Testing a Rowe BC-35

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As some of you may recall from a few years ago, I picked up a Rowe BC-35 change machine. It's been sitting at my parents' house for all these years now since I haven't had the room for it. Well, I finally brought it to the house in an effort to pass it on to someone who might be able to use it.

Back when I tried it before, I don't recall the thing ever coming on. Well, when I try it now, shit happens, but I don't really know what :p I don't know jack about these things, but I'd like to mess with it some to see if it works at all. Granted, I'm going to need to find some old bills and some quarters, I suppose, but does anyone have some tips on what to do with this thing to make sure it works properly? I pressed one of the Test buttons and it sounded as if it was trying to dispense coins, but obviously it wasn't since there's nothing in it. And it just kept going like that until I eventually unplugged it.

Turns out it had a copy of the manual inside of it, but it's been pasted together due to flood waters...so I'm slowly trying to peel the pages apart in hopes of finding some useful info. Fortunately, the flood waters mentioned did not reach any of the electronics :)
 
rowe 3500

As some of you may recall from a few years ago, I picked up a Rowe BC-35 change machine. It's been sitting at my parents' house for all these years now since I haven't had the room for it. Well, I finally brought it to the house in an effort to pass it on to someone who might be able to use it.

Back when I tried it before, I don't recall the thing ever coming on. Well, when I try it now, shit happens, but I don't really know what :p I don't know jack about these things, but I'd like to mess with it some to see if it works at all. Granted, I'm going to need to find some old bills and some quarters, I suppose, but does anyone have some tips on what to do with this thing to make sure it works properly? I pressed one of the Test buttons and it sounded as if it was trying to dispense coins, but obviously it wasn't since there's nothing in it. And it just kept going like that until I eventually unplugged it.

Turns out it had a copy of the manual inside of it, but it's been pasted together due to flood waters...so I'm slowly trying to peel the pages apart in hopes of finding some useful info. Fortunately, the flood waters mentioned did not reach any of the electronics :)

you might take a picture of it, the front outside and the inside
around the control board and powersupply then the bill acceptor out on table
or in your hard a side view..
that way i might beable to pin point any problem i can see from the picture
let me know and we can get started.
 
Here are some pictures I have handy. I'll see about getting the bill collector out later today or tomorrow. Let me know if you see anything right off hand. More pics are available here: http://www.arcadecrusade.com/gallery/v/gamerooms/mattroid/bc-35/

Also, should I be concerned with the alarm? I'd think if I was going to set it off, I would have already...but the last thing I need is for that to go off and really piss my wife off :)

Thanks!

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Broken?

Getting any Errors? in led display?
You have manual check error codes.

Remove hoppers then press test
motors turn?
Behind hoppers, Photocell lit around coin chute's
all three? evenly lit? not to dark?

All power supply leds lit?
any relay click after plugin,then its ready?
if it won't test dispenser
suspect first control board
take plugs off and take it apart
to see the board.
look for corrosion around battery.
inspect outer plug connecting pins
for cracks bad connection.
measure the voltage on battery.
if real bad see E-bay for replacement.
Not sure about the alarm see manual.
 
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Wow.
Your is in really nice shape.
Shoot me a pm on the change machine if you want.
Mine I got from a fellow Klover and it wasn't working.
Turns out the issue was a light bulb that had burned out behind the hoppers.
After the light was changed out the machine works like a charm.
I also have the original manual in an adobe format file I can e-mail you.
 
It looks like its getting power. All the lights are lit in the PS. I have played with bc25mc, but not the newer bc35. Not sure if thats all the lights on the pcb.. I think its supposed to display a 0 in the window. Hit the reset button in the middile of the board and see what happens

The AC6000 I was messing with has a low coin sensor. Try throwing some money in the hoppers. If your bill acceptor works, it will work with any $1.

flip open the little plate under the hoppers there are 3 buttons under there. each button will dump the left right and middle bucket. Even if the bill acceptor does not work, pushing the button will dump coins.
 
Actually having a BC35 if there is no issue with the bill acceptor there will be nothing displayed in the window.
If your problem ends up being the bill acceptor I have a fully functional BA35 bill acceptor I can sell you. :)
 
Thanks for all the tips, guys. Same to those who PM'd me as well and that I have not replied to. This week has been nuts so far, so I haven't been able to do much with it since the weekend.

I did go through the manual and check the status codes and whatnot. I haven't tested to see what, if any, codes come up when trying to put a bill in or anything like that, but I find it amusing that a .8. code is listed as a valid status, but what I see in the pic (.8.) is not :p
 
Same boardset as in my BC-12. Though the BC-12 doesn't have that air horn... what's the deal with that?

