Newb Pinhead, G07

Skarv

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Hi Guys:

I'm new here thanks to a neighbor who found out about my pinball addiction and gave me her Defender 'cause it hadn't worked in years so it just had to go.

Bummer!

So here is the deal. It is in really great shape but no Play.

I already ordered Bob Robert's Deluxe cap kit with flyback and all the other goodies. But here goes my questions.

Condition: It starts up and makes some startup sounds that appear legit. Once up, it buzzes pretty loudly.

Voltage LEDs are all on and correct. Fuses all good.

Monitor makes a vertical ghost image... barely visible in picture one, and then focuses down to the blotch you can see in picture 2. Then it pops back apart, and re-converges. Just does that over and over.

Careful inspection found the machine and its boards almost all in perfect shape. The only exception: The large board in the monitor assembly itself. This one looks great, but looks like someone poured a bit of oil on it, and then dust stuck to the oil making the thing look a bit fuzzy with gray dirt. The precise area is essentially right under the tube.

So, my question is whether anyone has any ideas of stuff I should be looking at, and parts I should be getting in addition while I wait for my B Roberts deluxe rebuild kit?

Thanks much, I'll post my results much like in Pinball land.

Dan
 

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Definitely start with a cap kit and a flyback. The flyback is a *real* common failure, and it looks like something is seriously out of whack with the focus there. You probably have a crack in it (the buzzing). Look for a crack, burn marks or seeping brown goo on the flyback.

The grunge and dirt is normal. The electrostatic charge of the picture tube tends to attract all the black carbon-containing dust from the air. This is the same reason why when you clean the dust off your television it's all black. Similarly, if you have a television against a white wall for a long time, then move the TV, you'll have this weird pattern of black grunge on the wall.

I've been known to clean monitor chassis by running them through the dishwasher.

It's hard to say what else might be wrong with the monitor - it sounds like it's going into shutdown, the power supply section is probably way out of whack... Might need a VR transistor, but the deluxe rebuild kit comes with that.

Start with the caps and flyback. Note that one of the caps (C302) has it's polarity markings on the circuit board printed wrong on the solder side of the board. While you have the chassis on the bench, be sure to reflow all the pins on the yoke connector, as well as around the vertical transistors and the fusible resistor (FR401, IIRC) in that circuit, and keep an eye open for other cracked solder joints. Ensure the width coil isn't broken, or better yet replace it (comes with the deluxe kit).

After it's all nice and rebuilt, follow the instructions available to adjust the B+ to the correct voltage - don't skip this step, it's very important that the B+ be correct, or at least pretty close.

If you're interested in a lot of mindless reading and monitor theory, you can read the "Read this first" monitor repair sticky thread. Some loser with way too much time on his hands wrote it.

-Ian
 
Thanks man. I'll report back after the cap kit is in.

Two comments though...

The dust and fuzz I'm talking about is more than just electro-static attraction. There is some liquid that somehow got in there. I'll go with it being the flyback and hope. But that doesn't really make sense as the oil would have had to flow uphill. But if the flyback is actually in an oil bath, then I'll go with that being it. I put some pix and you can see the darker tide mark, and the chunks that are sticking to whatever is in there.

Thanks for the tip on the cap polarity. That one would surely have bit me in the butt.

I did read the entire sticky, but still felt there wasn't a situation just like mine. But it sure got me started and going.

As for losers with too much time... I qualify, except for the too much time part.

D
 

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I'm not seeing anything out of the ordinary on your chassis. That's a good sign.

The first photos of the image on the tube are hard to make out. It almost appears if everything is right in the middle of the screen. Is the yoke plugged in?
 
The first picture is very hard to see, but there is a 1-2" hazy vertical bar roughly down the middle of the screen.

That bar then narrows to a blotch in the middle over the course of a second. Then it pops open again. I suspect it is the various consumables in the chassis, but I was hoping someone had seen the exact issue.

My bigger worry is the oil or residue just under the picture tube on the board. I'm planning to clean it well, but I want to be sure the source is corrected.

Yoke is plugged in, and in fact, i reseated it twice. Slides smoothly too. not like my usual pinball connector that kind of grinds due to all the oxidation.

Thanks for the input.

D

ps. Bob Roberts just shipped so I may get to this on the weekend after all. Fingers crossed.

pps. Wish I was in Brattleboro. Used to live in Hanover and loved it!!!
 
Re: the goo.. I typically take my monitors outside, hit them with a generous dousing
of simple green and then hose them down. You should see all the nasty water that flows off them.

Then I let them sit in the sun for a couple hours or inside for 2-3 days before
working on them. They end up being nice and squeky clean:) And smell great to!

Malice
 
Hi guys:

Here goes the redux...

Defender works great thanks to the Real Bob Roberts! The Deluxe Electrohome kit worked like a charm!

A couple of the takeaways...

The multicolored blotch that I showed in my pictures is just the aftercharge in the monitor. I still get it when I turn the game off. It lingers for a couple of minutes and then dissipates.

The gook on the board. One of the caps had blown up and sprayed this stuff. I wish I had done your simple green trick, but I just took a wet towel and cleaned it off best as I could. Wasn't perfect, but it works.

Finally, there a couple of caps that have not marking on them other than lead length. Problem is that the originals for some random reason have no marking either... so you have to go with the screened marking on the solder side of the board... except that the printing wore off due to overzealous soldering iron work. Bottom line... be careful with the soldering. I flipped a coin and seem to have won on that one cap.

Final question. intermittently, I get missing chunks in the lettering and some random flickering pixels. Any ideas what adustment I should be tweaking? It usually snaps back to perfect after a couple of minutes.

Thanks

Dan
 
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