Williams Solved Demolition Man (Williams, 1994) Won't Start Up. PLEASE HELP

wzunino

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Favorite Pinball Machine
Demolition Man
After nearly three years standing on end in my laundry room, we built a home for my Demolition Man pinball machine. I put the legs on and plugged it in but when I hit the switch, all I get is lights on the power boards. The play field doesn't light up or go through its self-test.

As much as I would like to hire a professional to get it up and running, I now live in Salmon, Idaho, a town of 3000 and not close to any metropolis. Can anyone suggest a coarse of action, suggest a book or a procedure to take or give me some other tips about fixing it myself?

I miss my machine even worse now that it is actually set up but won't run.
 
Solution
here are some things to check.
check batteries and battery holder for corrosion on cpu. machine was sitting idle for 3 years. change batteries.
does the DMD show anything or an error code?
take voltage readings on TP1,2, and 3 on the driver board.
check LEDs that are lit or dim on your boards , compare your findings to the LED list in manual page 1-40.
un-plug machine and remove driver board.
check out and test each fuse on driver board , then check the other board fuses. boards fuse list is manual page 1-41. when putting fuses back into clips check for Ving of clips , and will not secure fuse properly. replace bad clips.
a common driver board problem is C2 100MF @ 25v electrolytic cap. it is in the 5v section. when this cap starts...
here are some things to check.
check batteries and battery holder for corrosion on cpu. machine was sitting idle for 3 years. change batteries.
does the DMD show anything or an error code?
take voltage readings on TP1,2, and 3 on the driver board.
check LEDs that are lit or dim on your boards , compare your findings to the LED list in manual page 1-40.
un-plug machine and remove driver board.
check out and test each fuse on driver board , then check the other board fuses. boards fuse list is manual page 1-41. when putting fuses back into clips check for Ving of clips , and will not secure fuse properly. replace bad clips.
a common driver board problem is C2 100MF @ 25v electrolytic cap. it is in the 5v section. when this cap starts leaking , it starts reset problems , if the leaking continues a trace under the cap will get eaten away and shut down the 5v circuit. un-solder , check for damage , change cap with new one even if its not leaking.
if you want to go a little further , marco sells a cap and bridge kit. the parts that 1st go bad with age. sorry i dont know how to do those link things.
also your machine might be a good candidate for rob kahrs cpu daughter board to keep a solid 5v at the cpu board to help stop resets.
 
Solution
Thank You So Much!

I am anxious to begin going through your suggestions this afternoon. I really appreciate all the time you took outlining the information. After checking fuses, I really had no idea where to go next.

Oh, you mentioned checking for Ving which is a term I don't recognize but assume it is any grunge that might hinder conductivity.

I will post the results later. You are a life-saver!
 
Success!

YEESSSS!!! It was the first thing you suggested - replacing the batteries did the trick! I thought they were there as backup power for CMOS memory and had nothing to do with the power-up sequence.

Once more, thank you for answering my plea for help. You have made a fellow pinball aficionado very happy. I was able to introduce the neighbor kid to pinball. He had never played one that wasn't on a computer and loves it.
 
One more question, where can I buy rob kahrs cpu daughter board?

thanks
 
all williams SS & WPC ? games , the batteries are part of the power on sequence. if the batteries are dead, one display will show the machine program code and not be playable. williams is the only manuf. i know of that does this battery check on start up.
 
It is all up and running but started my old reset problem last night. I have to trace this down. After startup, one click on the left flipper will reset the machine. I have found that lifting the front about an inch and letting it fall back to the ground fixes this (!) So there must be a short somewhere in the flipper wiring but I would expect a fuse to blow if that is the case. Any ideas on this one?
 
in WPC games there is high demand for 5vdc. that along with voltage drops from connectors. the cpu 5vdc input might be to low for the cpu to run correctly. rob kahr's daughter board helps with this problem. the vibration test usually identifies that there is an intermittent connection somewhere , but rarely solves the problem. so using a daughter board and replacing C2 on driver board should take care of the problem.
 
