Pinball Help

The adventures of a pinball enthusiast (all original content)

Tilt/Switch-matrix problems on Bally-35 Flash Gordon

Posted on 2020-04-21 by admin

I was going through some old videos that had been uploaded to YouTube that for some reason were not made public and found this one. It’s a short video on how to go through the diagnostics on these 80s era Bally pinball machines and track down switch matrix issues. I don’t go into how the matrix works in this particular video, but I do demonstrate how a stuck switch can cause odd behavior. In this case, the tilt triggers when a certain target is hit.

The Great Switch Matrix Wild Goose Chase!

Posted on 2015-09-10 by admin

Here are six videos of an 8 part series of clips I shot this past week while working on restoring a Bally Theatre of Magic game.

What’s interesting about this series is you can really follow along with me as I fumble around trying to figure out what’s wrong. This is an all too common path many enthusiasts take which often leads them back to the beginning of the trail and emphasizes a number of common troubleshooting principals.

At this point, I have a working game except for two minor glitches with switches: An opto in the ball trough is not working, and it’s causing the game to kick balls into the shooter lane when powered up, and the EOS switches on the flippers are not being registered by the MPU. The solution to both of these issues was finally found and may or may not be what you expect. Watch the series to find out!