1936 Bally Challenger One ball payout Introduction
As I write these words, it’s winter, I’m bored from my day job and there’s a night time curfew because of some virus that shall remain unnamed.
So What do I do? Take a week off work to fix up a project game of course!
The project: 1936 Bally Challenger One ball PAYOUT machine.
I bought Challenger back in October 2016 at the Church of the Silver Ball Swap meet.
You can even see the game loaded in the minivan in one of my early blog posts.
One ball machines were a type of gambling machine popular at the time.
Later One Ball games typically had horse racing themes and for that reason, were widely referred to as horse racing games.
When One ball games were outlawed by the 1951 Johnson act, Bingo machines took over the ecological niche of the “One Ball”.
On a personal level I’ve been wanting to take care of Challenger for awhile now. It has beautiful nautical themed artwork and it pays out in Nickels in a small spring loaded drawer.
Since I repaired First Race and Hustler Arrangeball, I’ve taken a liking for games that pay out coins or tokens. Over the 20+ years of collecting and repair of amusement devices, I’ve become a bit bored with vanilla flipper pinballs and arcades.
When playing a payout game: hearing those coins being paid out automatically, that metallic staccato is music to my ears.
My example of Challenger is in reasonably good condition. The cabinet requires a bit of a glue job and the electro-mechanical bits need a refurbishing. The game is non working.
There’s not much information about Challenger online. I’ve found only one good picture of a Challenger… on IPDB and I strongly suspect that it’s a picture of the actual machine I have.
On the IPDB entry for Challenger there’s two advertisements that refer to two US patents in small print:
Other than that, No schematics, no manual. No information.
It’s a battery operated game and I don’t even know how many batteries it requires. Don't worry! I have a plan.
This is experimental archeology.
The more I learn about this era of games, the more I realize that there’s more information that has been lost, forgotten, than what information we collectors have gleaned collectively.
In my mind, 1936 is a watershed year for amusement with the release of Bumper: first game with electromechanical scoring and electrified bumpers. It’s one of my favourite Bally games. It has simple, yet beautiful artwork and it’s a must have for a serious historical pinball collector. I’m looking forward to bringing Challenger, another 1936 game, back to working order.
There’s a frumpy looking red arrow sticker on Challenger's apron. It reads:
CAUTION:
After depositing first coin
Raise ball to shooting position
Before depositing additional coins
Interesting: Multiple coins! Multiplier?
Next post, more overview and repairs begin
OK I'm surprised by the coin multiplier. Checking the flyer it does say 1-4 coins can be played, and it's a linear multiplier
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