Williams Solved PIN·BOT (Williams, 1986) Help identifying mystery PCB, please

merkury

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Favorite Pinball Machine
Pin*Bot #549
Hello,

Please see attached photos. My pinbot has this stripboard with a bunch of components and wires connected. The board is in the bottom of the cabinet under the playfield, mounted on the right side next to the power line filter. I have not traced all of the wires yet, but upon my first real inspection of it all I found these details. There are two mosfets IRFP350 and IRFP250. There is also a darlington pair NPN TIP122. And there are two NE556N chips (dual timer?)

I traced a few wires and found that 2 connect to the switches for the flipper buttons and one disappears into the cable bundle going toward the back of the cabinet (not sure if it goes to the playfield or the backbox yet). I wanted to ask here if anyone might know what all this would be before I went crazy looking for answers.

Thanks for any help.

Mystery Board
2nd Picture

- Shawn
 
Solution
Hello,

Please see attached photos. My pinbot has this stripboard with a bunch of components and wires connected. The board is in the bottom of the cabinet under the playfield, mounted on the right side next to the power line filter. I have not traced all of the wires yet, but upon my first real inspection of it all I found these details. There are two mosfets IRFP350 and IRFP250. There is also a darlington pair NPN TIP122. And there are two NE556N chips (dual timer?)

I traced a few wires and found that 2 connect to the switches for the flipper buttons and one disappears into the cable bundle going toward the back of the cabinet (not sure if it goes to the playfield or the backbox yet). I wanted to ask here if anyone might know...
Hello,

Please see attached photos. My pinbot has this stripboard with a bunch of components and wires connected. The board is in the bottom of the cabinet under the playfield, mounted on the right side next to the power line filter. I have not traced all of the wires yet, but upon my first real inspection of it all I found these details. There are two mosfets IRFP350 and IRFP250. There is also a darlington pair NPN TIP122. And there are two NE556N chips (dual timer?)

I traced a few wires and found that 2 connect to the switches for the flipper buttons and one disappears into the cable bundle going toward the back of the cabinet (not sure if it goes to the playfield or the backbox yet). I wanted to ask here if anyone might know what all this would be before I went crazy looking for answers.

Thanks for any help.

Mystery Board
2nd Picture

- Shawn
I would say that the board is an engineered version of a fliptronic board.
Using the TIP Darlington amplifier to drive the mosfets, higher amperage can be delivered to the flipper coils.
The timing circuits might be used to pulse the coils at a specific timed rate at full voltage, then a lower voltage supplied for the flipper coil hold in, sometimes eliminating the need for the end of stroke switch.
 
Solution
Thanks a lot pinballdaveh. I appreciate some kind of explanation and it makes me feel better about what that board is doing. It sounds like it should stay, even if it is a bit odd.
 
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