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Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Wed May 25, 2011 2:38 pm
by JSHAW
Wondering if anybody in the forums owns a pinball machine or two?

I'm getting ready to be the owner of a 1979 Bally Star Trek machine, found it in my area from a local guy who owns
an arcade shop where he buys them, refurb's them and sales them.

I went down to his shop last saturday and looked at it for the first time. My machine is still in the process of being cleaned up, when I saw it, it had only been in the shop for one day. They took it from their warehouse where it had been for a year or so.

Took some pics of it, will post them when I get them uploaded.

I made a decision in this process, which is part of getting it delivered to my house. I traded the guy my Xbox 360 and 27 games. I wasn't playing it
very much anymore, and figured if it's going to cut the total cost on the machine, I'd go for it. I'm also thinking that it's over for me and consoles.
Since I'm taking the plunge into buying a pinball I'm going to play the hell outta this machine. :lol:

After I get this first pinball machine in I'm going to want more. I already have my eye on several more machines. I have a garage that currently holds
boxed up stuff from past moves, and my cat's have their litter boxes in there. When the cats pass on the garage will be turned into a full blown
old school arcade room.

That's years down the road, this purchase is the first step into arcade gaming.

When I was growing up in the 70's going to the local arcade, which was in the local mall was a highpoint in any trip there. There were also pinball and arcade machines in our local Circle K, and the dollar movie theater. Any time I had dollar bills those were getting changed into quarters and playing till they were gone.
For me those days were times that I really had fun being a kid. We would also play alot of pinball at Myrtle Beach at The Pavilion, back when there was one right on the beach. Rows and Rows of Pinball machines.

Got any pinball stories?

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Next to it on the left is Close Encounters of The Third Kind machine

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Re: Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Wed May 25, 2011 3:01 pm
by Isgrimnur
I'm an aficionado, but never owned or seriously contemplated owning one. There's a pinball festival in the Metroplex every March where exhibitors come down and show off their stuff. A lot of guys are replacing the old bulbs with LEDs and it looks sa-weet!

They have swap meets, parts dealers, all sorts of stuff for the weekend. The main room has dozens of machines all set on Free Play. Some old ones, some new ones, and some I'd never seen before.

I used to play the first Indiana Jones machine back when I was sacking groceries '94-95. I set one of the top scores on the new Indy machine before they changed it out for the CSI machine. Man, I hate the center post location on that one.

Anyhoo, that's my brain dump.

Re: Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Wed May 25, 2011 3:19 pm
by silverjon
My uncle was the owner of a Bally Silverball Mania machine (1978). Technically still is, but it's on indefinite loan to friends of my stepbrother after Uncle B moved and didn't have room for it. It is the machine on which I have honed my skills, to be sure.

There's a campsite down in Drumheller with a vintage arcade where pinball is still only a quarter to play. Worth staying at if you're already down there for the dinosaurs.

I'll be attending the Northwest Pinball expo as part of my vacation shortly.
http://www.nwpinballshow.com/" target="_blank

Re: Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Wed May 25, 2011 3:27 pm
by LawBeefaroni
We had Star Wars (the stand up acade vector graphics one) and Rolling Thunder in college. Oh, and 1942 as well. Goddamn, I played a lot of 1942.

I've always wanted to get another Star Wars but alas, space is not currently permitting. Maybe one day. For now I have to settle with Steel Battalion on the old Xbox every once in a while.

Re: Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Wed May 25, 2011 3:29 pm
by SpaceLord
I miss Black Knight:
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Re: Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Wed May 25, 2011 4:14 pm
by hepcat
I ruled as few men have ruled before when it came to Flash Gordon pinball...

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When the Football Fight theme from the movie would play, it was like I was Mario and someone just gave me a power up.

Re: Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Wed May 25, 2011 7:10 pm
by Moggy123
I had a Bally Strange Science for the longest time.

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In the end, though, it's only one game and once I got to the point of being able to wrap the score twice - getting over 20,000,000 in a game - I gave it away.

