Category Archives: before

Mars God Of War Escapes Hurricane-Destroyed Home

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These days I’ve been working more on renovating my new pinball space.. that’s going to be an ongoing project now for the next few months, and as a result, I’ve been avoiding going on any pinball hunts, but the other day an innocuous ad appeared in the local paper for a short estate sale with “pinball machines”. It was nearby and I didn’t have any conflicts so I thought I might drive by and check it out.

As it turns out the pinball machines were not at the location of the estate sale. They were at another abandoned house that was wrecked by hurricane Katrina. I managed to talk the owners into letting me take a peek – they were very concerned about people even entering the other house because the roof had collapsed and there was mold, broken glass and debris everywhere. It’s really a shame because I could tell this house used to be very nice, but the occupants just left and never came back and everything inside deteriorated.

When we got to the place, the first game we discovered was a disappointment… it was not an actual coin-op game, but instead a circus-themed home-version pinball game. Of no interest to me. The other game turned out to be a Gottlieb Mars God of War — made in 1981. A System80 game. It didn’t look too bad but it was nothing that got me very excited and once I started looking around I realized there were no keys to the head so it would have to be drilled out to access and remove the head. I was going to walk and not even make an offer, but my friend Matt said, “How about $50?” The sellers were asking $250. All I could think about was how many years would be taken off my life expectancy for every minute standing inside this mold-encrusted room trying to access the game and was it worth any amount of money?

When we explained what was probably needed to get the game working and to move and disassemble it, the sellers agreed on the price of $50. It was hard to tell what condition the game was in or even if any boards were in it because we couldn’t get into the head. I said I’d head back home to get some equipment — the house had no electricity so I needed to bring power and a drill to get into the lock. On the way back I contemplated whether or not it was worth it. I knew it was a decent deal but like I said, I’ve been becoming increasingly picky. I spoke to my friend Wes and he reminded me, we are now working on a new space that can house a lot more games and these funky, uncommon titles are exactly the kinds of things we should have, and he was right. So I confirmed with the sellers we’d be back to get the game.

And here we are..

Right now we just picked up the game and moved it into the new space and threw a tarp over it. I hope to continue the video series exploring the game but it’s probably going to have to wait a few weeks.

There are exciting things happening here.. We’ve formed a local pinball club and everyone is helping refurbish an abandoned church – it’s a time consuming and expensive proposition, but very rewarding. I’ll be sharing progress on that as we go too, and now we have another cool game to restore and add to the collection that those that visit will get a chance to play!

Also, after opening the head, it was discovered that the game is complete, but as expected, the battery on the MPU has heavily damaged the board. This was a good excuse to order one of Pascal Janin’s PI-80 boards. We’ll want to have one around anyway — that’s another thing I’ll do a video report on soon. The downside is, at present, the replacement System 80 board is a whopping $390 shipped! When you look at the average sale price/value of these System 80 games, and think, “Wow, he got that game for $50 what a steal!” and then realize right away it’ll cost $400 just to get it to boot up, and the game may only be worth $400-$600, $50 is about right. These 80s-era Gottliebs are not profitable to restore, but I can justify it when I’m making these videos to share with everybody else. I hope you enjoy them! – Mike

Pinball Tips: Color matching

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Here’s some good advice on how to paint and touch up your game.

Color Wanted: Start with: Add a little:
Green Yellow Blue
Orange Yellow Red
Brown Red Black
Maroon Red Black & Magenta
Cream White Yellow
Tan White Brown
Ivory White Yellow & Brown
Gray White Black
French Gray White Yellow & Black
Olive Green Yellow Black & White
Pink White Red
Flesh White Red & Yellow
Coral White Orange
Purple Magenta Blue
Gold Yellow Brown
Lime Green Yellow Green & White

More hints:

  • Realize that not all areas of the playfield or cabinet, even if they were painted a single color, will remain the same color over time.  Different areas may fade to different shades.
  • Also note that many paint colors will change slightly as they dry, or appear different if a clear coat is added later, and try to do some test runs to see how the final result will appear before committing.
  • Mix your paint and put some on a piece of clear plastic and hold it over the area you’re going to touch up to see how well it matches.
  • You can pick up a pantone color matching set at most hardware and paint stores and use this to help match colors.
  • Don’t use hot water to clean the paint brush. This can weaken the glue that holds the bristles together and cause bristles to fall out.
  • There sites online such as this one ( http://pinballpal.com/colors/  ) which has color formulas for some popular pinball games.

First Look: Gottlieb “Top Score” (300) EM pinball

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And here we go with another acquisition. This was a game I initially turned down, but then the owner dropped his price into the area where it was worth the hassle for me to get. At first I wasn’t that excited about it, but like most Gottliebs, they are more fun and interesting that it appears at first glance. Here’s a “first look” fresh from a some guy’s house. The game was not working properly when I picked it up so it’s going to need some work to get running.

