วีดีโอ

@@paolobigi3488 thanks! I got mine here (keep in mind these are specifically Data East blades): cointaker.com/products/data-east-mirror-blades

I ordered mine from a pinsider who made a small run. You could ask if he will make any more: pinside.com/pinball/community/pinsiders/willie68 I think they are also included in the CPR plastic kit for LW3, but if you don't need to replace all your plastics, that kit isn't really worth it

@@brandonparrott5382 thank you and congrats! It’s a really fun game. I really recommend updating to the 3rd party “Chad Roms” which update some of the game rules, making it more balanced and fixing some of the audio glitches and other minor things. It’s a more enjoyable game with the update. You can buy the set (3 IC chips that need to be replaced) here, or sometimes you can find them on eBay or Pinside for cheaper: mattsbasementarcade.com/product/lethal-weapon-3-pinball-data-east-cpu-display-rom-chip-set/ The airballs are indeed a design flaw, but they can be stopped almost entirely with a piece of acrylic over the middle set of drop targets (you will see that mod in the finished shots later in my series). If you’re able to cut acrylic yourself you could make one pretty easily. I think the complete set of replacement plastics from CPR includes the protector, but that set is pretty expensive. I just bought a set of acrylic toppers for all the targets from somebody on pinside who was making them. You can try to reach out to them on pinside here and ask if they are still making them: pinside.com/pinball/community/pinsiders/willie68 And yeah mine has the audio hum as well. I bought a little add-on that was supposed to reduce hum but it didn’t actually do anything. That reminds me I was going to make a video about that…

@@christopherpham5050 yeah sorry, replacing the drop targets was about the one thing I didn’t record because I couldn’t find an angle where you could see what I was doing without blocking it with my arms the whole time. The good news is it was pretty easy. The hard part is getting the springs on and off the target. You CAN use a screwdriver but you will hate yourself trying to do that. I recommend a tool with some kind of hook or split at the end that can hook and pull the springs. The nice thing is that once the springs are off, you can just slide the old targets out and slide the new targets in. Unlike other brands, you don’t have to remove any plates or panels to access them. To get all the lights to come on, there is a test mode in the test menu. The DataEast menu is pretty hard to navigate. I’ll see if I can find a video guide for that. But if you can figure out how to get into the diagnostics menu, there is an “Lamp test” mode that cycles all lamps on.

@@christopherpham5050 th-cam.com/video/UVpQZhc4HIc/w-d-xo.htmlsi=DlGodzFO6CVrtxHc This video shows how the menu buttons work to navigate the menus. They are a little different in Maverick, but this should show you the proper method to go through the menus and find the diagnostics

@@ThePinballNoob Do you know if there is a video for a noob like me on how to replace the drop targets. Sucks it was too hard for you to video it. Any step by step on how to remove the drop target? I think I had opened it up before and felt overwhelm ed on removing it for some reason.

@@christopherpham5050 this one seems pretty good: th-cam.com/video/SEmsS3UQQw0/w-d-xo.htmlsi=EF9MoC1_jshbDtD2

Thanks!

Thank you!

Haha thanks for the compliments about the game and cat! It's not necessary to strip the game down and clean it as much as I did. In fact most of the cleaning I did won't ever be visible to somebody playing the game. I partly did it that way because I like to learn by taking things apart, and partly because the tutorial videos I was watching at the time were really in-depth restorations that did similar disassembles. Unless you are trying to restore a game to 100% perfect, brand-new condition, which would probably include sanding, filling imperfections, and re-painting, I wouldn't recommend doing it this way. For an example of a restoration I did without fully assembling everything, check out my Lethal Weapon 3 series. I still probably disassembled the playfield more than I needed to for that one, but I left the head and cabinet mostly intact. Good luck with the Black Hole, that's a really cool game!

Fascinating! Pinball games are very much like classic cars-all sorts of different kinds of resto. I’ll def have to check your other vids out. Great stuff! Thanks.

@@JeffreyNero-sk6jv That's an interesting point! It really is similar to cars in a lot of ways. You have people who collect the classic vintage ones, and people who prefer the newer, faster ones. You also have people who like to find old beaters and fix them up to make them beautiful collector's items, and other people who just want to have fun with the machines and ride them until the wheels fall off.

Thanks! Yeah I don't know why I didn't think about q-tips for cleaning the inserts. I probably just looked at what I had within arms reach and improvised. Definitely going with q-tips for the next one!

Thank you!

Thank you!

That sounds great - that game is so bright and vibrant already that it will look amazing with mirrors

@@Retromo thank you, and welcome to the hobby! I am happy if my journey to learn stuff is able to help others too

Haha yeah I didn't notice the fingerprints until I watched the video back! Definitely got them cleaned up now

Awesome. Look forward to your next video.

