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I hope someone can help me out a little.  I have a 1978 Bally Playboy pinball.  I bought it about 2 months ago in bad shape.  I have cleaned, touched up and clear coated the play field.  I have repaired the corroded mpu and done most of the upgrades to the boards found on http://www.pinballisnotdead.com/pinrepair/www.pinrepair.com/bally/index1.htm#minimum  On the transformer I did all but the bigger bridge rectifiers.  On the MPU and solenoid driver boards I did all include change the c23 ripple cap.  I did the initial start up voltage tests with only the transformer hooked up and everything was in spec.  I then did the test where they have you hook up the other connectors but remove J1 J2 and J5 plus fuse from the   driver board.  On TP4 I get 256 V and on TP2 I get 196.  This is where I am concerned, TP2 they say should be 160-190 or you could blow the score boards.  Then they say to check TP4 and see if it is close and if so there is a problem in the high voltage area of the board.  Is 196 V close enough or is there some thing wrong? 

I do have more wrong that I will need to dig into which is that F4 and F5 blew out while I was testing.  I replaced them with new fuses (I blew the old ones)  and only F4 blew but pin 12 of J3 on the solenoid driver board started to smoke ending tonight's testing.  I am hoping that was a loose connector.  I also realized when pulling the board that I only had 1 out of 2 grounding screws installed so I don't know if that played a part in this. 

My main question at the moment is will I blow the score boards with 196 V DC?

There is a voltage adjustment for the 190v output...There is a +/- 5volt tolerance...Attached is the schematic
Jimmy

cool Thanks,  I never noticed that adjustment.  Should it be dialed close to the 190v or somewhere between 160 and 190?   I read that pin 12 of j3 commonly burns, do you know why?  If I change the pins and connector am I likely to fix it or should I be looking for another issue?  What I have been reading is that F4 is common to blow from a short on the 43 volt line so I guess I have to dig on that as well.

If you lower the voltage slightly less than 190vdc, it will prolong the life of the displays...As far as the pins burning, replace or bypass them and/or use LED bulbs...If you are using #44 bulbs consider using #47- there not as bright and draw less power...If you plan on keeping the Playboy, I recommend the LED bulb kit...Make the game look really cool!...Hope all this helps...
Jimmy

FYI, if your displays are worn out or have missing segments etc., you may want to consider replacing them with LED displays. They are plug and play and you don't use the 190V at all.

they are made by Pinscore and come in reg. color (orange), blue, red and green...

http://www.marcospecialties.com/pinball-parts/PS-2518-A (http://www.marcospecialties.com/pinball-parts/PS-2518-A)

Jimmy

thanks for the tip.  I hope mine are good as these are pricey little jewels.

If you do decide to go that route, you may want to consider getting 7 digit displays and using a modified ROM that let's you go over 1M points. That's what I did with my Space Invaders. IMO it's too easy to get 1M points and then it just rolls over.

The modifed ROM can be found here.
http://www.ipdb.org/machine.cgi?gid=1823 (http://www.ipdb.org/machine.cgi?gid=1823)

Instructions for the hardware mod are here. You only need one for all of the displays. It's not that hard to do
http://www.pinball4you.ch/okaegi/pro_d7.html (http://www.pinball4you.ch/okaegi/pro_d7.html)

Here is mine.

I decided that I would get POd to rebuild that burn connector and burn it again so I hard wired pin 12 to keep testing and it no longer gets hot so I don't think I am worried about that for now.   I was able to dial down the 190 volt line.  I have it ate about 180.  

The trouble I am chasing now is F5.  I can plug in the play field all day long and the lights work and fuse won't blow.  If I plug in the top box it will not blow right away but it will blow after about 1 minute.  If I don't give it a full minute before turning it off, it won't blow but the fuse will be very warm.  I have only J1, 2 and 3 plugged in on transformer and all other boards unplugged.  Ground strap is not touching anything and I don't  see an obvious problem.  I still have the score boards plugged in but I assume they don't use the GI circuit.  What should I be looking for to be shorted?  Do the sockets short out? I took all the back light bulbs out and still have the trouble.  I let it blow the fuse and felt around for a warm spot but nothing.  Is there anything common?

If you take all the bulbs out of the backglass check for short in wiring with Ohm meter...Double check that you are using the correct bulbs in each spot...