Since this is a “First Look” on this machine, I’m embedding a playlist which will be continually updated with all the work I do on this machine. You can watch the first few, or keep watching to see more work done on the machine (at least as far as I’ve filmed and published so far).

Thanks for watching!

– Mike

 

First Look: Bally Mr. & Mrs. Pac Man Pinball

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Fresh out of the truck is another acquisition.  This came from a guy whose wife wanted it out of the house.  The machine had been sitting for many years and would not work.  Here’s a first look at a classic 1980s Bally solid-state pinball machine: Mr. & Mrs Pac Man.

Mr. and Mrs Pac-Man was built in 1982, with approximately 10,600 made. The designer of this game is the same guy, George Christian who did one of Bally’s most successful and critically-acclaimed titles, “Eight Ball Deluxe” (as well as the original Eight Ball game). The art is also by another renown artists in the field, Pat McMahon, who also did the artwork for Tales of the Arabian Nights.

In this video I show you what I see as I go through this newly-acquired machine.   You never know what you’ll find inside these cabinets, interesting hacks, foreign objects, broken stuff, etc.  I just moved the game into my workshop and am doing what I call an “audit” of it.  Seeing if I notice anything in or out of place and generally getting an idea of how much work may be needed to get this game back in shape.  Join me!

Here’s a look inside the cabinet:

Protecting and sealing pinball backglasses

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Continuing the ongoing saga of restoring a Williams Earthshaker, in this episode, I take a look at the backglass and go over some basic ideas on how to preserve and secure an old backglass from further flaking and damage..

After waiting awhile, let’s take a look…

Ok… we wait awhile and check it, and add some more coats..

So what do you do about clear areas on the backglass? You need to avoid creating any kind of “haze” that obscures score reels or other things that need to be viewed behind the backglass/translight. Here is how we deal with that:

Some additional tips:

  • When you work on the backglass, make sure the humidity and temperature levels are moderate.   It should neither be too dry nor too humid, but err on the dry side where possible.

  • Avoid cleaning either side of the backglass until after it has been treated, especially the screen-printed side.  Even if the screen-side is dirty, it’s best to seal in the dirt, rather than clean it and run the risk of causing the backglass to flake or crack.  However if you want to dust it with something like a Swiffer, you can try to do that, but again, be very careful that the Swiffer doesn’t hook on to any flaking and pull it off.  Ultimately it’s best to seal the screen-side before even trying to wipe down the front – you don’t want to risk getting any moisture on the screen side until it’s sealed.

  • Make your first 2-3 coats relatively thin.  Don’t slather on the Triple Thick unless you do it after several coats have dried and started to seal the backglass well.  There’s a lot of evidence that moisture if subjected to certain types of screens, can cause the backglass to wrinkle and peel off catastrophically.   So take your time and put a few very light coats on at first and see how the backglass reacts.

  • If you may have any loose flakes on the backglass, be very careful with the first few coats of Triple Thick.  Watch your spray angle and spray downward instead of across or you might risk blowing flakes of backglass around.

  • Spray in a well-ventilated area, or immediately leave the area after spraying

  • Avoid subjecting the backglass under any conditions, to freezing temperatures.  This may cause the various materials (containing different amounts of moisture) to expand and contract at different rates and cause cracking and flaking.

HAAG Show Swap Meet report

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On Saturday morning at the Houston Arcade Expo, there was a small swap meet in the parking lot. While it wasn’t big, there were certainly some good deals to be had and it was a lot of fun.  I picked up a neat old Stern “Memory Lane” that I’ll be showing more of on the web site in future PBH episodes.  At just over $100, it was another “no brainer” deal for me.

There was a nice T2 (Terminator 2) Williams DMD that went for less than $800.  There were two “Charlie’s Angels” machines, one of which went for about $100 (it had seen better days) and lots of miscellaneous parts.  I even found a coin mech for the 1940 Genco machine – what tremendous luck!

As you can see from the video, I picked up not one, but two pinball games, along with lots of other goodies.  I also found a set of sideart for the Earthshaker machine (prototype side art – woot).

Earthshaker looks to have been in an actual earthquake

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This week I pulled a Williams Earthshaker pinball game out of a guy’s apartment.  It had been sitting in the corner for a long time, not operating.  He got it off eBay more than a year earlier, paid a lot of money and I’m not sure he ever got it working, so it sat around collecting dust.  As usual, the description described to me on the phone verses what I saw in person were two different things, but he appeared to be flexible enough on the price to motivate me to go take a look at it.  We made a deal and I threw it into my car.  Here’s a first look…

Later on, I moved the machine inside and took a closer look.  I’m posting this video which was done before I attended the Houston Arcade Expo, and I managed to find a complete set of sideart for the machine from Gene at Illinois Pinball, so there is hope for the cabinet!

In the next video I pull up the playfield and take a look inside the cabinet.  I’m just getting this new web site going so I don’t have much traffic, but I envision in the future with more people visiting, after I post a video like this, other owners of the game might comment and we can collectively ruminate over the status and future of this pinball game.