Re: Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Wed May 25, 2011 10:17 pm
by Daehawk
Never was a big pinball player. I owned a stand up one as a kid made of plastic and run by some C or D batteries :) I was more a video game person. But there are two pinball games that stand out to me...F-14 Tomcat and Star Trek The Next Generation. Loved both those. The F-14 one was just so loud and had a thumper in it.

I swear I remember one with like 2 hands of cards showing on the back but I can't recall it's name now. I was late 70's early 80's for games.

Re: Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Thu May 26, 2011 1:07 am
by Zarathud
I live down the street from WMS. A good friend worked on the Mars Attacks! and the Star Wars Episode One pinball games. Looking back at his comments at the time, he knew early on that Jar Jar Binks was a sign that the prequels wouldn't live up to expectations. He still worked there when pinball died, and itdidn't sound like they were doing much production work near the end. Some of the blame goes to Half-Life multiplayer, where he could pull off some insane tricks and traps.

Re: Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Thu May 26, 2011 1:12 am
by Isgrimnur
Yeah, Stern is about all there is for new machines these days. I believe they put out 3-4 new tables a year.

If I had the resources/space, I'd so be picking up the Tron Legacy machine they're selling now.

Re: Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Thu May 26, 2011 10:01 am
by LordMortis
I've always wanted two pinball machines but I've feared the maintenance and now I fear the price.

Maybe I won the lotto last night and get my two tables. I think I'd get Earth Shaker and Black Knight 2000. I suck at pinball but I've always loved it. I probably would actually get a half dozen tables if I hit the lotto, representing different time periods.

Re: Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Thu May 26, 2011 3:03 pm
by Isgrimnur
Isgrimnur wrote:I set one of the top scores on the new Indy machine before they changed it out for the CSI machine. Man, I hate the center post location on that one.
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Re: Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Thu May 26, 2011 8:32 pm
by Daehawk
The Internet Pinball Database . Find info and pics on your old favorites. Amazing what they have and that I've forgotten.

Also here is 29 of the best pinball tables

Re: Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Sat May 28, 2011 10:01 pm
by Brian
This was the machine I ruled back in the day:

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Re: Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Sun May 29, 2011 9:49 am
by JSHAW
I found a free downloadable called FUTURE PINBALL, that allows you to play pretty much exact duplications of all the classic tables.

I found downloads for my Star Trek machine, KISS, and alot of others.

You install, then you have to go get the table downloads and you load the files into the game. It's pretty cool if you're into pinball.

Re: Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Sun May 29, 2011 12:03 pm
by Z-Corn
I'd love to have one someday, and I could make the room. I'm just afraid of the on-going maintenance costs. I've read there is a lot to keeping a machine running...

Re: Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Tue May 31, 2011 12:29 pm
by noxiousdog
JSHAW wrote:I found a free downloadable called FUTURE PINBALL, that allows you to play pretty much exact duplications of all the classic tables.

I found downloads for my Star Trek machine, KISS, and alot of others.

You install, then you have to go get the table downloads and you load the files into the game. It's pretty cool if you're into pinball.
PinMame and Virtual Pinball are similiar. And awesome.

Re: Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Tue May 31, 2011 5:01 pm
by GreenGoo
Z-Corn wrote:I'd love to have one someday, and I could make the room. I'm just afraid of the on-going maintenance costs. I've read there is a lot to keeping a machine running...
This reminds me of the time when arcades were going out of business and an original street fighter 2 (with all the original bugs) was being sold for 300 bucks. I had the cash back then and but no place to put it. Today I'd pay double or possibly triple for it.

I'm still kicking myself almost 2 decades later.

Re: Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Tue May 31, 2011 9:23 pm
by Daehawk
Z-Corn wrote:I'd love to have one someday, and I could make the room. I'm just afraid of the on-going maintenance costs. I've read there is a lot to keeping a machine running...
Just saw American Pickers find one. They said 1 relay for a single flipper is $100.

Re: Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Wed Jun 01, 2011 10:59 am
by JSHAW
Just saw American Pickers find one. They said 1 relay for a single flipper is $100.
It could depend on how scarce the parts are for a specific machine, and how old that machine is.