I assume the lamps are lighting until the fuse blows?  You are using a 20A fuse correct?

Just a guess, but check your lamps sockets on the the coin door. I think they get fed from the top box G.I. 

the lamps do light until it blows.  Coin door will light with play field and top box unplugged so that doesn't seem to be it.  I ohmed out the back lighting with no bulbs and shows open. 

Ok. And you are using a 20A fuse? Might try putting the bulbs in one at a time. Also as Mr. Dinoman asked, are you sure they are all the right bulbs?   
 

I am using 20 amp fuse and I have no bulbs in and it blows.  I am going to re check my pin out on J# and see if maybe I somehow have something off

Poppo is correct, you need a 20a fuse...All lamps are #44 (but like I said earlier, you might want to us #47)...Did you repair the burning pins...If you did not, they are probably creating a high resistance and therefor drawing more current then the 20amps....You need to fix that problem first...You can also disconnect the GI plug that feed the playfield and see if that stops blowing the fuse also and only plug in the backbox....

Might have a short to another wire. Could be a pain to track down. Might have to follow J3 Pins 10&11 by hand.

Actually more resistance would result in less current. I=E/R  :186-

Here is a better definition of what I meant:

"The GI connectors can get hot and fail. This happens because the Molex connectors don't always have enough surface area to handle the GI power requirements. The heat from the connector will cause the solder joints to fatigue which causes resistance (and more heat). The connector pins get so hot they soften the solder. All this causes more resistance, which causes more heat. It doesn't end till the board burns, the fuse heat fatigues and fails, or the connectors pins fall out (or burn!), and open the circuit."

True, the connectors can get hot and will burn etc.. This will result in higher resistance at the connector and would cause things like the lamps not to light. However it would not cause the fuse to blow. The only way for a fuse to blow is to have too much current flowing though it. And more current means less resistance (i.e. a short).

Now, if the board is burnt, it can cause a carbon short to an adjacent pin that may cause too much current to flow. But a burnt connector alone won't cause the fuse to blow.

Something else to try is unplug eveything from your lamp driver board in the top box. I know that uses a different supply, but it may help to narrow down if something in the GI lighting is shorting to one of the switched lamps (or if somone wired one wrong).

Thanks guys for the tips.  I changed all J3 board pins  on the power supply and connectors on 11 before this all started.  I also changed that connector housing over.  I swear I did it one wire at a time.  Turns out wire 10 and 8 (both orange were swapped.)  This had the GI circuit powering the 5 volt VR circuit blowing the fuse.  I put a new connector on the large orange for pin 10 as well.  My blown GI fuse issue seems to be solved but now I have a problem with the 5 volt VR that I sadly seemed to have caused.  

It happens. Glad you got that part fixed. In case you don't already know, here is a good source of parts, including the 5V regulator kit.

http://bigdaddy-enterprises.com/repairkits/bally_kits.htm (http://bigdaddy-enterprises.com/repairkits/bally_kits.htm)

Glad to hear it to....FYI If a #44 bulb has a wattage of 1.575 and is supposed to run on 6.3 volts than the bulb would be drawing .25amps...Now, if the voltage was dropped because of a burned pin to lets say to 3.33 volts-the current draw is now .50amp therefor increasing the current draw and blowing the fuse...I have had this happen on some of my pins...Replacing the burned pins solved my problems...Also as a electrician, It has happened that a loose wire at a breaker can cause the breaker to heat up and trip...
Just sharing experiences...

The little c29 cap is clearly shot on the driver board.  What are the odds that the VR has lived?  Do you figure my new C23 is shot from the AC as well?  I am wondering if I need the entire 5V kit or run to the shack tomorrow for the small caps.  What do you think?  I have changed to the #47 bulbs.  I would like LED but will have to wait and see what I have in this thing once it is going.

Sorry, bit you still have that backward. The lamp resistance will remain constant for all practical purposes. Decreasing the voltage will decrease the current. Wattage is voltage x current, so the wattage will not stay at 1.575w if the voltage changes. Wattage ratings are at the specified supply voltage.

It's simple ohms law. I=E/R  Assume the bulb has a 10 ohm resistance. At 6.3v the current would be 6.3/10 = .63 amps. Reduce the voltage to 3.3 volts and the current is 3.3/10 = .33 amps. You simply can not blow a fuse by increasing the resistance, only by decreasing it.

