love it. It’s a blast to play. It keeps you on edge with the music and non-stop action. The only thing to slow the game down is the T-Rex modes and the Raptor Pen. It’s fast and fun!

I’m only a casual Jurassic Park fan. Dino’s are cool no matter what but I was busy raising a family and building a career when the first movie came out and didn’t even see it until years later. I don’t have the nostalgia for the franchise that others might. Still … I like the movies. Actually really enjoy them. But the lack of theme integration or “imperfect” call-outs that others bang this game for are not an issue for me. Will I fall in love with it? Maybe, you know that Pinball “always finds a way …”

There’s something magical about telling “Alexa” to do something and then watching it happen (or not). I’ve always been an early adopter so I tried the Echo right when it came out. I quickly found what most early adopters find – limited use for the tech. Fast forward a few years and the proliferation of “Smart things” has begun to make a huge difference in how the Alexa environment can play in the average household. Even, as you’ll see, in the “not-so-average” household.

Our home is long – really long and at the very end of it is essentially an 8 stall garage with one very large room above it. That’s my Pinball Loft. In the Loft sits 40 pinball games just begging for Alexa to help in some way. Remember that long house? That presents a problem if you’re trying to get a strong WiFi signal to run the Alexa device. So what to do? First – fix the WiFi. I started with an expensive tri-band router thinking that it would have the extra range with its daunting array of 6 external antennae – it didn’t. Next I popped in an old router I had laying around (last count I had 7 of them). It actually worked to provide a signal to the Loft but at the farthest end, the signal was spotty. Now what?

After thinking it through, I came to the conclusion that literally everything up in that room would be connected together so having another SSID wouldn’t be a problem. No need then for setting up a wired AP (remember all those extra routers?) I could simply buy a range extender and have it broadcast a unique-to-the-loft room SSID. I settled on the Netgear EX-6150 AC1200 Extender. It’s less than $100 and for my application has a pretty cool feature that I’ll share in a minute.

The most challenging part of the install is finding the best “midway” point to install any extender. I ran around the house with my iPhone using the app called “Network MM” and reading the WiFi signal strength as I moved about. I lucked out. The best location was actually in the bathroom up IN the Loft. Nice strong signal back to the origin router and, of course, no problem transmitting (repeating/extending) that signal into the room – cause it was on the same floor!

Now the cool part of this Netgear extender – it can link back to the router on either the 5 GHz or 2.4 GHz channels BUT extend ALL channels! Really important feature in that you can connect at 5 GHz for super fast connections to the router but still have devices connect to the 2.4 GHz band. Important because the speed I was showing connecting at 2.4 was just around 15 Mbps. When I switched to the 5 GHz connection (again, back to the router) my speeds popped up to 40 Mbps. Essentially, you connect in the room to 2.4 but enjoy speeds at 5.

I bought 40 pieces of the most inexpensive (but safe!) WiFi enabled smart plugs that I could find on Amazon. Even got a quantity discount. They all run off the 2.4 GHz channel and that is why I wanted to be able to broadcast that band from my Netgear extender. The box arrived from Amazon and I went to work. Set up the plug using the native app (Gosund), rename it, ask Alexa to discover it, then set it up in the Alexa app with a group and a routine (turn on Pinballs, etc.) Everything was going swimmingly until I hit around plug number 15 or 16. Full stop. I could NOT get the next plug to connect. I moved it closer – nothing. I moved it right next to the extender – still nothing. I reset it several times – still nothing. I tried a new one from the next box – nothing. Getting dangerously close to the definition of insane I finally just stopped trying.

Eager to discover why I had “hit a wall”, I grabbed my tablet to punch in the suspect word search “max connections Netgear routers”. Got hits right away and got my answer as well – it’s 32. Most routers have a limit to the number of connections you can make to each channel. If you are running a tri-band Netgear router, then it’s around a total of 100 connections. 32 per band, or in my case JUST 32 for the entire 2.4 GHz band that I was trying to connect 40 pinballs to. The same 2.4 GHz band that already had 15 or so devices that the family had attached to it (iPhone’s, iPad’s, TVs, etc.) Bummer. Without buying a commercial grade router or investing in a new mesh WiFi system, this simply was not going to work. Even with those hardware solutions, there would always be the issue of saturating a core router band with 40 plus devices. Now what? Don’t worry … the story ends well.

