Pole Position... You knew it was coming.

SUCCESS! Thanks to a nudge from Gamefixer, I've gotten the boards out. Actually, not as bad as one might think.....

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The battery is coming off straight away. Going to replace both Big Blues, clean the board up, and see what happens then.
 
I swapped out both big blue's.... cleaned the PCB real good, and cut the battery off. Not in that order. Buttoned everything back up, plugged it in, and flipped the switch:

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So.... I played it for a few minutes. I'm not liking it on Free Play, though.... There's no attract mode. The shifter wasn't working either, so I figure that's something mechanical to check out. I turned my back for a second....... and this happened:

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Alright guys..... where do I start looking for this problem?
 
did you try the game without the filter board?

never know if might be damaged.

Not yet..... but it sounds like an idea. If nothing else, it will check that off the list of potential problems. Be back in 10 minutes with results.

Okay... I removed that filter board.... no change. For some reason, I was looking at the boards, and noticed that the LEDs weren't lit. Maybe it was a memory, but it made me think the board isn't getting power for some reason. So....... I go poking around in there again.

"My, those fuses look pretty dirty.... let's clean them up and see what's what there."

Bingo.

First one(closest to the front of the cabinet) is blown. The others look fine. I pull it out..... clean it up so I can read it. 4A, 250v. 3/3

Not sure what the 3/3 means..... but the rest I understand. Right... I've got fuses. Let's see if we've got a match.... 1.5......2.0.......2.0....... 3.0............ shit.

*sigh*

Too late to go running anywhere.... so that will have to wait until tomorrow. Not much else I can do tonight.... but maybe I'll swap out the marquee bulb while I'm feeling adventurous.
 
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well i see some things to look at.

Get rid of the filter board, it doesn't seem to hold up very well and it causes a lot of issues.

The monitor's hsync needs to be adjusted.

all of those graphical issues hopefully will clear up with better voltage once the filter board is gone but either way go download the service manual and read where it says which chip does what. Inspect those chips and probably clean legs/replace socket.
 
I pulled the board already, but I'm not going to trash it. I'll just label it and put it away. General consensus says it's not really needed, and may never be... but better safe than sorry. (I probably won't, but someone else might.)

Ian- Thank you for the youtube videos(and the advice)! They've been very educational. I did subscribe to the channel. :D

I did notice that the little "trigger" piece that detects a coin dropping through is missing on both coin slots. :facepalm: How did THOSE go missing, and where can I find replacements?

When I get it running again, I definitely want it off of Free Play, but I'm not mounting a credit switch.

I'm really hoping to get it up and running for this weekend. I have a friend coming over, and PP would get lots of love.
 
if my videos help anyone that is incredible. Since I don't put any effort into them and really still have no idea what I am doing. Now adays i don't have a clue how to make videos as I have so many gadgets to assist repair work it's hardly fair for someone just starting out.
 
..... and just found another problem. This is on the A/R II board(I believe) located inside the back bottom panel. Also spotted a second fuse that had blown. Both are the same rating... so I'll just pick up a 5 pack of them.

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Guess I'll be doing more surgery than I thought. That's okay, though.... I can't imagine these parts being very pricey. I just hope my local shop has them.
 
..... and just found another problem. This is on the A/R II board(I believe) located inside the back bottom panel. Also spotted a second fuse that had blown. Both are the same rating... so I'll just pick up a 5 pack of them.

el2pJda.jpg


Guess I'll be doing more surgery than I thought. That's okay, though.... I can't imagine these parts being very pricey. I just hope my local shop has them.

I suppose those are the resistors they suggest upgrading from 1/4 watt to 1/2 watt.

I haven't seen any of Ian Kellogg's resources on these, but this was a site I found when I was researching what to do with the AR2s:

http://melchman.net/arcade/Pr0n/tour/ARII/index.html

our AR2s are pretty healthy, nothing blown up, so it'll just be replacing old caps and upgrading parts fortunately. I need to hit up our Dig Dug, Centipede and Millipede as well.
 
the ol' burnt 10 ohm resistor.

Take a good look at your edge connectors of the PCB, how do they look?

Just slightly brown where the power comes in. Nowhere near as bad as my Dig Dug, though. I mean, it's noticeable, but not what I would call "bad". Definitely a sign that there's work needing done to the connection in order to prevent what happened to my Dig Dug.
 
Is there an easy way to tell what model monitor is in this thing? I saw a tag saying Wells Gardner, but didn't see a model number anywhere. Google isn't turning up much. I figure since I'm going to end up ordering parts anyway, I may as well grab a cap kit for it. Probably needs it anyway.

