Arcade Collectors worse nightmare

As long as he had it on a surge protector, he most likely just popped the breaker in the house.

Situations like this is why I tell everyone to use surge protectors. I had one guy lose a pinball when lightning hit his house, even though the game was off. The boards looked like a Salvador Dali painting...
 
I'm shocked it was running in the first place.
 
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Ha ha.. that is my video! It is real.. actually happened.

I bought that cab for $100 not working. This is before I had learned that Pole Positions were a nightmare to keep running. I got it home.. and then started researching on how to go about fixing it online. Learned to try reseating the chips, checking connections, etc (I was very new to arcade collecting at the time.. and still am a beginner today).

So amazingly.. I got it working just by seating the chips. Wanted to show my friend who helped me pick up the game that it was actually working.. so decided to film a quick video.

A storm was coming in at the time.. but I didn't think it was so bad that I couldn't film a quick video. So I go down to the garage.. hold the camera in one hand.. and try to play the game with my other hand. You have already seen what happened next. I heard the loudest boom of my life, I felt a slight shock in my hand that was holding the camera, and then I was in pitch darkness (this was at night..and I was in my garage). Figured the camera and my new game were fried, and thought that my house had taken a direct hit. The power was onviously out.. so I had to wait many hours before I could check the game. Turns out that a tree right across the street from my house took a direct hit.. which sent fragments of wood all over the neighborhood! Was quite a site.

Anyway.. was surprised the next morning that the Pole Position still worked! That was almost 3 years ago, and the game still works (although the monitor is now messed up and I have no experience fixing them...).

That's the story... video still cracks me up!
 
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As long as he had it on a surge protector, he most likely just popped the breaker in the house.

Situations like this is why I tell everyone to use surge protectors. I had one guy lose a pinball when lightning hit his house, even though the game was off. The boards looked like a Salvador Dali painting...

A surge protector won't do anything against a direct lightning strike.

Lightning travels MILES through thin air, with MILLIONS of volts potential. The little MOV in your $20 surge protector that is probably rated at 6000V won't even be noticed by that lightning as it goes through (and around) it's tiny blown-out parts. The power switch on that guy's pinball in its off state was much more protection than a surge protector would be, and lightning still jumped across the gap in the switch to melt the boards.

The only real way to protect something from a direct lightning strike is to unplug it from the wall. Surge protectors are good for protecting against spikes and surges caused by electric motors starting up, and power line problems should they occur. (Usually they are good for large surge protection just once, then they need replacing, which is why it is a good idea to pay a bit more for one with a "protection" indicator on it.)
 
That wasn't lightning, probably just the power supply trying to keep up with those boards :)

One note about surge protectors- they're pretty much worthless. What you really want is a whole house shunting device.
 
Forgot to put in my last post... there was no surge protector on the game. As mentioned.. I had just gotten it... my first arcade game. It was just in a random spot in my garage.. and I had plugged it into the nearest outlet in order to film the video. All my games are on surge protectors today!
 
It cracks me up that I have gotten almost 18,000 views and 90 comments on that video. Some of the responses are hilarious.
 
I had lightning hit a pine tree by my parents house.It blew off most of the bark on it,as well as super heat the sap in it.It travelled to the phone line where it fried all their phones,as well as dishwasher,and the air conditioner window unit in their bedroom.I remember going to use the kitchen sink to wash my hands,and turning the faucet on and seeing pitch black water coming out of it for about 30-45 seconds.The black being the remnants of the fried rubber washers in the piping.
 
One note about surge protectors- they're pretty much worthless. What you really want is a whole house shunting device.

Well, that's good for power coming INTO the house, but what about power already inside the house? I had a guy lose a power supply in an Area 51 due to a voltage spike. He was bitching about having one of those shunting devices on the outside, and I just pointed at the electric saws his home remodeling guys had plugged in across the room.

Does nobody remember the old days when you'd trip a breaker if your mom turned on her old hair dryer? You can plug something into your wall that can cause a surge to another outlet. Outside power protection for the whole house won't stop that....
 
I was expecting a flooded basement pic/video where only about 6'' of the tops of the cabs were sticking out of the water...something along those lines.

- M1A
 
Great video really funny, I just thought there would be a lot more cursing right after the power went out I know I would have cursed up a storm.:D

I did some swearing.. but it wasn't caught on camera. When that first happened.. I was so stunned by the volume of the explosion and confused that it took me a few seconds to even realize what had happened. By that time, I had already turned the camera off. Also.. my wife was pregnant at the time.. and so before I even had time to worry about the Pole Position machine or react to what had happened, my first instinct was to find my way through the dark and up two flights of stairs to her. My initial thought was that our house had taken a direct hit, and so I was very worried about her and the house. Fortunately (and surprisingly).. we suffered no damage (except for our ears hurting a little bit!). Can't say the same for the tree across the street... lol.
 
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