I did not want to originally mess with what I deemed to be complex protocols like Zwave or Zigbee. Now that I was backed into a corner, my stance changed and I started looking at them closer. It’s not that I did not know about them. I actually have some pretty in-depth experience with Zigbee and the Phillips Hue products. My last game room had a large selection of Hue products controlled by the Hue bridge and a physical Hue puck. I also had ordered some German made controllers to run my perimeter LED light strips and had learned how to integrate those into the Hue ecosystem, even though they are not native to Hue. Worked like a charm at the time so I did have a comfort level that success was within reach.

For my current application, I did not even need anything that complex. These were simply on/off plugs that I wanted to control with my voice using the Alexa app and an Echo device. I quickly settled on the Zigbee protocol. It was then that I discovered that I would need a new Echo device. The newest Echo Plus INCLUDES a built in Zigbee hub – no need for any additional hub to talk to the Zigbee enabled smart plugs, the Echo Plus could do it natively. I placed an order on Amazon right away for an open box Echo Plus.

Now … what smart plugs should I get? That turned out to be an easy answer BUT an expensive one. You see, the average WiFi smart plug is around $8 each. A little over $300 for my entire game room. The average Zigbee enabled plug is around $20 each … and that math is easy right? 40 pinballs at $20 each is around $800 bucks – ouch! I went on a mission to find the safest, UL listed durable Zigbee plug around. Amazon had the winner in the Innr branded Zigbee 3.0 enabled smart plugs at around $16.50 each. This dropped my total out of pocket by a few hundred bucks but still allowed me to justify the spend.

I put all 19 boxes of the Innr plugs into my Amazon cart. I let them sit there for a few days – unwilling to push the complete order button. Gosh that was a lot of money for something I could already do with my hands (turn the games on and off!) I finally sat down on a Sunday evening and looked over at Chris who was visiting and completed my order at a little over $600 in total. It hurt to see that total, but I was excited and hopeful this hardware solution would finally work.

The box from Amazon arrived on a Monday and after some ranch related chores and dinner, I ran upstairs to begin the install. I plugged in 4-6 of them at a time – sticking to one power strip at a time. I would then have Alexa discover them. Once discovered, a quick setup/renaming in Alex app and adding them to a group was all that was needed to get them functional. No need for any other 3 party apps. No need for any other hub (just the Echo Plus). I kept adding them until finished and the 40th one went as well as the first. I completed the last setup, stood back and used the words I had setup in Alexa as a routine “Alexa – Let’s Play Pinball” and like magic, and over a period of maybe 15-20 seconds, every single machine came on! I tested the entire thing in reverse with “Alexa – Game Over”.

This time the machines started shutting down, but at a staggered and slower pace. Enough slower that by the time the last 3 or so shut down I was holding my breath. No worries, they all went off. I’ve tested the system multiple times since then and all is still good. These plugs also “remember” their last state (on or off) and come back to that state when power is applied again. This is helpful for me because every single outlet in the room is on a switch and as a safety precaution (against surges and storms) I always cut the power to the outlets using these 8 switches. Now when I flip the switches back on, the outlets remain off until I give the command through Alexa.

The Innr smart plugs were working so well I decided to added more of them and ordered another half dozen. One controls my 4 channel receiver that delivers Sonos fed music to the Pinball loft. 2 more of them are controlling power to the SVS 13″ sealed subs that sit in opposite corners of the room. The subs are run wireless using the (fantastic) Parts Express Audio Wavelength “WLS” system. I bought a kit that consists of a transmitter and one receiver, then simply bought an extra receiver to run the second sub. I bought a short AC “Y” cord to hang off each Innr plug that feeds the subs in order to feed the sub with one end and plug in the WLS receiver into the other. That way the WLS isn’t “always on” and continually searching for a transmitter that is off at the time. Now, when I walk into the Loft and say “Alexa – Party Music!”, the receiver powers on, the transmitter powers on and the subs (and each subs receiver) come on as well. “Party’s Over” shuts the whole thing down just as fast.

It’s more that the simple coolness factor that drove me to do this (it IS cool though). I play pinball. A lot. Like every day. Walking into the room and not turning on 6 games at a time (like I have it wired to do now via a wall switch) is beneficial to both the machines and my electricity bill. Now I can walk into the Loft and ask Alexa to turn on just a SINGLE game, that I can then play and ask her to shut it off when I’m done. If I’m having a party, I can walk into the room and ask for all of them to come on with the simple phrase “Alexa – Let’s Play Pinball!”. Shutting them down is just as easy and if you’re not convinced take a peek at the videos for proof of just how well it works.

Now if only this command worked …. “Alexa – Make me a better pinball player!”

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8K33oikgQZo?feature=oembed&wmode=opaque&w=500&h=281]

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZX1UG0_XsJQ?feature=oembed&wmode=opaque&w=500&h=281]