bought my 1st pin off cl for $150

dudljoe

Active member
Joined
May 30, 2010
Messages
612
Reaction score
32
Hello all well I finally found what I think is a good deal I bought a bally supersonic off cl for $150. So I got it home and it worked fine except a couple bulbs being out and needing new rubbers and a nice cleaning. But now its mpu led is staying on and no game play. So where do I go from here I'm new to working on pins and don't want to burn a bunch of money on this pin. Thanks in advance for any help you may have.
 
Could be simple; try re-seating the connections to the MPU board, and to the rectifier board (small board with the fuses on it). Also, reset the cables to the driver board, especially the upper-right connector.

Could be complicated - using your voltmeter, check to make sure the voltages check out on the test points on the rectifier board - a missing voltage can cause the MPU board not to boot, and come on with a solid LED. Check the fuses as well for continuity, and the fuse holders for damage.

If there is a backup battery soldered to the MPU board, look for signs it's leaking, and any acid damage - a very common cause of issues, especially when it gets into the chip sockets in the area.

If you don't have a hard copy of the manual, go pull it down from www.ipdb.org.

These are just basic first steps, but should give you a better idea of what's likely going on.
 
update

Well very cool thanks for the advice got home and reconected the harness and not shure how but she's hummin right along again. But the mpu board does have some acid damage on it towards the bottom of the board and the battery has been changed not any way to know how long ago. Who's the best to send boards to to have fixed?
 
To make any of these old Bally's reliable you MUST do the following:

Address the rectifier board first. You need clean reliable power flowing through the game before you can diagnose the other boards. If you don't feel like you can address these issues yourself then send the boards to Clive at Coin Op Cauldron. If you do send the boards out, you WILL have to address the connectors in the game yourself while waiting for your boards to get back.

You will need replace the majority with new .156 molex female pins. You may not need new housings but replacement is a must.

If you decide that you want to do this yourself and save a ton of money, let us know and we can walk you through it. Its not too hard....

From your symptoms I am guess its a combination of bad connectors and your rectifier board needing to be rebuilt.
 
So what kind of cosmetic shape is it in?

This pin is on my list of "Wants", and if you paid $150 for an otherwise nice condition game, I think you stole it! For a really nice perfectly working example, I'd pay $600-$700.

I'd clean up that acid damage, and put new connector pins on.
 
Last edited:
Hello all well I finally found what I think is a good deal I bought a bally supersonic off cl for $150. So I got it home and it worked fine except a couple bulbs being out and needing new rubbers and a nice cleaning. But now its mpu led is staying on and no game play. So where do I go from here I'm new to working on pins and don't want to burn a bunch of money on this pin. Thanks in advance for any help you may have.

You probably have some connector issues but there could be and likely are other problems causing the MPU to lock up.

Is there any corrosion on the MPU? Is the original battery still present? Does the LED on the MPU flash at all when you turn the game on or just stay solid?

Check these voltages at the MPU:

TP2: +12VDC
TP4: GND
TP5: +5VDC

EDIT:

Just read this :)

But the mpu board does have some acid damage on it towards the bottom of the board and the battery has been changed not any way to know how long ago.

Shipping back and forth to Canada would kill any good deal I could give you on repairs. Corrosion repairs can be a real PITA anyway. I could sell you and MPU for $100 shipped with NVRAM adapter (no batteries). Otherwise I've heard good things about Clive at coin op cauldron for repairs.
 
Last edited:
anouther update

well i got new rubbers ect ordered from marco spec. and i did find that the harnesses on the rectifier board had some heat damage that was causing bad connections ( j1,j2,j3) so im going to replace all that, luckily they had a kit to do it for 10 bucks. and as far as the overall condition of the pin ide say its a 7 out of 10 as it sets now. But will easily be a 9 after a good clean up. ill put up some picts of it later.
 
Back
Top Bottom