Re: Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Sat Jun 04, 2011 1:44 pm
by MindToyGames
SpaceLord wrote:I miss Black Knight:
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Oh god, I LOVED that one! The voice was so cool. I would be at my local arcade playing that one for hours at a stretch. I went through a period in my mid-teens where I loved pinball, and every weekend i'd be at the arcade playing them.

Re: Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Wed Jun 08, 2011 9:22 am
by Crabbs
This was my Jr High and High School game of choice.
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Then my College addiction was Pinbot

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Re: Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Wed Jun 08, 2011 2:39 pm
by Elbino
I had a Getaway and a Tales From the Crypt in my rec room for a few years. I bought them from a guy who imported container loads from Europe. When I got them they were so dirty you couldn't see the playfield lights and they were about 50% working. A summers worth of tinkering and stripping them down to bare playfields and they were a thing of beauty. I had a lot of fun putting them back to rights, then about 6 months of fun playing them. A year later, I sold them. FYI for anyone getting pins for an apartment/condo: They are LOUD.
It's expensive to own a machine, but a pristine cleaned and waxed playfield with new rubber and rebuilt flippers is something you're never going to experience unless you do it yourself.

Re: Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Wed Jun 08, 2011 9:06 pm
by JSHAW
Well, thought I'd post my update and pics of the machine, which found it's new home in my home.

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It arrived 1 week and 1 day before June 6th, which was my birfday. The seller told me he had it ready and
I was so stoked to get it here I couldn't wait for the 6th, so he delivered it to the house. I'm officially out of
the XBox 360 market, I gave it to him with 27 games and he cut me a discount on the price and delivery charge.

After he left I started with a closer examination of everything. The playfield needed cleaning, inside the cabinet
needed cleaning, but overall it's in good condition, the exterior cabinet has no scuffs, dents, dings or scratches,
which I'm happy about. The seller had to order some parts for it, and added a new lock to the scoring cabinet, it was missing
the lock when he acquired it.

So far I've vacuumed the interior of the cabinet, wiped down the playfield, waxed down the wood cabinet with some nice polish,
cleaned the cabinet glass and scoring area glass. It's looking great, it's been playing great, so far so good.

Next step will be to replace some light bulbs that are dimmer than others. Going to upgrade to LED's, which I've seen add
alot to a machine. Also started looking at buying some spare parts for it, nothing expensive just things that I might need spares
for in the future.

For me this one's a keeper. I've been a TREK fan all my life so there's no plans to ever sell it.

This is a new learning experience, one that I think has me hooked. Which means more machines in the future, then
upgrading the garage years from now into an arcade.

Re: Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Wed Jun 08, 2011 9:47 pm
by Daehawk
If I had that thing not only would I have great fun playing it but i'd save a ton of quarters in it. I'd use it as a bank. Pay to play and not open it till full.

Re: Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Wed Jun 08, 2011 10:24 pm
by hentzau
Man, that is sweet. I remember that machine well.

Re: Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Wed Jun 08, 2011 11:39 pm
by JSHAW
Man, that is sweet. I remember that machine well.
That's the thing that set the hook in me now as an adult, because I remember it so well. I never realized back then how solid
these things are made. Solid wood, metal, electronics, glass, the entire thing just screams craftsmanship to me now.

I was 15 turning 16 and that summer was my last in NC before my family moved to Texas. I was leaving everyone that I
had went to school with and grew up with from 1st grade to 10th grade. My parents sold the house I grew up in from 1st to 9th grade, moved us into an apartment where we lived for 1 year before the texas move.

When Star Trek-The Motion Picture was released I would spend an entire day at The Capri Theater (which isn't a theater anymore)
on Independence Blvd in Charlotte NC and watch the movie from first to last showing. To me it was something major for my favorite tv show, Star Trek, to be up there on the movie screen. I was really addicted to sci-fi, Star Trek & Star Wars at the time.