FWIW, I was an electronics instructor for quite a few years.

Well, if you fed 7.3VAC into the output of the 5VDC regulator, chances are pretty good that it's toast too. The bad news is that you may have cooked a lot of other componets too.  You basically fed 7.3VAC into every 5VDC IC chip.  :50-

I fed AC to TP5 since it was soldered to the board.  All connectors were pulled from the board.  So you think more than the 5 volt kit? 

Well, if no other boards were plugged in (i.e. the MPU, lamp driver, etc.), then you should be ok. But if anything that runs off of 5VDC was plugged in, then it may be toast. The board that has the 5VDC regulator feeds all of the other boards directly. So unless they were all unplugged in the top box......

I would get the whole kit.

You beat me to it...If you swapped #8 and #10-Normally pin 10 is 119vac to the reg. board and #8 is the 7.5vac to the GI's...You should have seen a brigth flash and ALL the GI's would have burned out...

I was following a start up guide that had voltage checks along the way so I never got further than plugging J3 into the driver board.  I will get the 5volt kit and see where I land.  Thanks

Are you looking at the right schematic? Pin 10 (of J3) is the 7.3VAC GI line. Pin 8 is the input to the 5V regulator. Swapping them put 7.3VAC into the regulator instead of rectified AC.

jbshocks,
You "shoulld" be ok with the kit. It was not the output of the regulator as I first feared. But you did feed raw AC into the regulator which I'm sure cooked it, and also killed the capacitor (that does not like AC).  

If you order that kit from that link, you may want to order some other things, like some of the lamp driver SCRs (both types). They tend to go bad.

If AC has run through an electrolyic cap, check it with an ESR meter. If bad, replace. If you don't have an ESR meter then just replace it. Standard capacitance tests on a multimeter will NOT show damage to a cap.

Since the one cap is definitely toasted, I would just replace them both (along with the regulator).

Answer to your ?....The schematic for the Power transformer module that feeds everything....J3 Playboy 1978...JB stated Powersupply earlier

Better check again. :209-  J3 P10 is 7.3VAC GI lighting.  J3 P8 is 11.9VDC (not 119VAC) that goes to the 5VDC regulator.  

In any case, he has the wires back where they belong, and now just needs to get the +5VDC back up.

Could be...I have a bad photo copy...

Parts finally arrived from Big Daddy today and I changed the entire 5 V VR kit and all voltages checked out.  I hooked up the rest of the machine and plugged it in.  The flippers kicked which startled me and I unplugged it.  I plugged it back in and the displays all had a little glow but no numbers.  I see no kind of flickering at all on the MPU LED to indicate a boot is going on.  While looking it over I smelled smoke and realized it was under the play table so I unplug and take a look.  It was the solenoid that knocks the outside of the machine.  I probably have a bad transistor and coil at this point but I cut the wire off the cable in hopes of dealing with the boot problem. 

I check the voltages on the MPU at TP1, 2, 3 and 5 and all in spec.  This MPU did have corrosion but not really that bad.  I bought a corrosion kit for it but only changed one transistor that had a broken leg at Q2.  Should I shot gun the rest of the kit in?  Change the U8 socket and U8 and retest?  What is the next best move? 

If Q2 or associated parts are bad, the LED won't do anything. You can ground TP6 to see if the LED is working.

The corrosion may not look bad, but if it get's under the chips and sockets it will cause all sorts of problems.

There used to be some good step by step troubleshooting info here, but it looks like most of the links are dead.
http://www.pinrepair.com/bally/ (http://www.pinrepair.com/bally/)

I have to look, but I think I may have a working MPU somewhere if you can't get yours running.  
Just checked. I don't have it any more.

I have been using that pinrepair guide all along and it has been dead the last 2 days.  I have pulled up some cached copies to work from.  I used a pc power supply to do testing which makes things go a ton faster.  I changed out the LED and now I have a solid light.  I tried shorting pin 39 and 40 of u9 to get it to boot and nothing.  I have now changed U8 and its socket though now that I have read more it would have nothing to do with a solid light.  From the corrosion kit I have replaced all 3 transistors, all 3 diodes and all of the capacitors.  I did not change the resistors as they look good and seem to check fine.  I am just about to throw in the towel on this MPU,  after all I don't know if someone plugged the machine in with with the corroded MPU and fried the chips.  I wish I had a logic probe to watch pin 40 U9 to see if the reset circuit is working. 

