Help with Harley LA Riders...no sound...

Vectorman

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[problem solved now...thanks!]

Guys,

I've got a Harley that has no sound. I am ignorant about this era Sega and after doing basic kindergarten troubleshooting assumed it was a board problem and sent the boards off to Eldorado. Well, they charged me $170 and it still has no sound. Not sure what they did (the invoice didn't say).

I don't even have a wiring diagram for this game, so I am stuck. Does anyone have a wiring diagram? The manual that you can download from Segaarcade.com doesn't have any wiring info. I'm thinking the first place to start is to check the wiring to make sure everything is hooked up right. There are a few empty plugs and I'm wondering if something is missing. this came from an auction where the games had all been screwed with. (i know that doesn't narrow it down much).

Or is this a common problem to which someone knows the solution?

Thanks for any guidance you can give me...

John
 
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I'm not sure if you have the standard or deluxe, but here's the wiring diagram for the deluxe, which should at least help: http://www.sauservice.com/manuals/Harley/DLX/60hdlx.html .

When I had one, it had no sound, and IIRC there were bad solder joints on the large ceramic resistors on the sound amp board (they had gotten so hot that they desoldered themselves). I'd certainly pull that board and inspect it, and if possible check for unamplified signal going into the amp board. That should narrow down whether there's a board problem or amp problem.

DogP
 
well from what I've gathered this Harley/LA Riders game is a System 3 boardset. unfortunately, these are complex as hell, and your results may vary in a multitude of spots.

first, your sound outputs will come from the main board, it will be 2 different connectors for front and rear audio, and then another for MIDI (the music), if I'm not mistaken.

these then connect to the sound board, which then feeds out to 2 amplifier boards... one will be for the speakers and another will be for the subwoofer, assuming of course that I know what I'm talking about.

the cause for no sound is where things get hairy. on these particular Sega games, if the speakers are blown, it will fry the driver IC on the amplifier board. I can only really remember System 2 that only had "front" audio, not rear, and they had a single amp board, but maybe with System 3 permitting it has front and rear, it might have 2 separate amps for the audio, I totally forget. in fact, that has to be it, because our Daytona USA 2 had rear audio, but not front, and the front audio IC had a HOLE in it. both speakers were blown, and the tech at the place we got our games from didn't know his arsehole from his earhole, so naturally it was never attended to properly.

I forget the resistance on the speakers, I want to say they're 4 or 8 ohm, either or though, they'll be marked, and if you do a resistance check with a meter, if you don't get that ohm reading on the + and - terminals on the speaker, the speaker is trashed. if that's the case, then dig in and check your amp boards, check the ICs on them, if they look noticeably damaged, then they're no good and will need to be replaced.

we got our replacement from American Vending, and the soldering job isn't for the faint at heart.

alternatively, when you have the game powered on, do you get amplifier hiss from the speakers? if you do, then it's not a problem with your speakers or the amplifier hardware, but with your audio wiring running from the main board to the sound board. the volume pots can also be bad, or simply dirty, try turning the knob to both extremes back and forth, often times this can clean it up to where it's at least functional again.

if none of these are the cause then uh.... well, maybe the sound board is bad. I don't know anything else to check. :(
 
Thanks for the guidance guys....it was very helpful.

I am amazed to report that I checked the speakers and both of them were completely blown. In 20+ years working on games I've only seen a blown speaker a couple times, and even then it still made SOME sound. These were as dead as a doornail.

I hooked up different speakers and the sound is working. BTW, the subwoofer has been completely removed from the seat I discovered.

So, where is the best place to replace these? I've got hundreds of speakers from other games I've stripped, but none that are this odd tiny rectangular size!?!

And what should I use for the subwoofer?

Thanks again,
John
 
Never mind guys...I found speakers on eBay and they're on the way (from England)...?

Thanks, this one is solved!

John
 
yeah, I thought the blown speaker thing was unusual too. like, I've never seen it in video games before, and that's with stuff even way older than these games.

glad you got lucky and the amp ICs were still intact.
 
yeah, I thought the blown speaker thing was unusual too. like, I've never seen it in video games before, and that's with stuff even way older than these games.

glad you got lucky and the amp ICs were still intact.

