Have Time Pilot? I need a pic of the inside :)

Reality_Studio

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Hey guys I posted in the tech forum as well, but if anyone here has a Time Pilot machine could you give me a picture of your monitor power connector that is on the left side of the cabinet? My cabinet came with no monitor and I'm not sure how the wires are supposed to matchup between the cabinet monitor power connector and the power connector of the crt itself. I have a spare crt I'm going to use in this cabinet but it's connector does not match what the cabinet already has, so I'm trying to see how the wires should connect and then make a new connector. I attached a pic of what my cabinet monitor connector looks like with its purple, brown and blue wires. The monitor I'm going to use has green, black and white wires but with a different style connector. So I'm trying to figure out does green go with brown, what does white go with, etc. Any help appreciated!
 

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Look where the wires go. They are connected to an isolation transformer in the bottom of the cab I bet, those are the a/c wires. Ground will be connected to earth ground, probably all the way back to the center lug on your wall plug. You can find that with the continuity setting on your multimeter.
 
Look where the wires go. They are connected to an isolation transformer in the bottom of the cab I bet, those are the a/c wires. Ground will be connected to earth ground, probably all the way back to the center lug on your wall plug. You can find that with the continuity setting on your multimeter.

I agree with this take. Check where the wires are going and don't trust the colors, ever, until you have verified it yourself. I have seen things hooked up backwards several times, not just with power, but with multiple things inside a cabinet. Especially if an operator had your machine on his route.

Also, check your fuses. I had a cabinet once that when I first opened it was wired completely backwards (hot and neutral wires colors swapped) and had pennies where fuses were supposed to go!
 
Here is the one that I already had on my computer. Not sure if it is good enough to tell you what you want to know, but here it is anyways...
 

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Look where the wires go. They are connected to an isolation transformer in the bottom of the cab I bet, those are the a/c wires. Ground will be connected to earth ground, probably all the way back to the center lug on your wall plug. You can find that with the continuity setting on your multimeter.

Yeah I had followed the wires, I mentioned that in my tech thread post but stupidly forgot to mention that here, my bad :( Problem is my isolation transformer has zero information on it. I attached two pics, one is the cabinet monitor power connector and the other is the isolation transformer. When I followed the cables back I saw that purple goes to purple, blue goes to blue and brown goes to green. I assume green is ground which should mean:

Monitor green to cabinet brown
Monitor black to cabinet purple
Monitor white to cabinet blue

...but the isolation transformer doesn't have a word of text on it so I have no idea what wire is what. Hence I'm a little paranoid about just plugging it in, don't want to blow up the monitor!
 

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No need for text on the iso xformer, check it with your meter if you don't believe your eyes. ;)

There's no visible copper on the three wires coming out of the isolation transformer to probe to, at least on mine. The five or so connections on the other side do have test points but not the three on the other side. Do you guys just tear away some of the paper to see bare wire, or snip away some of the wire shielding to get a place to test with a meter?
 
Just measure at the connector. With the game off, check for continuity between each wire and the frame of the transformer to find the ground. Then turn the game on and measure the AC voltage between the other two wires. You should see ~110V. It's that easy.
 
Just measure at the connector. With the game off, check for continuity between each wire and the frame of the transformer to find the ground. Then turn the game on and measure the AC voltage between the other two wires. You should see ~110V. It's that easy.

I had tried that as well. The cabinet is mostly bare, no monitor or boards in it currently just the power cable, switcher power supply, jamma wire harness and isolation transformer, that's how it came. So I tested each of the 3 points on the cabinet monitor power connector with G and FG on the switcher power supply for continuity and there was none. On a whim though I just tested them again with either AC connector on the switcher power supply while unplugged, and all 3 wires purple/blue/brown show continuity to either AC connection on the switcher.

I also checked to make sure power is being fed to the isolation transformer, on the attached pic that connector leading to it fortunately has the normal black/white colors, I disconnected that and it reads 125v. The little 220VAC label at the end is a dongle of sorts, one side is 110v the other 220v, the game can support both so you plug in the version you want, it's still plugged in as 110v.

As a final test I used a regular voltage tester on the purple/blue/brown wires leading to the cabinet monitor power connector, turned the cabinet on and all three wires cause the tester to beep.

Not sure what any of this means except maybe that all three colors are supplying power and there is no ground?

EDIT: Forgot to mention, yeah I also tested continuity from each of the purple/blue/brown connectors to the isolation transformer frame and there was none.
 

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No need for text on the iso xformer, check it with your meter if you don't believe your eyes. ;)

Maybe that was a little harsh and not really helpful. Let me try again.

With the power off...

