Blue Donkey Kong TKG3 (1st “Restoration”) - Opinions, Tips & Advice GREATLY appreciated!

TGTDE

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Hey everyone, I picked what I believe to be a fairly rare, low serial number Blue Donkey Kong TKG3 with what appears to be original copywrite-less art on the Marquee, Bezel, CPO and what's remaining of the side art! I purchased it knowing it would need some TLC but so far I'm super psyched with this find!!

Let's start with the positives: I think the cab is in pretty great shape, everything appears to be original aside from the buttons/joystick on the control panel, and a small hole drilled in the coin door 😤

The game boots and plays properly, buttons work and all the sounds seem to be proper / accounted for (Donkey Kong jumping, thumping, Mario running, jumping & so on). The counter shows less than 46,000 plays.

When I first brought it home there was a constant loud repetitive sound I believe the "running" sound was stuck on / glitching. It was constant, from power on until powered down. However adjusting the main audio pot down decreased it, so much so I was able to make it disappear completely yet still having all the normal sounds / sound effects still be present and at a good volume level for gameplay . When I tried to raise it back up to check if it was still there the first few times it was, but then most recently it seems to have completely gone away altogether, even with that volume knob cranked up...🤷‍♂️

Now my main, and really only problem is with the picture being produced.. When I first got it, part of the left side of the screen was cut off (vertical collapse). Donkey Kong was a giant red blob, and aside from the girders and ladders you'd never be able to tell what anything was supposed to be unless you were already familiar with the game. Mario was a blue blob,
the barrels, Kong, and really everything aside from the different numbers on the screen, the ladders and girders were all just blobs.. it played, but everything looked horrible!

After tweaking the different picture size, positioning and color settings the detail and overall picture quality improved drastically! The game is now at least fun to play while I try and figure out how to get it back to looking 100% !!

I'm going to attach some photos of the cab, as well as some photos of the screen. Mario's head, the barrels and donkey Kong still have big squares around them and I'm wondering if this is a common problem that one of the knowledgeable vets may be able to save me hours diagnosing?? Do the colors on the monitor just need further tweaking and those boxes will go away? Will my cap kits on order likely fix this issue? Am I in over my head and should just skip to sending out the boards to Mike's Arcade or Starbase Alpha Arcade??

I'd hate to not be able to play this for weeks / months if it's something I can eventually figure out and fix myself (with your guys/gals help of course).. 👀

I've already ordered: cap kits for the monitor and pcb from Arcade Parts and Repair. True flat 15mm t moulding from Chompin Quarters. Phoenix Arcade copywrite-less side art for the side that's missing ( going to leave what's left of the original on the one side). Proper Nintendo repro buttons, black joystick ball, and a new coin stop for the broken one on the coin door from Mikes Arcade.

Between wealth of knowledge on here, as well as the various YouTube tutorials I'm confident I'll be able to get those cap kits (and everything else) installed with minimal anguish.. 🤞!!
 

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Here's what the screen is looking like after adjustments.. (I'm at work now, and I thought I had better example photos.. I'll snap a few better ones when I get home..)
 

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The boxes are going to be a game boardset issue, most likely on the video or CLK board. I would start by reseating and verifying the roms. Some of the earlier DK boards used texas instruments sockets which are notorious for being terrible. I had a very similar issue with a Radarscope board that ended up being that issue.
 
The log from what I was talking about with the sockets. I also had brown boxes.

 
The boxes are going to be a game boardset issue, most likely on the video or CLK board. I would start by reseating and verifying the roms. Some of the earlier DK boards used texas instruments sockets which are notorious for being terrible. I had a very similar issue with a Radarscope board that ended up being that issue.
Thank you 🙏 will give this a shot in the next few days and report back!
 
SHE'S PERFECT!!! Thank you @SNESNESCUBE64 🙏! Unseated and then reseated all the roms and when I fired her back up the blocks were gone 💪 ! When removing the four board stack I did also notice this one small connector that wasn't even plugged into the board, and when I put it back together after reseating the roms I plugged that back in too. Not sure which had more of an effect on the final results. I'll attach a photo of the disconnected connector in case someone else has similar graphics issue they can check it, as well as the roms! It had fallen and was caught up hanging down between some cables.
IMG_3152.jpegIMG_3138.jpegIMG_3162.jpeg
 
Looks like the service switch plug. The service switch on donkey kong is attached to the coin door. When you press it, it adds a credit without incrementing the coin counter.

