Gorgar Hacked to Hell

Michael Roma

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I just picked up a Gorgar today and boy did whoever had this before me hack the hell out of the wires. The guy I purchased it from said that it used to boot but then stopped and started blowing the solenoid fuse.

After further investigation under the playfield I found that the center drop target coil had its wires just dangling down and werent connected to either lug. :confused: It also appears they bypassed the GI fuse board and tapped directly into the wires going to the PS board.

So before I attempt to power this on for the first time I want to undo the hackjob. Does anyone know where I can download the wiring diagram/schematics for this? All I could find was the 12 page instruction booklet.

- Mike

wirehack.jpg
 
That site is 9 years old and most of the links off it are broke. I can't believe that it is this difficult to find a PDF of the operators manual and schematics. My search-Fu must be off.

- Mike
 
backbox wiring is the same for all the System 6 games, was a standardized harness, so you could use ANY system 6 game diagram for that purpose. Circuit boards too.

If you could take a photo that goes about 6" higher, it would be a big help. The GI wiring shouldn't go into the power supply in ANY way on a System 6. Don't know of a current link for the service manual for Gorgar, but 80% of it is repeated in all the system 6 books anyway, except the playfield wiring schematic.

Here's your operators manual....
http://www.ipdb.org/files/1062/Williams_1979_Gorgar_Instruction_Booklet.pdf

For the circuit boards and backbox wiring, you can use this site. Awesome diagrams there.
http://www.firepowerpinball.com/

And the always awesome...
http://www.pinrepair.com/sys37/index.htm

-Hans
 
Not crazy about the theme but great gameplay. The pinrepair and firepowerpinball sites will help you repair and "bulletproof" your pin. I have two similar initial condition firepowers that I resurrected using the guides (actually a pair of them that I bought together) and both have been working reliably ever since. Be sure to add the extra fuses as advised since you will be working in that area. I see the burnt purple power resistors on the driver board that should also be replaced.

Pin restoration is a labor of love but you have a lot of folks that will assist you here and on rpg.

Bill
 
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first thing i'd do is take that black electricians tape off and solder the ends together and shrink wrap the connection
 
Thanks Hans for the link to the firepower site. Those diagrams are awesome and just what I was looking for.

With the exception of the fuse card and transformer hack job the game is actually really clean and in good conidtion. I can't complain being that I got it for even less than what the seller on CL was originally asking. :D

Now to see if I can undo what has been done.

- Mike
 
Well since I didn't have any heat shrink tubing to redo the transformer mess I decided to pull all boards to check for cold solder joints and test the transistors on the driver board.

I found 2x 2n6044s that were a little high and an MC7915c that replaced a TIP102 (is that even a compatible part?) that I couldn't get a reading from. I replaced all parts (the MC7915c with a TIP122) and I get normal, as expected readings.

Also, after further inspection of the wiring it looks like they totally bypassed the fuse card and took power directly from the transformer and not tapping into the power supply board as I originally thought.

- Mike
 
Well I made some progress last night with the re-wiring. I purchased some heat shrink tubing, cut all the connections to the transformer and went to work.

I have a couple of quick questions...

1. What should connect to the bottom of the leftmost eyelet on the fuse card?

2. The backbox wiring diagram on the firepowerpinball.com site shows that pins 3 and 6 on 3J1 are not used, yet the wiring diagram on the site shows that pin 3 taps into the + on 6BR2 (and pin 6 is NC). My connector had two yellow wires that were tapped into the + on 6BR2. Is pin 6 truly not used?

Thanks for the assistance thus far...

- Mike

gorgarback1.jpg


gorgarback2.jpg
 
3J6 Pin 6 is the "Unregulated" logic power, with should be somewhere kinda near 12vdc but varies...a lot sometimes. It's a grey/white wire The other end of that wire is at the CPU board 1J1 pin 9.

Just be careful, as there's also a grey/white wire that should be going into 3J1 pin 12 and 10P1 pin 5.... but this is an 18VAC wire coming straight from the transformer. Not compatible, but same colors.

Yellow and White/Yellow are normally the GI light wiring, which is 6.3vac. Not sure why that would be tied into a rectifier. Should only be a violet or orange on the +DC sides of those rectifiers for the lamps and solenoids(plus the black grounds). Logic circuits are rectified on the power supply itself by a pair of diodes.

-Hans
 
Well I made some progress last night with the re-wiring. I purchased some heat shrink tubing, cut all the connections to the transformer and went to work.

I have a couple of quick questions...

1. What should connect to the bottom of the leftmost eyelet on the fuse card?

2. The backbox wiring diagram on the firepowerpinball.com site shows that pins 3 and 6 on 3J1 are not used, yet the wiring diagram on the site shows that pin 3 taps into the + on 6BR2 (and pin 6 is NC). My connector had two yellow wires that were tapped into the + on 6BR2. Is pin 6 truly not used?

Thanks for the assistance thus far...

- Mike

gorgarback1.jpg


gorgarback2.jpg

yellow wire from transformer lug #19 goes to the bottom open hole lug on the fuse card.

yellow wire from transformer lug #17 goes to the bottom of 6F1 on the fuse card.

yellow wire from 7P1-1, 8P2-1, 9P1-1&4 go to the top of 6F1

yellow/white wire from 7P1-2, white/yellow wire from 8P2-2, 9P1-2&5 go to the top of the open hole lug on the fuse card.

Mike, I have a hard copy of the full Gorgar service manual if you need any other info.
Dok
 
Thanks to everyone who offered and gave assistance. Because of all of you I am almost there...

I went over my transformer wiring and made a couple of changes, checked all fuses, crossed my fingers, and powered on the game. Presto, it lives... sort of.

The game appears to boot and doesn't go into audit mode. However I cannot get it to coin up and start a game (Is there a free play setting I can set in the setup). There are a couple of loose wires at the coin door so that might be the cause. I also tested for voltage at IC19 pin 22 and only get 1.2V DC. There are 3x AAA batteries instead on 3x AA batteries... each AAA battery is capable of putting out 1.5V so will that make a difference?

Next I put the game into test mode and ran it thru the switch and solenoid test. All solenoids seem to fire and the switches work for the most part (a couple need some adjustments). Also, when I power the game on initially it kicks a ball into the shooter lane automatically and there are no gameplay sounds (I never played Gorgar buy my Pharaoh has start up sounds). I can get the sounds to play by pressing the self-test button on the sound board.

Again, thanks for all the assistance thus far. Any suggestions for this new batch of questions?

- Mike




gorgarlives.jpg
 
Yep, there is a free-play setting. Go to audit #18, which is the "max credits", should have a default of 30. Set it to 0 instead, and you're in free play mode.

The good news is that pretty much everything is looking good now for that CPU. If you had any major problems, it wouldn't even be showing anything on the displays.

I'd also get that black rubber off there, put some white rubber on it instead. Black gets dirty too fast, and plays too slow. Gorgar's meant to be a fast game.

The fact it kicks a ball automatically concerns me a bit. Is that solenoid locking-on at startup? Or is it just firing momentarily? If it's locking-on, make sure to get it taken care of before it fries the coil or the driver board.


-Hans
 
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The AAA batteries shouldn't be an issue, just won't last as long as the AA's. Most likely you need to reset the CPU, before you put it into free play and it should stop kicking the ball upon start up. Mine did that, and some other weird shit until I reset the CPU. The little instruction book tells you how to reset the CPU.
 
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