Doesn't anyone ever REPAIR their Williams Hyperball?

If anyone can share problems they've had with their machines in the
past and what the fix is - I'd really like to read about. I've got a
machine here that was working great for a couple years and has suddenly
had a failure in the ball lift motor circuit and with all the solenoids
(including the shooter).

I'd really like to get more information about the small Power Supply
board that is mounted underneath the main PS and see if there are any
of those boards available out there somewhere... Seems like someone
should have some of those boards in their stacks of Hyperball parts.

I did learn that the optos in the 9 lift-up targets can be replaced
with the same optos that are used in the TZ clock housing.

Is anyone capable/willing to take on a repair job of the CUSTOM driver
board used in Hyperball? Does anyone have a 100% tested and working HB
driver board for sale?

Any information is appreciated. I'd really like to see some useful
repair logs/data put into these archive for current and future game
owners. There must be a lot of mods and upgrades that can be done to
make these machines more reliable. It's a great game and well worth
restoring/rebuilding/refurbing. How did you keep your HB running
problem free?

Thanks

Steve

I was at the Supershow in Marion, IL, had the Popbumper.com booth right
next to Lenny's Pinball World. Lenny was presented with my freshly dead
Hyperball I had purchased. He had it working in no time - MINUS the
very expensive high voltage switching transistor on that little driver
board. We discussed all the replacements and it boils down to the
$12-15 cost of the NTE replacement (If I recall correctly).

Point is, he is very experienced with that odd-ball main driver board
and the little HV board. Contact him and tell him that I sent you. His
site is http://www.pinballrepair.net or call (630) 205-8592.

Rob Craig
popbumper.com
Pinball & Arcade Supershow 2006
Herrin Civic Center, Herrin, IL
September 29th & 30th

Is this that transistor on the power switching board?
Does anybody know the original part number (NOT the NTE number)?

-- Ed

The transistor on the big heat sink is a 2N6057. Not sure if that is
the one you're discussing...

John
http://www.home.earthlink.net/~zeecarr3/hyperball.htm

I spend a bit of time getting my Hyperball working several years ago.
Since then it has worked fine up until about a week ago. Then all of
the lamps went out, and the solenoids failed to fire. I was in the test
mode trying to find out what was wrong, and I started to smell
something hot. As I took the backglass off I saw the frist signs of
smoke rolling up around the inner score swing door. I quickly shut off
the game and proceeded to try to find the damage. Virtually every
component on the driver board including the PIAs was very warm, not
exceedingly hot. It was obvious that everything was shorted on for some
reason. The game worked perfectly the last time I used it. I puzzeled
over this for a while and decieded to reseat the 40 pin interconnecting
MPU/driver connector. The problem disappeared, and no component failed
in the smoking incident. What luck.

The biggest problem that I remember facing when I initially got the
game running was the ball lift auger. When I first got the game
running, the ball lift was very glitchy and spotty in operation. It
would blow fuses and I had all sorts of problems with it. I did not
want to pull the lift out of the game but I was glad that I did. My
game was in exceedingly nice cosmetic shape, and did not have very many
plays on it, but the lift auger was badly dented and pitted from
lifting the balls. If I recall correctly it is cast aluminum, and as it
mushes against all of the balls it can easily dent if there is the
slightest impedence of the ball motion. In actuality the auger had all
sorts of casting imperfections on it. It was no wonder that the lift
action was poor. I spent a while filing and sanding the auger so that
it was smooth to the touch. I did not bother to polish it. I felt that
a finish from about 200 sand paper was adequate. After I put the lift
motor back in, it worked like a champ. The flow of balls up to the
playfield rail was like pumping water. I have only about 200 plays on
it since then, but that part works great. I do not hear this munching
sound the lift made before fixing the auger

Steve

The part # of the transistor mounted onto the small power switching
board is MJ10000. It is a 400v part. I just picked one up at a
local electronics store for $19.50 (ouch).

I'm going to replace that transistor, the opto isolator and Triac on
that board and see what happens.

I just found the troubleshooting section of the schematics package.
The procedure on a non-working ball-lift motor and non-working shooter
seems pretty good. It talks about those parts on the ps switching
board and few resistors on there also. I'll let you all know if
anything comes of it. I guess worse case I can send all my boards off
to Lenny.

Steve

Dont work for them etc. Just tryin to help

kc

I picked up a new head for the game and moved all of the parts from one to
another. Since then, the interconnect will stop the solenoids from firing.
I slight crunch on the boards "fixes" it. I'll replace the connectors and
pins when I get bored and have nothing else to work on I guess.

Al

"pinguy" <ast...@aol.com> wrote in message
news:1144412762.6...@i39g2000cwa.googlegroups.com...

Al

"Tim Iskander" <tiskan...@THIStwcny.rr.com> wrote in message
news:sPDZf.40761$Da7...@twister.nyroc.rr.com...

Did some checking on this part -- 400Volts, 25 Amps... brute force switching
back in those days. Motorola discontinued quite awhile ago. Few smaller
manufacturers made them such as Mospec... but I don't know if they make them
anymore. Surprisingly, Central Semiconductor doesn't make an alternative to
this.

For future reference (anybody working on this board in the future) --
Checked with a friend of mine in the supply side for these MJ10000's. He
found me fifty old Motorola's.. he thinks. They've been sitting on the
shelf so long - he needs to verify they're still there. Won't know until
Monday or so. They ain't cheap. Probably be in the $11 each range -- still
much cheaper than those NTE knockoffs, though.

The power transistor controls power to the ball shooter. There's also a
big, honking electrolytic capacitor and a peak clipping 5W resistor in this
circuit as well.

The Triac controls power to the ball feed motor and the opto controls the
ball feed motor's Triac.

They're independent of each other but share the same board. If you're
having problems with both -- suspect connectors.

Good luck,
-- Ed

The small power supply board was later used as the flipper power suppy board in
System 7 to 11 games. You can get them cheap and repopulate one if you need a
spare. I always wondered what the additional traces were for until I got a
Hyperball manual. Just don't buy a blue Data East board. This one will only work
as a Flipper power supply and can not be modified.

Like the standard boards it can be tested with Leons System 7 Test rom. It will
not drive the additional PIA for the displays but otherwise very easy to fix. One
or more of the obsolete 2N6548 lamp matrix transistors seem to fail quite often.
these can be replaced with TIP102s but legs need to be twisted.

Regards
Frank-Rainer Grahl
(frg...@REMOVE.ME.gmx.net)

FYI -- 2N6548 is another industry standard number for MPS-U45 as used in
Gottlieb's.

-- Ed

>
> Regards
> Frank-Rainer Grahl
> (frg...@REMOVE.ME.gmx.net)
>
>

Hyperballs were equipped with hevier-duty components on games with
serial # 550167 and up which included a different transformer, auger
motor, and power switching board.