Generally, any code that will shut it down will also show as soon as you power it up. All your power LED's are up too, so that's a good sign.

Does the BC-35 have test dispense buttons? If so, give it a press and see what happens. Either that, or run a dollar into it.

-Hans
 
Just as a quick update, I sold this to KLOV member IdahoFarmer recently. I did get in there and do some more testing on it, but never did get the quarters to dispense. I'm pretty sure it's damn close to fully functional, so I'm hoping it won't be too much trouble to get running again. The quarters were feeding through the hoppers just fine, but getting trapped in the sorting mechanism thing in the back. Basically, they all just bottle neck in one spot - not sure why. Oh yeah, and the bill collector does work, though needs to be upgraded to take new bills.

Regardless, I'm really glad it's going somewhere where it can get running again and doing what it was meant to do (which is NOT to sit in my garage for years) :)

Thanks to everyone who offered help in this thread and by PM. I did learn quite a bit while digging around and enjoyed figuring out how these things work and watching it do its thing - very cool. I hope to have another one day when I have a proper game room, though I suspect I'll opt for something smaller next time.

Oh, someone had asked for a picture of the front of it. Still in awesome shape for being about 30 years old :)

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Maintenance!!

Its all about good Maintenance and common sense!!
Monitoring the error codes helps but common sense trouble shooting
will omit the errors or any intermitting error codes..

Springs break,in dispencer, dirty or tight, solenoid's could have a issue.
dispencer motor [brakes] not working correctly and
Bad solder connections on the pcb on the dispenser!!
diverter doors not opening correctly! Sensors alignment or not lit..
Will jam up the coins..anything in the coin chute path,alignment?
Visual inspection is all you need.
Battery leaks on main board.
Traics shorting and can be replaced by anyone, causing a motor
to stay on!

Maybe the BC35 CC doen't use a battery so it won't be leaking..
newer model do,and leak on the main pcb.can try to clean them off!
stacker issues with motor/gear box, bad eos switch.
Bad rollors,in stacker..alignment!
Cash box full error??
alot of things could go wrong but repairable by anyone who wants to!

Just things to think about after a few years of sitting around working or not!
Theres powersuppy issues..cables get loose to validators or bill transport assy..
I'm not even talking about the validators in all its issues you could have
and very expensive to replace when you can do it yourself or try!

How to use the test procedure to help in get the changer up and going again..
you know short cuts to a fast repair!!
After all if the game room use the changer it needs to be a hundred percent!!
My comments are about judging the whole machine not just certain parts of it.

I wasn't seeing any suggestions on the other threads so i thought
no one knew about the common things that fail on these..
And here your getting them sent to your PM..
Maybe they could post them so we can all know what there tips were!!!
odds are if theres no problem with the machine it still needs good maintenance.
Good Luck on your next repair!
 
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Ohmerone is right.
I got my BC-35 around a year ago for $50 non-working.
I looked over the manual and did some troubleshooting and found that there are three standard light bulbs near the back of each of the hoppers that needed to be lit.
After checking that out I found that two of them were blown.
I changed all three of the bulbs which I had extras from other games that I had and poof!
The changer is now 100% working.
Who'da thought a light bulb that cost maybe .05 can make a the whole bill changer not work.
Crazy..........
 
Ohmerone is right.
...
Who'da thought a light bulb that cost maybe .05 can make a the whole bill changer not work.
Crazy..........

What? You never heard the old wag about "the 10 cent part that brought the 1/2 million dollar machine to a screeching halt?"

Which I suppose could make the case for Rowe going to LEDs in the 3500 series. :)

Need to move my BC-35 a bit this weekend... Doing a bit of rearranging. May fire it up too for a test. Hoping to be needing it before too much longer.
 
What? You never heard the old wag about "the 10 cent part that brought the 1/2 million dollar machine to a screeching halt?"

Which I suppose could make the case for Rowe going to LEDs in the 3500 series. :)

Need to move my BC-35 a bit this weekend... Doing a bit of rearranging. May fire it up too for a test. Hoping to be needing it before too much longer.

Yep, and I converted mine over to LED's as soon as it arrived for just that reason. Easy upgrade too for the older incandescent optos, just use the cointaker 90 degree red LED's. Installs exactly the same. Most visual light opto receivers are more responsive in the red/ir range of the spectum.

-Hans
 
Yep, and I converted mine over to LED's as soon as it arrived for just that reason. Easy upgrade too for the older incandescent optos, just use the cointaker 90 degree red LED's. Installs exactly the same. Most visual light opto receivers are more responsive in the red/ir range of the spectum.

-Hans

This is good information. Thanks! My 35 is acting up right now, and it's the sensor behind one of the hoppers that's causing it. I'm going to try upgrading the bulbs.
 
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