My restoration of a "Ball Walk" (1960s) game (Cointroinics)

tstone

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My restoration of a "Ball Walk" (1960s) game (Cointroinics)

I recently bought a "Ball Walk" game by Cointronics. I think this game dates to the 1960s.

I was disappointed how little information I could find about the game, including simple pictures, so I thought I'd post up some pics and information about the game and my restoration of it.

This is a mechanical game that operates on a dime. It can be used with no electricity. If you can plug it in, however, it has a light, buzzer (for tilt an "0" score), and bell (for jackpot). It also has a flashing light that flashes when the game is very slightly touched (like when a coin is inserted).

The game uses 1-1/4" balls.

The object of the game is to use the 2 bars to try to maneuver the ball, which starts on top of them, all the way "uphill" to the front of the machine, where it strikes a switch and rings a jackpot bell.

Invariably, the ball falls short in one of the collection bins with drawing of 60's era sexy babes. Your score is tallied at the end by adding up the number of balls in the different bins.

There is a wire sensor in the "0" bin that triggers a mercury switch if you drop the ball in there (to let you know you failed). The mercury switch also trips if the game is shaken. The mercury switch trips a very loud buzzer.

When I got this game, it was filthy! I cleaned the playfield to really nice condition, bought brand new balls, cleaned the rods, and stripped and painted the heavy metal stand.

I considered powder coating the stand, but didn't want to remove and re-apply the sticker on it (see pics). I don't know if it is steel or cast iron, but I can tell it is old by the hardware (slotted screws, huge square nuts). It was probably added on. I think the game originally just sat on a table. The stand is very heavy and thick metal.

Overall the game (glass, cabinet, stand, playfield) is in really nice condition. The coin mech works like butter. If I had more skills, I'd disassemble it and polish it.

This is a fun and challenging game with great subject matter and graphics.

Pics of the game follow!
 
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pics

Some pics of top, left, right, and front.
 

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more pics

Pics of the base, the label on the base, and a couple more of the top with the lights on.
 

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pics 3

Pics of the unusual coin box (a long plastic "drawer") and the mercury switch used for the buzzer that sounds on "0" score and tilt.

Also a pic of the whole game.
 

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This is awesome! I'd never seen one of those before, but I did grow up playing a smaller version of this game that my dad used to have. It was called Space Probe.
 
Had a bunch of folks over over the weekend and they played this like crazy...it's addictive.
 
I like the innuendo, all the pinup girls on it, you pull the two rods apart, etc. Probably lots of dirty old men played the hell out of this in bars.
 
nice work. yep, remember seeing a few here and there back in the stone age...

yep, grew up playing the home model...

Thanks for posting that, I've never seen that. Definitely pretty much exactly the same mechanism.
 
Got my highest score ever today!

(500+500+500+400+300) * 2 for ringing her chimes = 4400

This is the first time I've ever actually rang the chimes.

See pic!
 

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