Won't Launch Ball
Well, most everything was working fine for a couple of days but now when you hit the 'launch' button (either on the handle or the front of the machine) it makes the sound effect but the plunger never shoots the ball. Start Up self-test indicates Switch 47 is malfunctioning but it seems like the coil (AE-26-1500) might be to blame.

Any Ideas on this one? This hasn't happened to me before.
Interesting note: If left powered up, the flippers occasionally rapid fire on their own for a while.
 
PINBALLDAVEH Saved My Machine!!!
Your suggestion to use Rob Kahr's daughter board was spot on! I have been fighting this reset problem for seven years and getting bad advice all over the internet about the cause and what to do to fix it. I have been disappointed so many times, I was really expecting this to fail but you already know it didn't. For the first time in years, you can turn the machine on, hit all flippers at once and not get a reset.
Thanks for being so smart about this stuff. Now I am going to Rob Kahr's site to thank him.

Warren Zunino
 
I don't see how to delete this posting but I found a cold solder on the coil that was causing the problem.
 
Rob Kahr's Daughter Board

Yes, rob kahr's daughter board does the trick. It rescued my STTNG from running on my Variac for 3 years. Also I wanted to report...I finally replaced my STTNG failing, scratchy sound board with PinSound's fine after market upgraded board. I installed twin Kicker coax speakers in the back box. There are several sound file downloads and the 2.1 stereo sound is quite stunning. The PinSound board has three audio amps and plenty of power[Read Loud Loud LOUD]. I will post a photo or two so you all can see the illuminated controls. They are back box: Treble, base, Volume, Balance Plus cabinet: Volume, Bass and Treble.

P>S> If you are wondering "Why Does It Have A WiFi ANTENNA ??? ". That is a Sony 4 Gig Flash Drive in the USB hole atop PinSound's board. Sound files are downloaded, Zip File goes on stick, similar to Virtual Pinball installs. The PinSound installation kit comes with 8 Gig thumb drive. I installed an alternative 2.1 Sound scheme on the drive you see in the picture.
 

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Demolition Man Cryo Claw Malfunction

The Cryo Claw on my Demo Man went over to pick up a ball during a game and never came back. It doesn't run during the system Power Up Self Test and when I try to test it with the Utilities, I will move left and right but will not run the Auto-Test.
Because it is failing during power-up, the game will not start. I had to go into Settings and disable the Cryo Claw to make the game function. The fact that there is an option to disable the Cryo Claw seems to indicate that it is a frequent failure point. Self-Test diagnostic now displays that it has been disabled but does not show any bad switches or sensors.
Does anyone out there have any idea what might be going wrong or how I could diagnose the problem?

Thanks guys - you have been great and educated me extensively over the years but this one has me stumped.

Warren
 
The cpu might think the boom is out of range. There is an opto detector that senses claw at bottom and an opto for the arm. Check switch tests for operation of 2 cryo-claw sensors. There are many settings to disable playfield toys on most machines. Toys all have a high failure rate. With your crane disabled the diverter to the claw should also deactivated. There are several failure modes for that elevator and boom. The game should provide some hints about the malfunction. There is a warning against moving the "CRYO CLAW" BY HAND.
P>S>I understand you can't get to on board tests. Sorry I don't understand why the malfunction halts the startup. I guess you can't enable the claw while the game is running. I suspect a short, stalled/bad motor, bad coil, failure in opto's and could be in the ball diverter circuits too.
 
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That is what I found in the manual just now!

You know your stuff, Coil_Smoke. This happened about six years ago and fixed itself but that time when I disabled the Claw, the diverter never opened the gate but each time you shot a ball up the Claw ramp, it awarded one of the five features on the Claw. This time it does nothing. I can't find anything about that in the manual.
However, the manual states that I should be able to correct 'out of range' error by using the Claw Tes but doesn't say how. Do you know?
 
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