My work on servicing Counterforce is now coming to an end. It’s great news because now I can actually play and enjoy it! This project has gone quite quickly compared to my others (just over 2 months in length). First task for this update was to clean the legs up a bit. They are old and have some rust, but I’ve certainly seen worse. I have a two options I can consider. First is to clean them up and the second is to clear off the rust as much as possible and spray them. I guess a third option is buy a new set – but these legs are still good and I think a clean will do. New legs on a machine with faded and scratched cabinet art won’t look right anyway. Each leg was placed onto my work horse to have the rust cleaned up. This was done mostly with a wire brush attachment for my drill.
Pinball
Documenting my adventures into pinball repair and restoration
Something that has been been on my to do list for awhile is to make a few adjustments to the chimes. Space Orbit has a 3 chime setup (10’s, 100’s and 1000’s). The chimes work fine, but most of the grommets holding the chimes in place have aged and need replacing. Some posts are missing the nylon washers that sit between the grommet and lock nut too and these need to be replaced.
It’s been awhile since my last crap box purchase. I actually wasn’t keen on buying any more as I have built up a large amount of spare second hand parts that have come in handy for my pinball projects. This one however had a few very specific parts I wanted, so I couldn’t resist. At the cost of $12.50AUD, it was hard to go wrong. First up, the largest part here, was a coin door. It’s not in the best condition, but the coin entry and return face plates are in good condition and match those found on my Pinbot machine. This could be useful for parts in the future.
First item on my to do list for this update is to address a small issue with the the add a ball lamps. More specifically, the order in which the light up. There are 5 lamps in total. Each time you are awarded a free ball (achieved by hitting a lit WOW target), a new planet will light up to show how many extra balls you have been awarded. Right now, the order in which they light up is incorrect. They light up in the order 3, 4, 2, 5, 1.
The Counterforce project is now on the home straight. Not much more to do and i’ll consider it a another project completed. I’m looking forward to actually playing it. First (and biggest) task to look at for this update is rebuilding the lower set of flippers. The flipper bats are dirty and will need a good clean. The others came up nicely, so I expect these will too. The rubber is long gone but easy enough to replace. The playfield area around here also needs a good clean, which I’ll do once the bats are removed.