Put your multimeter on continuity test. You see the green wires screwed down to the case of the isolation transformer? Put one side of your meter there, and the other on the brown wire at the plug you are trying to identify. It should be the same wire/ If it is, that is Earth Ground.

The other two are just one long wire that is wrapped around a core. If you test them for continuity, they will be connected. You hook both sides up to power your monitor and it doesn't matter which is which, since the isolated A/C supply is doesn't have the neutral bonded to ground.

So, if you have a black and white wire on your monitor, they can go to either one of the purple and blue wires. The ground is the important one, it should go to the monitor frame.

Someone correct me if I'm wrong here!
 

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Put your multimeter on continuity test. You see the green wires screwed down to the case of the isolation transformer? Put one side of your meter there, and the other on the brown wire at the plug you are trying to identify. It should be the same wire/ If it is, that is Earth Ground.

Thanks, I had tried that as well with all three of the purple/blue/brown connectors, and none show continuity. All three of them show continuity to the AC connectors on the switcher power supply though, but none show any to ground. It's almost like all three are supplying ac and there is no ground, does that make any sense?

To add to the mystery, I was googling all over for images of the inside of Time Pilot cabinets and found a video on John's Arcade Youtube channel where he restores his, and at one point he shows the inside. It isn't quite clear enough to be sure, but the monitor power connector that plugs into that cabinet monitor power connector seems like it has only two wires attached even though the connector has 3 holes. It's almost like only two are being used to feed ac to the monitor and there is no ground. I thought you had to send ground back from the monitor to the isolation transformer no? Anyways it's not completely clear so I can't be sure.

EDIT: This is the exact time he shows the inside of the Time Pilot cabinet for a little bit:
https://youtu.be/AzcQtwYH3bs?list=PLF6Omn2cXb7aoTe310XPwV3qt-yE9CMIm&t=342

And here very briefly is a closeup of the power connector, but he pans so it's blurry:
https://youtu.be/AzcQtwYH3bs?list=PLF6Omn2cXb7aoTe310XPwV3qt-yE9CMIm&t=388

If anyone has a Time Pilot cabinet, or possibly any Centuri cabinet, can you check if only two of the three pins are used on that cabinet monitor power connector?


So, if you have a black and white wire on your monitor, they can go to either one of the purple and blue wires. The ground is the important one, it should go to the monitor frame.

That's what I thought, so I was like ok let's find ground. Figured brown traces back to green on the isolation transformer so it would be ground. But none of them test continuity for ground, and all seem to test continuity to ac, hence I'm confused lol. My only thought at this point is that all three are ac, there is no ground on it, and the monitor power connectors only use 2 of the 3 pins (black/white). But would need a picture of someone else's cabinet on the inside to be sure.
 
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OK, I just took a look inside mine. Brown and purple are the AC lines on the connector. Ignore the blue. There is a separate FG wire for grounding the monitor frame (you can see it in John's video).
 
OK, I just took a look inside mine. Brown and purple are the AC lines on the connector. Ignore the blue. There is a separate FG wire for grounding the monitor frame (you can see it in John's video).

Excellent, that's the info I needed. I took a look at his video again and I see that separate ground wire for the monitor, I'll attach that to FG. Thanks so much for the help!
 
Confirmed it all works, my Time Pilot rises from its grave, albeit it as a Klax for the moment. Cool, now to clean this franken mess all up :)
 

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Nice! Glad to see it's working. I was just about to take a pic of my time Pilot but looks like you've got it sorted out. Let me know if there's anything else you'd like pics of in a time Pilot. I look forward to seeing the final product :)
 
Nice. But why were you bothering with continunity when you could just test the voltage? Green is screwed to the transformer so if it's the same line it's ground, and you can mix purple and blue (it's AC voltage) without any harmful effects. Note, it's not always good to mix the main line of the machine because then you end up switching the neutral side on the power switch, but on the dedicated isolated line to the monitor it doesn't matter.
 
Nice. But why were you bothering with continunity when you could just test the voltage? Green is screwed to the transformer so if it's the same line it's ground, and you can mix purple and blue (it's AC voltage) without any harmful effects. Note, it's not always good to mix the main line of the machine because then you end up switching the neutral side on the power switch, but on the dedicated isolated line to the monitor it doesn't matter.

In the OP's defense, the wiring in this particular case is a bit goofy (the wire colors change, they're not easy to follow, and there ends up being a wire on the connector that you don't use). Probably a good idea that he asked here for confirmation.
 
Yeah bear in mind I'm still fairly new to restoring these things, and I'm used to ac being two wires and a ground. When I couldn't find ground I figured I could either muck about and sort it out on my own, or just ask for help figuring someone else here has already gone through this. If you don't know, ask, that's my motto especially when dealing with 110v :)
 
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