Depending on how much you want to spend on trying to fix yours, you might be best off buying a Ultimate MPU or a Dash-35. Even the used original MPUs seem to have gone up quite a bit on ebay.  Every used MPU I had bought always ended up having some sort of intermittent problem. I finally bit the bullet and bought a Dash-35. Never had a problem since.

To troubleshoot these boards, you really need a logic probe or a scope.

If you have a eprom burner, this may help.

http://home.scarlet.be/~fb054529/bally/ebally.htm (http://home.scarlet.be/~fb054529/bally/ebally.htm)

It's test ROM that aids troubleshoooting.

Thanks for all the help on this.  should I be able to read the 7825 prom chips in my eprom burner?  I am wondering if by chance I have bad cpu, ram or roms but can't decide if I want to throw $30 more at this thing just to end up buying a new board.

 Also,

Any Idea what the displays should be doing with a locked up MPU?  Mine have a glow to them but no numbers lit up.  I would assume this would be correct with a locked up game.  I am hoping I don't move from bad MPU to bad displays.

I'm 99.999% sure the displays won't do anything if the MPU is locked up.

As for the ROMS, it might be a good idea to jumper the MPU for 2732 chips if it isn't already.
Here are the ROM checksums if you can read them in your burner.
http://pin-logic.com/early_bally_pinball_game_roms.htm (http://pin-logic.com/early_bally_pinball_game_roms.htm)

Does the green LED even flicker at all on power up?

Do you know what is needed to merge the U1 and U2 chips together?  I have not seen a combo U2 rom for playboy.  Also do you know what U7 does?  Would it need to be replaced?  I don't see U7 rom files.

Never a flicker just a short delay before the LED lights

Use this command based on the names of the files on ipdb.org to merge U1 and U2. Easiest to put it in a batch file and put in the same directory as the two original files. 2732_U1_U2.bin  would be the merged file. The merged ROM goes in the U2 socket

copy /b 743-14_1.716 + 743-12_2.716 2732_U1_U2.bin /b

I belive U6 can just be burned right to a 2732 using no offset, but using this command will work too which just puts a copy in each "bank". 2732_U6.bin is the resulting file.

copy /b 720-30_6.716 + 720-30_6.716 2732_U6.bin /b

U7 is the static RAM chip. It "can" go bad. But you would need to get some LED flashes before it's tested.

If you need to locate that test ROM, send me an e-mail.

does it matter what 2732 chips I get?  Does prefix and suffix matter?  I put the stock chips on my burner and they all show blank so either dead or my reader will not read them.

Any 2732 chips should work fine as long as your burner will work with them. I know for sure that 200ms (2732-200) will work.

If they are stock ROMS, are you using the 2716 setting? I don't recall if I had problems reading stock chips or not.

Also  :172-

they are actually 7848 chips but those are not in my list.  I just tried the 2716 and nothing.

I am just about to throw in the towel and order a board.   I think I will sleep on it.  I burned the test eprom and re did the jumpers same behavior.  So according to instructions it says to try to jump 5v to pin 40 I do that and light goes out  but does not cycle.  The socket then starts to melt at pin 40.  I bent pin 40 up and decided to give it 5v directly and take the board out of the middle and it would just dim the LED.

Hmmm.... That's not good. Did you pull all of the chips the directions tell you to? There is no way that you should have a meltdown on pin 40. But the reset line does go to other places, so there could be a short somewhere.

I agree that it might be time for another MPU and use this one for spare parts.

I did pull all other chips.  just the 2 in it.  one of the clock signals show 3.88v which is high as well so I am wondering if this got plugged in with all the corrosion and burned a bunch of the ICs.  That may also explain why the led was burned out.

You can really only check the clock crystal with an oscilloscope as it generally doesn't swing enough to trigger a logic probe.

Now you can check the clock signal at the CPU with a logic probe.

Checking with a voltmeter really doesn't tell you anything.

Well, yes and no. Ideally one would have access to a probe or scope. But the test ROM is designed to help you troubleshoot the MPU with minimal test equipment by running a specific loop to check the main CPU and PIAs. If the clock is running, the meter would read about 2.4V on those specific pins. Not a perfect test, but it would be +5v or 0v if it was not running. It could be running to fast or too slow, but typically it's either working or not.

