1999-12-24:
I bought the Top Score locally, for R1000.
I was assured that everything works 100%, but I can't
get the flippers or anything on the playfield to work
yet.
The Top Score is a really nice example of an EM pinball
machine -- in addition to the two bumpers it has two
sinkholes, a star rollover switch, a spinner, and a
return lane that returns the ball to the shooter lane.
The playfield is quite worn -- although I have seen much worse. If you're not in a hurry, here's a picture of the playfield (100k).
1999-12-30:
I found the problem -- One of the make-break switches on the
"AX" relay was badly bent. Fixed that,
and the game mostly works. But it needs a good cleaning -- all
the switches are extremely dirty, probably the result
of a well-intentioned previous owner using Q20 (local WD40
equivalent) to "clean" the switches.
2000-08-16:
I'm now seriously starting to fix this game up. I sprayed the
back of the backglass with lacquer to
stop the peeling, also masked / sprayed the score window area
white. The translucent white and red areas don't look
very good, I've been told that this is typical of Gottlieb games.
OK, so I have the playfield off, and I'm taking an inventory of
which coils are burnt and what other parts I need to fix
up this game properly. Will replace all coil sleeves and rubbers,
and clean everything up - the goal is to have a machine
that I can play, that looks good in the living room (HAH!, as if my
wife's going to fall for that :-)
2000-10-09:
The parts that I had ordered from Steve Young arrived on Saturday.
I stripped and cleaned the motor,
and removed the playfield plastics. Straightened the plastics
with a hair dryer. Tedious, but it works.
Since I have the playfield plastics off, I scanned them.
Maybe someone can use them to
reproduce playfield plastics.
Lemme know if you do...
plastic1.cpt (2.2MB) and
plastic2.cpt (1.8MB)
plastic1.gif (956K) and
plastic2.gif (828K)
plastic1.jpg (151K) and
plastic2.jpg (122K)
(All are 200dpi).
I've stripped most of the stuff off the top of the playfield,
and started on the flippers. I plan to clean the playfield and
spray it with clearcoat, I don't know if I want to try to
restore the paint yet.
2000-10-13: Last night I disassembled the pop bumpers.
I'll need at least one set of yokes and a spring. I think the
coil on that pop bumper is also not standard.
I've got almost all the bits off the top of the table by now, will try to locate some naphta over the weekend.
Last updated 2000-10-09