Good work getting it running.
 
That would make sense why the service switch wasn't working when I first got the machine. So I bet that's working now too, that's great 😃! Thanks again 🙏. The picture still only uses up about 3/4 of the screen and gets cut off no matter how much I adjust the v and h hold, size adjustment knobs on the monitor and the two knobs on the pcb. So I'm thinking there's either an adjustment knob somewhere I haven't found, the ones that I do know of need replacing or it's just vertical collapse and the cap kit will fix it when installed.
 
Looking at the picture you posted, the adjustment you need to make is v size. Which is on the remote board next to the other knobs like brightness and volume. If it does nothing use a multimeter to check whether or not it is broken.

If the chassis on the monitor hasn't been recapped yet it is due. When the caps start going south you get most commonly brightness and sizing issues on EZ20s.

Snippet from DK user manual:
Screenshot_20250305-083625.png
 
Looking at the picture you posted, the adjustment you need to make is v size. Which is on the remote board next to the other knobs like brightness and volume. If it does nothing use a multimeter to check whether or not it is broken.

If the chassis on the monitor hasn't been recapped yet it is due. When the caps start going south you get most commonly brightness and sizing issues on EZ20s.

Snippet from DK user manual:
View attachment 804275
I appreciate all the help! Yup, I have tried adjusting the v size and after a certain point things start getting cut off on the left side (and there's no bringing them back when I tried adjustments to any of the other nobs.. ). The monitor nor any of the four boards (or I'm assuming PCU) have been recapped, at least from what I can tell but I am new. All three kits have arrived from Arcade Parts and Repair. Now I'm just a desoldering gun and some free time away from tackling that! (Plus the B+ filter or whatever that thing is called and the pots kits I threw on to the order!)
 
In terms of maintenance on these, don't waste your money on cap kits for the boards or even the power supply. The power supply held up a lot better on these nintendo machines than the monitor did. I don't believe there is harm in doing the power supply however. I do caps on the game board if there are failures on it.

However, one thing I do whenever I get a nintendo board on the bench is replace the position potentiometers on the game boardset. They are very fragile and break all the time. It is not necessary to replace but I do anyway. You can use 30k or 50k piher pt15 potentiometers.

One bit of caution (other than monitor safety, if you have never done it read up on discharging monitors and safety around that) is when you recap the audio amp on the monitor, do not revers the two 3 pin plugs. You will cause a bit of damage to game board doing that. It is fixable but is a headache.
 
In terms of maintenance on these, don't waste your money on cap kits for the boards or even the power supply. The power supply held up a lot better on these nintendo machines than the monitor did. I don't believe there is harm in doing the power supply however. I do caps on the game board if there are failures on it.

However, one thing I do whenever I get a nintendo board on the bench is replace the position potentiometers on the game boardset. They are very fragile and break all the time. It is not necessary to replace but I do anyway. You can use 30k or 50k piher pt15 potentiometers.

One bit of caution (other than monitor safety, if you have never done it read up on discharging monitors and safety around that) is when you recap the audio amp on the monitor, do not revers the two 3 pin plugs. You will cause a bit of damage to game board doing that. It is fixable but is a headache.
I think I had read you mentioning these position pots in a different thread and I did add them to my order 🙏! I've heard people talk about the power supply unit always being the first thing to check when having problems with a machine, but if you rebuild them you're good for decades after so I figured why not! I'd rather not risk screwing up the game boards but I thought with the 40 year old caps there was a risk of one leaking and ruining the board 🤷‍♂️ I just figured better safe than sorry. We'll see how smooth the monitor recap goes, and go from there!

As for discharging a monitor I was able to successfully discharge my Mrs Pac (being super over cautious with ridiculous rubber gloves and screw driver taped to a long wood stick with a an alligator clip and wire from screw drive to a good ground). I'll be rewatching the videos I watched when I discharged that machine and take similar ridiculous precautions lol!!

As for the audio pin tip this is the first I'm hearing of that. I'll make sure I keep that fresh on my mind when I do the recap!! Thanks again 🙏 . I'll upload some more photos during / after the recap.
 
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