Stern Solenoid Issues

FrizzleFried

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Here's the story (and I'm sticking to it!)...

I sold a Stern Lightning to a guy. He's had it for 3 weeks to a month. The guy called me saying that the ball won't shoot out to the shooter lane and I agree to come by to take a look thinking a leaf switch was out of adjustment and the table didn't "realize" the ball was sitting in the trough...

...nope.

NONE of the Solenoids are firing EXCEPT the flippers and the knocker. All the rest are no go. In test mode it jumps through all the solenoids doing nothing until it hits the knocker and then "knock".... of course the flipper don't flip either as that test doesn't pop off the flippers, but they do work as well. That said, I do have the flippers bypassing the relay... so they flip all the time... (old hack).

So I go to pull the solenoid driver board and it was laying against the front of the back box...it had come off the stand offs. I remove it and take a look. Nothing appears to be burned out... no noticeable broke traces, etc... it looks fine. I reflow the header pins just in case and hook it back up. Same issue... no solenoids fire except the knocker (and the flippers work).

Any suggestions? Dude is willing to lay out the dough for a new solenoid driver board, but I want to make sure the issue is in the driver board before I have him do that... I assume it could be a mainboard issue, right? I checked all the connectors on the main board and they were fine... but I didn't pull it out. The fact that the driver board had come loose has me leaning toward an issue with the driver board, but it would seriously suck ass if the guy bought a driver board only to find out that wasn't the issue.

Oh... I checked fuses as well and they appeared to be fine as well.

Any suggestions?

Anyone have a spare driver board they could loan me to help determine if the problem is the main or driver board?

HELP! I don't want the negative karma associated with selling someone a pin that dies after only a few dozen games.... but I ain't about to take it back either (not that he even suggested it).
 
D0h! No... I didn't... do the control ONLY the solenoids on the playfield (not the knocker)?

Quite possibly. I've seen Stern games with a bunch of coils hanging off the fuse by the flippers that's supposed to be only for the flippers as far as I know.

In any case... I wouldn't be surprised if there were a fuse under the playfield causing this problem.

Alternatively you could have a "daisy chain" wire off somewhere that supplies power to the coils that are not working.
 
Could actually be a number of problems if the fuses are good and the driver board shorted against the GI or ground wires on the back of the insert panel.

I'm just thinking it's the worst. Let's hope not. How far does this person live from you?
 
Dude is about 3 miles from me. I just called him and sure as shit the slo-blo under the playfield was blown. I feel like an idiot. I forgot there was a fuse up there.
 
Dude is about 3 miles from me. I just called him and sure as shit the slo-blo under the playfield was blown. I feel like an idiot. I forgot there was a fuse up there.

Excellent!

Don't feel too bad. It could have been a LOT worse. Pinball repair can be a sadistic mistress.
 
I wont be able to get out to his place until Sunday but it looks like that is probably the issue. I have his driver board here so he can't test himself...

Bummer.
 
I wont be able to get out to his place until Sunday but it looks like that is probably the issue. I have his driver board here so he can't test himself...

Bummer.

When you get back out there....check all the under-playfield coils for burning. A driver could have shorted, locking on a coil, and taking out the fuse. Might want to take a TIP102 transistor with you. Alternately, if you still have the driver board....check the "tab" of all the solenoid driver transistors....make sure there's no continuity to ground.

Edward
 
I finally had a chance to get out to the guys house today. I pop in the fuse...

...all is good!

Nice!

Thanks guys.
 
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