Japanese Pachinko parlor in the 80's

Tokyo-Ga - Pachinko & Mu

Clip from the documentary movie Tokyo-Ga, by Wim Wenders (1985)







Kogichi: The nail man...

1949 Bally Champion One Ball pictures

Here's a gratuitous dump of pictures from a 1949 Bally Champion rare horse racing game.
I'm looking for documentation (manual, schematics, etc.) (BTW) on this game.
Enjoy!

Inverted cow catcher coin chute. Love it!

A strange serial number badge?

Beautiful side art

An actual production date

The proverbial "One Ball"

More to come...

I'm soldering jones connectors as I publish this.

1949 Bally Champion One Ball Project

New arrival to the collection

1949 Bally Champion

A genuine bona fide One Ball Horse Racing gambling machine.

I've wanted a One ball for almost as long as I've been collection bingo machines...

Drove basically a whole day to and back to pick it up.

Just took a chance on it. The ad was up for a while despite the price being very good.

I didn't even know if the machine would fit in my minivan.

Just drove and took a chance.

Fortunately for me. The back leg was broken somewhere far back in the machine's turbulent past. It was held by a couple of flimsy pieces of wood, glue and a few wood screws. This allowed me to take the back leg off. That gave me just enough space to fit in the Sienna.

This game is Massive. It's HEAVY. I had no Idea how bulky these games were.

The fit was so close, I had to take off the front levellers just to clear the rear hatch.

Once I got the machine home however. I had to deal with the broken cabinet...

I decided to make the back leg removable IF (and that's a big if) I ever want to move the game.

First, I removed and cleaned the original repair.

I got some construction adhesive, 3/4 in plywood and carriage bolts at the hardware store.

I cut some pieces of plywood.

Cheapskate trick: If you only need a small piece of plywood and don't want to spend for a whole 4 X 8 sheet. Most big box home improvement stores have a cutting service department. They usually have cutting remnants. They aren't supposed to sell remnants but they usually do anyway. I got a convenient 12 inch by 8 foot stip of plywood for a canadian fivver. Pretty sweet...

PL glue job with 1 1/4" nail gun staples (not shown) and obligatory clamps. 24 hour cure time.

Next step was drilling holes for the carriage bolts

I made a crude template for drilling the necessary hoes.

Mostly just to have the same pattern on both sides of the cabinet.

The finished product is very solid and the back leg is removable if ever necessary.

I made sure everything was straight before bolting it together.

It doesn't look too bad.

Next step is to take care of the crummy jones connectors.

I predict lots of soldering in my near future. 

This is looking like a typical pindude152 project. Driving way too far for a NO value game that requires a ton of work and potentially lots of spare parts.

I'm not complaining, I welcome the challenge.

BTW

I'm looking for a (free) scan of the Schematics and/or the manual, since neither are available on IPDB.

To be continued.

Heck! I don't even know how this is going to end. I'm posting stuff as I do the repairs .

Williams Upper Deck Pitch and Bat

Is there such a thing as "binge repairing"?

My First pitch and bat machine...
1973 Williams Upper Deck... Last EM Pitch & Bat by Williams.
19 years after I started collecting these crazy machines.
It's about time. I was ready.

The problem was that I was waiting for the right machine, at the right price.

I picked up thins machine on a Friday.
On Saturday, I rested.
Sunday, after my first morning coffee, I started working on the machine. Slowly at first, then faster and faster until I was in the repair flow.
I didn't pause. Not for coffee. Not for beer. Not for food. I just kept on working. Replacing a jones connector, splicing cut wires, cleaning switches and de-gumming stepper mechs.

I worked like a Madman...

By Sunday evening, I had a "working game".

By Monday night (or the wee hours of Tuesday), I  had a perfectly working and playing game, having worked on it from arriving home after work till 1 am.

I've been intrigued about why I binge worked so hard on the game.

The answer, I fear, is that I'm fed up about working on games.
I just wanted to get it out of the way. Out of my system. The Upper deck being a coin op bucket list thing.

I hope this "fed up with EM repairs" thing is just a passing phase.

Eye Candy: Northwestern model 60

Northwestern model 60 with Capersville.
Nice pair :-)
I picked up this bulk vender in a junk shop. It's THE gumball machine I've been looking for... metal body, glass globe, freestanding, with the key.

Now, what kind of bulk candy should I put in it? That's the real question.

Nitwitz I think.

Northwestern Model 60

Super Shot Bingo Pachinko

This article is from the July 1976 issue of Canadian Coin Box Magazine, page 8B

So far I have not found any information about Super Shot or Amusement Service of Atlanta.

Interesting machine.

It's like a simplified version of a Satomi Sammy Miracle Arrange Ball with 9 numbers instead of 16.

Cool, Weird, Rare

Bally Mariner close-ups with tiny little sea horses

Here are a few close-ups of Bally Mariner. 

Gratuatist shots of sea horses and a very sad looking fish.

Art is credited to Christian Marche

Two Sea Horses all lit up

Sea Horse with a zero

Very Sad Fish