Pinball Part Suppliers?

sblair

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I'm looking for feedback from folks on who they like for Pinball parts and why?

I was primarily using Marco Specialties as their website was really well done and lots of detail for most every part or supply I needed. Their prices were on the high side, but not too unreasonable given the effort maintaing their website probably takes.

The issues I've had with them is that most every rubber kit I ever received from them was incorrect. Even after talking to someone in charge there, things were still incorrect in my next order. The bigger issue for me now is their shipping prices have skyrocketed much higher than is reasonable even when placing a medium size order for a number of items.

I saw the thread on Pinball Resource, but I'm curious about others as I've found PBR doesn't have near the range of items that Marco carries.
 
I haven't had the same problems with Marco and I've ordered quite a few rubber kits. I've heard their kits can be inaccurate though.

I usually look for stuff in this order:

Pinball Life:
http://www.pinballlife.com/

Pinball Resource or Marco:
http://www.pbresource.com/
http://www.marcospecialties.com/

Bay Area, etc...
http://www.bayareaamusements.com/

I have used all of those and found them all to be good sources. Pinball Life is by far the one I use most.

Search on this forum and google as well. It's been discussed many times.
 
I got my rubber kit from Marco for Silverball Mania and the kit was wrong. Had several extra of some rings, but was missing one of those itty bitty ones for the metal studs. I had to order some bumper caps later anyway so a few cents later I fixed it up.
 
Been there done that after that miscue with Marco, I asked here about correct rubber kits and was directed to www.actionpinball.com There based in Salt Lake City and there kits have all the rubber parts for your game. I recieved 2 rebound rubbers for High Speed and wondered why 2 as the machine when I bought it had just one back there, The guy at action said 2 rubbers in the back prevent the rubbers from wearing prematurely, other vendors only gave 1 rebound rubber. So I use actionpinball for the rubber kits Marco for other things and Pinballlife for the majority. PBR is basically for Gottleib and EM's. I never have dealt with them so have no comment. Action also gave me a map of my game where every piece goes, dont really need it but it there for reference. I have been to there shop in Salt Lake,it is small and tight quarters parts dept. Helluva bunch nice guys.
 
For rubber I order what I need from pinballlife, plus a few spares. I started with the assortment and just get what's missing for any particular machine. If you want to stick with kits I go along with actionpinball, their kits are the closest you'll find. They verify there's on machines, not just from the manual, and make changes as needed. The map and size guide they send is very hand to.

Generally I get most of what I can from pinballlife, then Marco and Bayarea.

Jerry
 
I buy most of my stuff from madamusements.com. They have the cheapest bulk rubbers, always the best prices on alot of stuff. Shipping is always at cost, and there fast
 
I buy most of my stuff from madamusements.com. They have the cheapest bulk rubbers, always the best prices on alot of stuff. Shipping is always at cost, and there fast

You have to put a hyphen between mad and amusements, I just typed in what you had and got a paintball store mad-amusements.com
 
for rubber kits i also use action pinball.i like there placement map alot better.they are a little more than marcos,but no problems.i like marcos for large amount of supplys.i must say all the companys i deal with there shipping out of hand.
 
Being the fairly anal Engineer I am, I decided to compare the various companies with the list of parts I'm looking for to see how they fair.

Marco had everything I needed, but was a bit high on some parts and most notably they can't get a rubber kit correct to save their life and their shipping was on the high side to me now.

I don't understand why PinballLife was at the top of so many lists for people. I was pretty disappointed in their selection overall. PBR has the best pricing, but their website is really lacking.

Overall it seemed that Bay Area was the best choice, but people didn't rate them as high. I'm curious about why not?

Comparing shipping prices by selecting 10 boxes of #47 lamps, Bay area was by far the lowest shipping price. Close to half the price of Marco and PinballLife.\

(See attached file for part price comparison)
 

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