Xenon - My New Project

FrizzleFried said:
Pin 10 on J3 of the regulator/driver board was toasty black. So bad it snapped in half when I took a closer examination. I'm in the process of wiring up a new connector.
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That connector is one of the places that I see overlooked a lot in preventative maintenance work but it's one of the most critical connectors in the game and it's often got problems like the one you're finding now.

There should be good info on pinrepair.com regarding that connector but I would replace the molex header/pins and tie TP1 and TP3 together. That should solve the problem. While you're replacing headers and pins you might as well think about doing J4 on the MPU. I bet it will start booting again once the connector is repaired at the regulator/driver board but it wouldn't hurt.
 
OK... I didn't have a nice 25 pin connector in that size to wire up but I did have a 10 pin. Luckily it was pin 10 that burned and the connector broke right there. Eventually I WILL buy a 25 pin housing and re-wire the whole connector, but for now only the top 10 pins got re-wired.

Guess what... it works (for now at least!). I disconnected all except the bottom left plug on the MPU and it too fires up... so on to the last 2 "problem" I need to deal with:

Problem #1

There are 4 mini roll-over switches at the top of the playfield. Switch #1 (left-most) switch does not work. I checked and the two leafs are making contact. Where do I start on this one?

Problem #2

As described in my prior post... I have two dead playfield lights that are NOT socket issues... to determine what transistor powers the two I THINK I need to trace the two wires back to determine their pins at the driver board. Once I find that out, I need to find out what transistor goes to the pin... which leg of the transistor do I check against the pin for continuity?
 
One of Lindsey's lamp driver testers would help immensely....BTW,I don't think those things on the driver board are transistors...I think they are SCR's....
 
Burt6666 said:
One of Lindsey's lamp driver testers would help immensely....BTW,I don't think those things on the driver board are transistors...I think they are SCR's....
Click to expand...

That is what I meant... sorry... the little rectifiers.

I have one of his boards, but it indicates about 8 SCRS not working on the board... but I only have issue with 2. My guess is the other 6 not firing just aren't used?
 
With the LED board be sure you're looking at the right section of the chart and you've got the board installed correctly.

Beyond that I would just look at the manual to determine which SCRs are driving those lamps and check/replace them.
 
Good news! I fixed the switch problem. I'd already cleaned the contacts so I knew that wasn't it, so I metered it and found no continuity to the backbox. I traced the wire and about 5" from the switch I noticed a kink where the wire was bundled together... upon further inspection the kink was actually a break. I repaired the break and the switch works.

I am down to 4 lamps not working... 2 in the back box door (likely just the sockets, but I can't get to them without taking the door apart which I suppose I will be doing here tonight or tomorrow.... and the 2 in the top left "wheel" in front of the eject hole... well, 1 in the wheel and the "hub" lamp.

To test I simply run a lead from a working lamp to the lug of the non-working lamps and the fired up... run the same lead from the non-working "wire/tab" to the lug and nothing. I guess I get to replace my first SCR's...
 
Somethings gotta be wrong...

One problem lamp I am having is the 9th pin down from the top pin on the J3 connector (pin 20)... when I use the LED testing board it shows the 8TH LED not lighting but the 9th is... (flashing in test mode). That tells me the SCR is good. So I do a continuity check from the connector to the lamp and sure enough, there is continuity?! I plug back in and... nothing. Even running a lead from the wire to a known good lamp/socket produces jack squat. What am I missing?

EDIT: This "issue" is addressed in the following posts. Lets just call it a "non-issue".
 
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OK... once I realized that there are 30 LED's on the test board and only 28 pins.... and that the top 2 LED's aren't to be counted, the two pins that I was having issues with were NOT firing, I knew I needed to replace Q25 and Q41. It just so happens that includes one small SCR and one larger SCR. Well, brother Lindsey hooked me up with 2 smaller and 2 larger SCR's so I was good to go! Unfortunately the larger SCR looked different than the one on the board. The one on the board was larger with a metal heat sync coming off it. The newer one was smaller and had a metal side and a "plastic" side. After a couple minutes online to make sure I put the bugger in the correct way I set about replacing both SCR's.

It was with great joy that I saw the two problem lights come to life. SUCCESS!

I replaced the drop targets with new Xenon targets and I started to replace the flipper bats (mine are mis-matched and I got some nifty blue ones from Bay Area Amusements)... which is where I am today.

I loosened the set screw on the flipper bat but the bastard wont come loose. Is there anything else other than beating on it to get it loose?
 
Awesome!

I'm glad you were able to figure it out. I'll have to put together some instructions for using the LED board once I start selling them on a larger scale. That probably would have helped you. It worked exactly as intended and pointed you straight to your problem. It was just a little confusing :)

FrizzleFried said:
OK... once I realized that there are 30 LED's on the test board and only 28 pins.... and that the top 2 LED's aren't to be counted, the two pins that I was having issues with were NOT firing, I knew I needed to replace Q25 and Q41. It just so happens that includes one small SCR and one larger SCR. Well, brother Lindsey hooked me up with 2 smaller and 2 larger SCR's so I was good to go! Unfortunately the larger SCR looked different than the one on the board. The one on the board was larger with a metal heat sync coming off it. The newer one was smaller and had a metal side and a "plastic" side. After a couple minutes online to make sure I put the bugger in the correct way I set about replacing both SCR's.