Any updates?

Funny you should post this.  My parts came in from big daddy today (they are a little slow) and I have been playing it for the last half hour.  It turns out poppo that U2 on the driver board was the trouble.  I did try U3 first but it was still locked on.  It still needs some tuning up but at least it is playable.  I have not rebuilt the solenoids and I can tell a few need that and I have some lights not working.  Some things that were not working in the first 5 minutes are working now so I figure I will run it a little and then tear into the little issues.    Thanks so much for the help on this. 

Good deal. This is where the self test button helps. Good for finding those stuck switches and cycling the solenoids, testing the displays etc.

As for the bulbs, the lamp diver SCRs are notorious for going out (for the switched lamps). I hope you bought some of those too.

BTW, if you are thinking about switching to LEDs, they may work well for the general lighting, but may flicker if used for the switched lamps. That is because the switched lamps are being strobed. An incandescent bulb will keep glowing for the very short period of time between the strobes and your eyes will not notice it. However an LED will visibly flicker. This applies to these older Bally machines. It might not be an issue for newer machines.

each time I ordered parts I threw on some extra so I have all that.  Also extra diodes, solenoid transistors.  The mane lighting issue is that all of the lights on the left left of the rabbit are out.  I haven't looked at the schematic yet but I am guessing some sort of common is bad.

I have one display that has some slightly messed up numbers which I guess indicates it is on its way out.  I have no idea how long they last after they are a bit screwed up but here is my question.  I understand that you can replace just one display with an LED but could you do the 7 digit mod and only put the 7 digit in player one and leave the originals in all other positions?

You might try re-flowing the solder joints where the display meets the display board and also the display connector solder joints. I have had that fix a few.

You can put in a 7 digit LED as is. It will work just like the ones in there, except the leftmost digit will never do anything.

If you do the 7 digit mod (which is both software and hardware), it will effect all displays. If you don't know, this is what they do. The software is modified to divide the score by 10 immediately. Then a fake zero is displayed in the right most location making the score look right. For example a score of 1000 is divided by 10 to give you 100. Then add a fake zero to the end and it displays 1000 like it should. So since it would normally only go up to 999,999,  if you divide by 10 and add the fake zero, it will then display up to 9,999,990. Some hardware is also needed to decode the extra bit that was initially not used. But you only need one for all of the displays.

As I recall you got one of those Ultimate MPUs. I don't know if they have incorporated the 7 digit mod ROM into it or not. So it might be a moot issue. Although one could burn a new ROM with the modified code.  :79-

thanks for the further explanation

poppo,  I have a couple other questions now that the machine has been running for awhile. 

1. I have about 4 GI bulbs that keep burning out.  They typically get a little brighter than the other bulbs for a little while and then burn out.  2 are pop bumpers and 2 are bank bumpers.  Is this common from vibration?

2.  There are 4 roll overs at the top and if you roll over lane 1 or 4 both light go out,  roll over 2 or 3 and both go out.  This is normal.  On the third time of trying to clear these lights when you roll over 2 or 3 light 3 stays on.  You can go over 2 or 3 repeatedly and light 3 will stay on.  Soon as you loose the ball and go to the next ball the light will go out.  I could see the SCR sticking on but it seems strange that it only does it under these specific situations.  Any thoughts?

1. Yeah, it's not uncommon for the bumper bulbs to get bright and then burn out. It is from the vibration. I got tired of the pop bumpers lamps going out, so I put some of the bright 4 LED bulbs in my pop bumpers and the problem was solved.

2. Without seeing how the scoring works, it's hard to say. The one light staying on after the third roll over may be due to a bonus/special indicator.  Does any other lamp come on when they have been rolled over a third time? Maybe the bonus/special lamp is shorted to the 3rd lamp causing it to light up whenever the bonus/special lamp is lit.

Thanks,  I think I will take the LED route on at least the troublesome bulbs.  Any source you like for the LEDs?  I will check the bonus light short idea. 

These are the LEDs I used for the pop bumpers. Actually they are 4+1

http://www.marcospecialties.com/control/keywordsearch?SEARCH_STRING=05-44w-41 (http://www.marcospecialties.com/control/keywordsearch?SEARCH_STRING=05-44w-41)

But they are out of stock.

another question.  in attract mode or after pushing the game start button there is a faint hum.  Soon as the ball hits any target the hum will go away.  once you lose the ball the hum is back until you hit another target.  Is that normal?  If not any thoughts?