Less than 100 yards from the apartment complex was a corner store/gas station that had a small game room. It was in the far
left corner of the store, glassed in, with 4 arcade machines. At one point they had the KISS pinball in there, then they switched it out with the Trek pinball. I know now that I'm a better player now than back then because those games on the Trek machine didn't last very long. But I still loved looking at the machine, the glass art work, just the overall thing hooked me.

The one thing that I thought they should have done differently, which I still see, is they left out Chekov, Sulu, and Scotty, from the
glass artwork. They were always part of the core group, with Kirk, Spock, McCoy and Uhura.

Take care guys, I'm gonna go win some free games. :D

Re: Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Thu Jun 09, 2011 12:15 am
by Daehawk
I'm also a huge Trek fan. I never got to play that one though. Star Trek II was one of the first movies i got to go to alone. I was about 12 years old.

One of my favorite pinball machines is Star Trek The Next Generation though. The style of the table, the sounds, voices, and lights really drew me in to that one. I played it each trip to the mall. I would love to own that one :)

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Re: Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Thu Jun 09, 2011 12:31 am
by Daehawk
Check this out

Where did they get that video game?

HEREs the real version

Oh wow! Apollo 13 pinball with 13 ball play. Geez.

Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Thu Jun 09, 2011 7:15 am
by JSHAW
Daehawk, the simulated ST table was one created for use with Future Pinball. I saw the same video 2 weeks before getting my machine.

I didn't think I would be able to actually find that exact simulated table but through a series of google searches found a website that had the zip file. I downloaded future pinball and alot of tables and can now play every recreated table thats been made to run on Future Pinball.

I watched alot of youtube videos on pinball machines before I got mine. Videos about restoring and actual gameplay sequences.

Along with The Next Gen machine theres a ST 25th anniversary machine that as part of the game has an area on the scoring glass as the transporter room. It's a pretty cool machine.

Acquiring the other 2 Trek machines is in my future plans, along with The X-files, The Twilight Zone, and Terminator 2 machine. I have to wait till my current cats pass away before I can renovate the garage. That's their current litter box area and they like to hang out there. That's probably 5-10 years away from now.

Pinball is now my current passion and hobby. My wife is excited and totally wants the garage project to have a pool table and a jukebox so it's great for me that she likes the idea and it makes getting the future puchases greenlighted that much easier. One step at a time....

Re: Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Fri Jun 10, 2011 7:44 am
by Z-Corn
Congrats, that's a beauty!

Re: Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Wed Jun 22, 2011 3:59 pm
by Paingod
Very cool and congrats! I've always wanted to own one - I loved them in arcades.

Something I've also always told myself I'd get is a "Gauntlet: Legends" machine - I was in love with that; I just didn't like other people trying to pump in their own coins while I played.

Re: Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Wed Jun 22, 2011 4:37 pm
by Jag
That is awesome! Congrats.
Paingod wrote:Something I've also always told myself I'd get is a "Gauntlet: Legends" machine - I was in love with that; I just didn't like other people trying to pump in their own coins while I played.
"Dwarf needs food..."

Re: Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Thu Jul 28, 2011 10:13 pm
by Daehawk
Look what I found on one of my trading sites. http://www.bonanza.com" target="_blank ......A Star Trek pinball table...$1695.00

http://www.bonanza.com/listings/1979-Ba ... e/38920554" target="_blank

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Re: Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Sat Jul 30, 2011 1:22 am
by JSHAW
For the last two weeks I've been upgrading my machine with LED lights. Got it where I'm liking the results.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DBt6-Ybfjwo" target="_blank

Daehawk, that $1695 is kinda high priced, unless it is immaculate condition with no problems at all with the internal boards.
IF you really wanted it you might be able to talk them down to $1500, which is more in line with the current going retail price.

$1695 it would have to be MINT, no flaws, no playfield imperfections, no signs of wear anywhere, none on and inside the cabinet, none on the playfield, none inside the backglass box and NO hardware/mechanical issues.