It was with great joy that I saw the two problem lights come to life. SUCCESS!

I replaced the drop targets with new Xenon targets and I started to replace the flipper bats (mine are mis-matched and I got some nifty blue ones from Bay Area Amusements)... which is where I am today.

I loosened the set screw on the flipper bat but the bastard wont come loose. Is there anything else other than beating on it to get it loose?
Click to expand...
 
Lindsey said:
Awesome!

I'm glad you were able to figure it out. I'll have to put together some instructions for using the LED board once I start selling them on a larger scale. That probably would have helped you. It worked exactly as intended and pointed you straight to your problem. It was just a little confusing :)
Click to expand...

May I suggest you simply black out the top two LED's with a Sharpe pen or something before shipping? :)

Now the only two lights out are two in the backbox door which will require me disassembling... fun.

:)
 
FrizzleFried said:
May I suggest you simply black out the top two LED's with a Sharpe pen or something before shipping? :)

Now the only two lights out are two in the backbox door which will require me disassembling... fun.

:)
Click to expand...

I did think about that but then I thought those LEDs are there and also have resistors in series so maybe they would be useful for something else at some point.

But yeah... you're right I'm going to black them out before shipping in the future. I'll also have instructions online. Probably should have that now actually. hehe

You're really making progress with this thing. Awesome. You only scared me twice so far where I thought my MPU might be bad :p
 
Only twice? I need to work harder.

:)

I'll have this up and running this weekend. I am just waiting for my posts, rubbers, and that one coil sleeve. Tonight I will finish up the flippers and put a coat or two of wax on. BTW - Liquid wax is OK right? As long as it's carbanuga(sp?)...
 
FrizzleFried said:
Only twice? I need to work harder.

:)

I'll have this up and running this weekend. I am just waiting for my posts, rubbers, and that one coil sleeve. Tonight I will finish up the flippers and put a coat or two of wax on. BTW - Liquid wax is OK right? As long as it's carbanuga(sp?)...
Click to expand...

Good job Frizzybear! I would suggest you break out the simple green to get the real nasty crap off the PF. Then use Novus #2 a couple times. If you have several fine scratches after that then step down to Novus #1. I swear to you using Novus on a PF absolutely makes them stunning. Following up the Novus treatment with your liquid Caranuba wax is the icing on the cake.
 
Alright...so I pull the backbox door apart and check out the sockets for the 2 lamps not working. They are fine. Upon further testing it appears the single SCR at Q25 on the aux. board isn't working as it just happens to control the two lamps that are out.

I pull the aux driver board and install the last remaining larger SCR I got from Lindsey.

I fire up the cab and... nothing.

DAMN! I look at the board again and notice that my dumb ass has installed the SCR backwards. My guess is that the SCR is now dead.

I pull the board and notice that Q26 is Not Used... I pull Q26 and stick it in Q25... still nothing.

SO... either (A) Q26 was bad too or (B) I jacked something other than the SCR when I installed it backwards originally or (C) something was already jacked up when I installed the new SCR but the bottom line is that I am not getting a signal out of pin 18 on the J3 connector of the aux driver board.

So I guess my questions are:

(1) Did I destroy the SCR by installing it backwards (my guess - yes)

(2) Did I destroy something else in the circuit when I installed the SCR backwards...if so, what?

(3) If the answer is NO to (2), then do you think that Q26 was just a bad SCR too and should I find another not-used SCR to stick in there? I don't have another "new" one on hand unfortunately.


EDIT: I am 99% sure Q26 was fine BTW... as that is pin 17 which I used for testing purposes and it fired from my recollection (when the SCR was at the Q26 location that is)...

EDIT #2: FIXED! See below...
 
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FIXED!!

I took a look at the schematics and said to myself...

"Self... that is a pretty damn simply circuit. Why not go out there and meter everything right to the chip?"

When I pulled the board and took a look at the circuit it was quite apparent that my problem was a trace issue...

...right after the resistor there was a gap of about 1/32" in the trace.

I soldered a jumper on and put her back in the machine. Fired her up and now ALL LAMPS WORK!! W000t!!!!

Now, I bet because I didn't complete the circuit the SCR from Lindsey is still good? It makes no difference as the SCR from Q26 is working great... but if I can use the other one as a spare I'll keep it.

I've learned quite a lot about how these things work with this cab...
 
>ARGH!<

The freakin' reset issue has cropped up again!

I've isolated it 100% to the top left connector.

If I remove that connector that game is solid. I let it run for 10 minutes without a reset.

If I connect the connector it resets within a minute... sometimes more... sometimes less... and bending/adjusting the wires seem to affect the time between resets... but maybe that is just my perception?

Do you think this may be a filter cap issue with fluctuating +5? If that's the case, why only when the connector is plugged in?

From what I can see that connector deals with CPU controlled lamps and displays... I do have 1 "bad" display, but I pulled that one off circuit and there is no change.

I am down to either filter cap or faulty connector, but it doesn't appear to be burned anywhere?!


EDIT: Gotta be the connector... I tweaked the connector back and held it there with tape and it ran for 20 minutes straight... I turned it off without a reboot.
 
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