Project log - Pinball machine

[Bergo]

did you try cramming the magic blue smoke back in?

[rsilk]

You only get blue smoke from semiconductors. Resistors give black stinky smoke.

Anyway, let's try this again:

[rsilk]

So it turns out I had three problems with the controlled lamps:

* The undersized resistors which melted
* A bug in the controller software which caused some of the lamps to latch on (which is why only the one resistor popped before I caught it)
* A wiring error in the power supply was feeding 50V to the bulbs instead of 18V. This vaporized all of the light bulbs once I got the above 2 issues fixed.

I spent tonight replacing about 50 light bulbs (sigh), and now everything works great!

Got some video:

http://youtu.be/BqWAM7FzRpA

[nathanwiebe]

How much power does the whole system draw?

[rsilk]

Not sure, I haven't measured it yet. The line fuse is 8A though, and I haven't blown it yet

Commercial pins typically draw about 4A, though. So somewhere just shy of 500W.

[rsilk]

I've got the prototype machine working to my satisfaction - now time to build the real thing.

Parts are ordered, I've started designing the game, and the software stack is beginning to take shape. Getting there, slowly.

[rsilk]

Spent about 5 hours tonight stripping everything off the old playfield. There is a ridiculous amount of stuff on there, even after all the wire comes off.

Also bought some fancy plywood to form the base of the new one. Construction begins this week!

[Travis7s]

What game was the playfield originally from?

[rsilk]

Alien Poker. Bought just the playfield off ebay a long while ago, it's a complete junker.

[rsilk]

Been a while since the last post, but the project is progressing nicely.

The ball trough and bottom part of the playfield are populated and wired up, so it's possible to play a "game" of pinball right now:


I sketched out a basic game layout. This will probably change:


Work is starting on the top part. I've got the orbit shots and the ball lock in so far:


I'm waiting for some parts to arrive, so work on the upper playfield is stalled. Time to make some starburst inserts for the lights:


Prototype looked like ass:


Got the machine tuned up, a sharp bit, and a better model for the part. Looks much better now!