Thanks! Definitely a pain having to re-dub all the audio, which is why I was in a grumpy mood when I was recording it haha On most games I don't mind them having plain cabinet walls, but for some reason the walls on this one really stood out to me, probably because they were bright blue. The mirror blades definitely help with the claustrophobic feeling!

Thanks!

Thanks! I just noticed the fingerprints on the left blade in this video lol

Thank you! I have one more part coming... I had to do something about those ugly cabinet walls!

haha that song is permanently stuck in my head now!

Thanks, that means a lot coming from you! I always enjoy catching your streams and checking out what you are working on

That DMD looks great! I will consider this option, thanks for the advice.

That’s awesome! I swear DataEast games multiply more than any other. I record the videos mostly for myself so I can remember what did, but if they can help somebody else (especially learning from my mistakes) that’s even better I have Google docs with the list of bulbs that I can link and also my list of rubbers that I ordered from Titan (although I need to tweak it a little bit) if that would be helpful

Who wouldn’t!

There might be something along those lines coming up soon...

Thanks for the tip! I'll pick one up the next time I'm placing an order. Definitely sounds like it would come in handy

Thank you! You shouldn't have to wait long...

Sure! So the Ultrasonic Cleaner is just one I picked up at Harbor Freight, but it is pretty much identical to this one: amzn.to/4bYN06g For the Tumbler, I ordered a Berrys 500 model with an extra bowl so I could have one filled with walnut (better for removing heavy corrosion, won't polish as shiny), and one filled with corn (lighter and polishes better). For heavily corroded parts I start with walnut for 24 hours and then do corn for 24, with a spoonful of Mothers Mag and Aluminum polish in each bowl. For parts that are in decent shape, I just use corn cob to polish. Tumbler: www.berrysmfg.com/product/ber-qd-500-vib-tumbler-110v Walnut medium: amzn.to/3R69biP Corn cob medium: amzn.to/3VjOgv2 Mothers metal polish: amzn.to/3X8921Y

@@ThePinballNoob Thank you! Picking up a Sorcerer for restoration work next week!

@@lokust_pinrat nice! That’s an awesome game

Thank you!

Yes, thank you!

Ultrasonic cleaner jumpscare

Yeah it really is a great looking game, but unfortunately there is a lot that can go wrong

Thank you! Let’s see… the new all-in-one board was nearly $500 itself. 5 new displays probably around $250 total, $100 for new plastics, $100-ish for new rubbers and LEDs, $100 for legs. Probably a final $100 for all the miscellaneous parts like connectors, pins, wires, coils, etc. All in I would estimate around $1200 total with almost half of that just being the all-in-one board, but that was definitely worth it and made the game pretty much bulletproof, no fiddling around with unreliable 40 year old boards.

By Pinside average price it's still a steal! Nicely done.

I found a site that had the 3D printer schematics for them, and they linked to a site that you could order the 3D prints from. Pretty cheap too! This blog post covers it: www.lisy.dev/gtb-edge-connectors.html

Awesome! Is yours fully working?

Thank you! I have some other videos that go more in depth about what I did to fix up the Genie. I went with Comet bulbs for the Genie and all my games really. They aren't the cheapest but they are great quality and they have a really good selection that cover pretty much any type of bulb you could want. They have bulbs that simulate the not-so-bright yellowish color of old school incandescent lamps, up to super bright pure white bulbs. I went somewhere in the middle for my Genie - I did what they call "Sunlight White" bulbs which are in-between the super white and the more yellowish whites. I also color-matched the inserts according to Comet's color guide: www.cometpinball.com/pages/the-art-of-pinball-leds

@@ThePinballNoob I watched several of your videos, and I plan on watching the rest, thank you! My only nagging electronic issue is annoying AC hum from the speaker, I replaced all of the capacitors on the sound board hoping it would help. Same with the power supply. Probably not as noticeable in a noisy arcade environment but definitely at home.

Thanks

Thanks for the advice, I actually ended up replacing that too after the fact (when I did the capacitor replacements at the very end follow-up bit). Not sure if it was bad enough to cause problems, but it's never a bad thing to replace it with a new one!

@ThePinballNoob good prevention. The DE PSU is pretty reliable once you replace the caps and headers you replaced.

This is proof that you watched the whole video

Yes, and a big improvement over soldering the wires straight to the boards! Have you had any trouble since fixing yours?

@@ThePinballNoob no, it’s been solid ever since. I LED’d mine too so the drop in current loads will likely mean those connections will last indefinitely now. Always good to fix it right. It kinda puzzles me when I come across hack jobs like those soldered wires instead of fixing it right. Not really all that much more work to do it right and reliable.

Gotta suffer for fashion

You're the best when it comes to pinball repair!