Well, actually they may not have been...I had already ordered a couple of new amp boards on eBay and put in one of them. So the original board may have been blown....

John
 
ah, very well. you'll probably be able to tell, I think I mentioned on ours it actually put a hole in the chip. it's a wonder that doesn't cook anything else.

which speakers did you use as replacements? I wound up just using a set of Daytona 1 ones that that Arcade Boneyard guy had up on ebay a couple years ago, they work, but they don't sound right. there's like zero bass response from them, and the sub does work, they just sound weak.
 
which speakers did you use as replacements? I wound up just using a set of Daytona 1 ones that that Arcade Boneyard guy had up on ebay a couple years ago, they work, but they don't sound right. there's like zero bass response from them, and the sub does work, they just sound weak.

I found some on ebay that were the same size. Have no idea if they will sound ok or not, but they will at least fit. That's an odd sized speaker. 3" x 5" with mounting holes 2.5" x 3.5". The ones I found are in England, but even with shipping it was only about twenty bucks.

John
 
Did you get the seat rumbler? If not, if it's the standard cabinet (and maybe the deluxe as well), it's actually an Aura Bass Shaker (like: http://www.amazon.com/Aura-Sound-T2B4-Bass-Shaker/dp/B0002ZPTBI ). Mine was completely burned/seized up when I got it.

DogP

Thanks for telling me that! That is what it looked like in the manual, but I had no idea. I ordered a $15 subwoofer speaker on eBay that I figured I'd just cram in there somehow, but if that doesn't work, I know what to get now.

Thanks for the info!

John
 
Yeah, there's probably enough room in there to fit a speaker... the shaker is pretty cool though... it's basically a speaker, but rather than having a cone, it's just a weight (so it rumbles more than making sound).

DogP
 
we have the deluxe 18 Wheeler (the large optimus prime looking beast) and the subwoofer in that shakes like that too. guess it's the equivalent to force feedback, but with sound.

interesting note about that: I wondered for the last 2 years why the sub didn't work in that, until on a slow day I decided to take it apart (I was on a NAOMI maintenance kick back then) and found the amp board that drives the subwoofer and it had some 1/2 amp fuses in the holders.

the sad part is that this particular board is marked CLEAR AS DAY that it requires something like 6.3 amp fuses right under the holders, and we wonder why it didn't work.

that's a clear demonstration of what I contend with daily in our arcade, the tech at the place we bought our games from is like herpes, it's the gift that keeps on giving.

what other captain obvious BS mysteries I'll uncover next is to be determined, but I thought the Daytona 2 with the blown speakers was pretty rich. that was like a 1 minute google search to find out the cause, solution, and prevention of the problem in that case.

while on the subject, I ran across a site a couple years ago where someone added a volume pot to the subwoofer directly, as opposed to the way it's usually wired where the sub and the rear speakers share a volume pot, and I can't find it anymore. I had it bookmarked, but that computer was seriously stolen. I ask this cause you have to put the rear volume at ear-shattering levels to even get any bass response at all, and it still sounds wrong. DogP, encounter anything like this before?
 
while on the subject, I ran across a site a couple years ago where someone added a volume pot to the subwoofer directly, as opposed to the way it's usually wired where the sub and the rear speakers share a volume pot, and I can't find it anymore. I had it bookmarked, but that computer was seriously stolen. I ask this cause you have to put the rear volume at ear-shattering levels to even get any bass response at all, and it still sounds wrong. DogP, encounter anything like this before?

Well... you can't add a pot in line with the sub to turn it up (the pot can only decrease the volume), but you can add a pot in line with the other speakers to turn them down. You'd have to make sure you use one that can handle the power though. The better way would be to use something actually made for volume control, and impedance matches using a transformer... like: http://www.radioshack.com/product/index.jsp?productId=2102606 .

Or you could add an amp to turn the sub up.

DogP
 
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