(Yeah, that's going to be a first for me)
 
Is there an easy way to tell what model monitor is in this thing? I saw a tag saying Wells Gardner, but didn't see a model number anywhere. Google isn't turning up much. I figure since I'm going to end up ordering parts anyway, I may as well grab a cap kit for it. Probably needs it anyway.

(Yeah, that's going to be a first for me)

Its a K4900.

FYI, those resistors will also burn if your edge connector is not on correctly. As in moved too far in one direction. Its easy to overlap pins which would cause the board to draw its power from the sense lines which is one of the ways those resistors fry.
 
Its a K4900.

FYI, those resistors will also burn if your edge connector is not on correctly. As in moved too far in one direction. Its easy to overlap pins which would cause the board to draw its power from the sense lines which is one of the ways those resistors fry.

That sounds like another good reason to do the power mod to that thing.... Thanks for the info!
 
the test point mod is great because it'll distribute power all over the board pretty evenly. you'll never have a condition where one half of those giant Atari boards sags and makes Sense lose its mind jacking up voltage.

I've seen past threads where there's like a Sense debate over whether to keep it or defeat it and was surprised most people were in favor of keeping it. when you do the test point mod you render Sense useless anyway, so get rid of it.
 
I suppose those are the resistors they suggest upgrading from 1/4 watt to 1/2 watt.

Bumping the thread, because I just got back from Baynesville Electronics. One of the gurus there told me that this is absolutely fine to do. I picked up the replacement resisters, a roll of wire(18g), and a few other misc. things.

The manual stated the wrong bulbs, though....... so I'll likely be going back for the right ones.

Going to order the cap kit, and the big blues later today. They did say that they'll have a compatible battery back in stock, but I forgot to ask when.

Right..... so I'm off to do some surgery..... cover me Porkins, I'm going in!
 
..... and just found another problem. This is on the A/R II board(I believe) located inside the back bottom panel. Also spotted a second fuse that had blown. Both are the same rating... so I'll just pick up a 5 pack of them.

el2pJda.jpg


Guess I'll be doing more surgery than I thought. That's okay, though.... I can't imagine these parts being very pricey. I just hope my local shop has them.

Its good to add a little bit of height to the replacement resistors on the AR2 so they are not touching the board. In case they burn out again in the future, it won't damage the PCB.
 
Its good to add a little bit of height to the replacement resistors on the AR2 so they are not touching the board. In case they burn out again in the future, it won't damage the PCB.

yeah, that's what I did on the Williams power supplies in fact (there's one ceramic on those that gets nuked a lot) I also installed new bridge rectifiers so I could mount them higher up. those were a thing of beauty when I was all done.

I bought an AR2 from someone on here last year and it's one of the fully populated ones on both sides, will that work in PP?
 
Its good to add a little bit of height to the replacement resistors on the AR2 so they are not touching the board. In case they burn out again in the future, it won't damage the PCB.

I opted to buy both the 1/4 and the 1/2, but I think I'm going to install the 1/2s. They are slightly bigger than the 1/4s, so I have to leave some distance between them. I hadn't noticed how MUCH damage that blown part had done until I got the board out.... it's burned on the back side, too.

Giving some thought to that(I haven't replaced them yet, either.... back started bothering me REAL bad, so I had to quit for a while)..... I think I'm going to put some clear-coat nail polish on the component side of the board, just around those spots, to help prevent any more damage should another one pop(an extra layer of protection, you might say).

Except for the soldering part, I did get the PCB all wired up. However, I don't see a "pin-out" diagram for the harness... so I'm kinda stuck at the moment. My meter is rather cheap, and I don't really trust it for testing voltages. Anyone know which pins are the +5, and which are the ground? I am not risking wiring that stuff up until I know for sure I'm not going to burn out chips(or anything else) on the board. The last time I actually used a meter for something useful, is measured in decades, not years.

My back is finally settling back down, so I can get back to the project...

Oh, another little piece of good news..... my uncle cut me a board from some of his scrap to take care of the missing top piece of the cabinet. That should help keep the bloody cats out of there. I swear, if one of them breaks the neck of that monitor.......
 
On my kit they are 1/2W, but it really doesn't matter since they will get toasted if the 2n3055 fails.

if you are going to defeat the sense mod, just throw straight wire instead of the 10 ohm resistors. No reason to waste money on resistors that won't even be used.

The big blues don't need to be replaced unless they are blowing fuses constantly or causing extreme ripple on the 5V rail. I know some people like replacing stuff for funsies.


Not going to fan the sense mod flames so don't ask my opinion :) I don't think its necessary to attach wires to every test point. Just hitting one ground and one 5V terminal on each board is more than enough. That's how my harness mod is made, that's how all of the cabs I work on have it and that's how my test bench is setup. I have never had an issue. I would be more concerned with getting a working fan in your cabinet if there isn't already one there.
 
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