Re: TAF laundry list OF minor problems

Thanks everyone for the great advise! I haven't had a chance to dig deeper into some of the problems yet but will hopefully soon.


1. Crappy bulbs, or maybe its driving transistor could be flaky, cracked
solder?. As the previous poster said, it could be dud bulbs or an unreliable
holder as well. Check for short circuits to other wires etc.

I did order new bulbs from Marco so hopefully that will tell me if it was just a bad batch of bulbs. I'm thinking they should be here in a day or two.


2. Check the switch contacts on the flipper mechanisms. They do wear out and
go out of alignment. Check that  the switch blades on the flipper mechanism
aren't bent, make sure they are nice and straight and gapped correctly, if
not, replace them. Go to macrospec.com or bayareaamusements.com and order a
flipper rebuild kit for fliptronics games FYI, Addams is a fliptronics 1
model. Kit comes with all the bits, minus the flipper coil to completely
renovate the flippers.


I may need to do more reading on this point before messing with it. I'm not real sure how they should be "gapped". But I'm sure Clay's doc talks about that somewhere. I'll also check the switch matrix per another suggestion.

3. Thing Flips.
The feature is activated via a rollover switch on the 'Thing Flips' lane
bottom left. You might know this already. This happened occasionally on mine
but I tolerated it because I moved the machine around alot. Essentially, the
feature takes time to learn its shot, sometimes it over does it, and
sometimes it under does it, even not activating at all or seemingly so. It
needs to adjust itself over 30-60 thing flips to get shot consistant.
You can program Addams to re-learn thing flips again.
Go into test mode, via the switches on the front door, in the manual (a
couple of pages in marked 'The Addmas family B,
2 settings are recommended, the U8 factory reset and the 'New Location' U12
settings. (U=Utilities Menu) Go and do U12 New Location reset first and let
it run and play, it will adjust itself.  If you feel over time that it just
doesn't seem to respond like you feel it should, try the factory reset as a
drastic last case scenario.

Yeah, I have tried doing the factory reset thing already and it still doesn't seem to work all the time like it should. As a matter of fact, something new just popped up when I did some playing last night. Started a new game and everytime I got the ball up the Bear Kick ramp, even though Thing Flips wasn't lit, it ALWAYS routed the ball to the UL flipper. It's almost like this pin is possesed. Sometimes works fine... sometimes just does weird things. I'm guessing I'll be working on this pin a while trying to get all the weirdness out. :(


4.  This is another program setting to change, Got into test mode again, A.2
setting 29 ? (Adjustments menu) Game over kickout. This isn't shown in the
regular Addams manual, only the Gold edition. Non-the-less look for this
setting. I seem to recall another setting, something like called Slow game
start, once again, not in the PDF manuals I have. The setting tell Addams to
eject the balls. It is not a fault but normal behaviour.

Interesting. I looked through the settings and can't find the adjustment you mentioned. I'm wondering if it's because I have L-2 software loaded. I have ordered the latest (L-6) so maybe once that comes and install it, that option will be available.

5. Well, I have a TZ that does the same thing. Earlier posts seem to suggest
this is the DMD itself doing this, some DMD's are quiet, some give a little
screech which changes as the complexity of the image displayed. I haven't
pinned this down to power supply, DMD, DMD controller or the audio board. I
tend to think that the speaker sit on each side, maybe some induction is
occurring from power over-supply but haven't really looked into it as yet.
Iam going to eventually replace the DMD and its controller board anyway so I
will hopefully find out then but it is not a serious issue.

I agree, it's not a serious issue... just more of an observation. I guess everytime I've played these types of pins, it's always been in a noisy environment. Now that I have a more modern pin in my rec room, I notice it.

One more quick question. This pin is jumped for German. The manaul says that if you want it for America, jumper all W13-W18. For German, W18 is the only thing missing so I would have to solder W18. In Clay's doc, it mentioned that you can also set W15-W18 as out and that will also set it for America for some pins. It would be easier to snip than to solder a jumper on. Has anyone tried this on TAF to confirm this will work OK?

Thanks again!!
.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: TAF laundry list OF minor problems
    ... solder in the links. ... Clean the optical tx and rx switch found just above the Thing Flips flipper ... Check the switch contacts on the flipper mechanisms. ... I'm guessing I'll be working on this pin a while ...
    (rec.games.pinball)
  • Re: TECH: Flash Gordon RHS flippers not working?
    ... Check J1 pin 9 that connects to the ... flipper coil and also check J2 pin 1 which comes from the right ... Also check the board for cold solder joints (go ahead ... It is NOT going to be a fuse issue if the left flippers work ...
    (rec.games.pinball)
  • Re: Weak TZ Flippers.
    ... There are also jumpers from pin 6 to pin 5, ... sufficient flipper power. ... Make sure nothing has been added to the flippers, such as jumpers to ... other voltage sources. ...
    (rec.games.pinball)
  • Re: de-soldering ICs
    ... my aging desoldering braid. ... So I heat up my iron, apply the braid, ZOOP, up comes the solder into the ... Get some liquid flux!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! ... top and the bottom of each pin. ...
    (sci.electronics.repair)
  • Re: Weak TZ Flippers.
    ... There are also jumpers from pin 6 to pin 5, ... sufficient flipper power. ... J907 pins 1 and 2 are jumpered by a Blue with Yellow stripe wire, ... other voltage sources. ...
    (rec.games.pinball)