Don't know if you've ever seen the cable series HARDCORE PAWN, but they have a ST pinball that has the rare prototype backglass that shows them wearing the TOS uniforms, and there are game plastics on the playfield that have a female crew member wearing a red jumpsuit uniform. When they changed out the backglass to show the crew wearing the uniforms that were in ST-TMP they added playfield plastics that removed the female red jumpsuit and replaced it with Lt. Ilia in 2 areas. HARDCORE PAWN has a website and the last time I looked their asking price was around $1400, which is a pretty good deal for a machine that's much more rare than the ST-TMP Bally version.
pin backglass version.

Re: Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Sat Jul 30, 2011 1:28 am
by JSHAW
OK, looked at the bonanza ad, I've seen that same exact company listing for same pin on Ebay.

Those are stock photos, and I highly doubt they're of the machine they have for sale. Their ad mentions normal dings from wear.
Don't seen any in those stock photos. I wonder why? I doubt they want to put the actual photos of their machine for sale up because
the buyer would see the actual condition of the pin and want to talk them down from their $1695 price.

Bait and Switch? I think so...

Re: Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Sun Jul 31, 2011 12:01 am
by BooTx
noxiousdog wrote:
JSHAW wrote:I found a free downloadable called FUTURE PINBALL, that allows you to play pretty much exact duplications of all the classic tables.

I found downloads for my Star Trek machine, KISS, and alot of others.

You install, then you have to go get the table downloads and you load the files into the game. It's pretty cool if you're into pinball.
PinMame and Virtual Pinball are similiar. And awesome.
This intrigues me, but as a complete noob (hell I've never even played a real game of pinball before), I Require Assistance. Can you recommend one of the programs over the others along with perhaps a source for the ROMS, or like, tables or whatever? It looks like I might need to download sound samples or something too?

I watched part of a Pinball documentary called Special When Lit yesterday on the Documentary Channel. It was...strangely fascinating.

Re: Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Sun Jul 31, 2011 11:06 am
by JSHAW
Future Pinball doesn't require ROM's, but you do have to download the specific pinball "table" which is another name for the machine that you want to play.

vpforums.org is the place to go, there you'll find a download area, and there you can get instructions on how and what to install
as it relates to Virtual Pinball and Future Pinball.

Ipdb.org is the Internet Pinball Database, where you can find ROM's and any pinball machine that's out there.

I saw the documentary Special When Lit also, and YES, the pinball community is very quirky and fascinating.

Re: Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Thu Aug 04, 2011 11:30 pm
by BooTx
Well I went and downloaded Future Pinball along with a handful of tables and it is a lot of fun. So far I have Sci-Fi Classic, Kiss, Addams Family, and Star Trek. They're all fun but I think my favorite is Addams Family so far.

I don't know if it was like this in real life or if I just suck but I seem to be losing the ball down the side chutes at an alarming rate on the Kiss table. I think on more than one occasion I launched the ball and one second later it was hurtling down the side chute.

I've had a ball get stuck a few times on some tables but a nudge always gets it going again. Except once on the Addams Family table where that ball was stuck. I nudged it every which way I could before the board gave me some slam tilt error or whatever and that was the end of that. Stupid machine ate my quarter!

Oh, and I can't seem to get the high score system to function properly on anything. It's like I set a high score every time I complete the board and when I go to play it again later in the day all the scores are gone again. Maybe I'm just an idiot.

Re: Any Pinball Machine owners here?

Posted: Mon Aug 08, 2011 8:51 pm
by JSHAW
Oh, and I can't seem to get the high score system to function properly on anything. It's like I set a high score every time I complete the board and when I go to play it again later in the day all the scores are gone again. Maybe I'm just an idiot.

Your not doing anything wrong. The tables don't keep high scores retained for later use. Once you exit that table it doesn't retain
scores in any type of memory within the Future Pinball software.

The KISS table is pretty much the same way you'd play it in real life. Balls can and do drain very frequently on the left and right sides, same way with Star Trek. If you can learn to control your shots, control where the ball goes, once you can do that you'll find that the ball stays on the table longer.

See if you can find the Terminator 2 table, it's really good.