Is the hum by any chance coming from the speaker? My space invaders had a hum that would come from the speaker. So I connected a +5V regulated wall wart power supply to the sound board (disconnected the normal +5V but used a common ground) and the hum went away. Note: It must be a regulated +5V.

If it's not coming from the speaker, the only other thing I can think of is possibly a drop target solenoid driver that is acting up. When you press the start button, all of the drop targets are reset. It should be a momentary activation of the solenoid, but if one was staying on, it would hum. Not sure why it would stop when you hit another target though.

Here is a picture of my sound board. The two black wires with the arrows are coming from the regulated +5V power supply (the one with red is +) The original +5v is removed and taped off. Click on picture to enlarge.

this is from the speaker and it is almost like the last tone of the start up music continuing.  I may try the 5v power.  I did recap the sound board before ever getting the machine up.  I kind of wish I would have done that afterward to make sure that was not the issue.

Ok. I think it's sort of normal considering how all of the wiring is packed together. I looked at the +5V line with a scope and was very noisy. And that was even with a new MPU, new solenoid driver board, and new lamp driver board.

but with the external power yours does not hum?  Do you think shielding the the 5v line with nickel tape or something could help or running a twisted pair with + - 5 lines over to the sound board?

Nope, none at all.

I did try using more ground straps and some other things, but it really didn't help. Just too much noise is getting introduced into the 5V line from all the SCR switching and what not going on. You could try putting some different value capacitors across the 5V line (10uf-100uf) where it comes onto the sound board, but I didn't have much luck with that. I then tried the regulated (switcher type) power supply and the hum was gone. 

I have a little 5v cell charger that is .7amp output.  Would that be enough or do you think it is to small to run the sound board?

Might work if you keep the volume low. The one I am using is 2 amps.

Any updates?

I have been distracted with my silverball mania and haven't found a proper power supply yet.

Since I now have a functioning original MPU and known good chips I decided to get really aggressive  with my attempt to get the original playboy board to boot.  I figured what do I have to lose.  So I put the board in the dish washer.  I had heard about doing this but was a little scared.  I gave it a good cleaning in the dish washer with all removable parts gone and  then preheated the oven to 200 and turn it off.  I left the board in the oven for 2 hours.  I got it out and a few areas kind of turned ugly so I guess they probably were not as clean as I thought.  I took the dremel with wire wheel and polished those bad areas and then followed the instructions on that test U6 program  http://home.scarlet.be/~fb054529/bally/ebalmemtest.htm  I am all the way through testing all chips and get all proper flashes.  YEAH!  Sadly since I have to wait another 45 minutes to erase the 2732 U6 in order to write the game program back I can't test in the machine yet.  Even if it won't get the game running it was fun to mess with and I could never have gotten it this far poppo without your help. 

I guess testing is done for tonight  the erased eprom failed the blank check.  I tried to write it any and of course it failed.

I couldn't just go to bed so I put the chip back in the uv eraser for 10 minutes and it blank checked.  It wrote with no issue and the board passed bench test.   I put it in the machine and it booted right up.  I played 2 games and rebooted the machine 3-4 times.  It seems to work perfect. 

 :244- Glad you got it working.

cleaning the volume control seems to have solved the hum

OK its a sickness.  Anyone know a good therapist?  I just bought another one.  Another 79 Bally, this one is called super sonic.  I don't think it has run in 30 years.  It is in very good shape but the MPU was just toasted with battery damage.  This time I didn't even fool around with trying to delicately clean it.  I neutralized with vinger/water, put it in the dish washer, baked it in the oven, bead blasted it and then rinsed with isopropel alcohol.  u11 was shot.  I changed the sockets in u7,u8,u10,u11.  I borrowed chips from playboy and it flashes and flashes and flashes and flashes and never stops.  Any thoughts?  I may rejumper for 2732's and make one of those test chips.  I really should have bought more of those eproms.

I think that is your best bet.

Wow...yeah, i wouldnt consider what you did "delicate cleaning" anyday....

I changed jumpers and flashed a test prom.  blinks per test then when pressing the reset switch to test memory that tests ok.  reburned to playboy and stuck the board in the playboy.  It poped some solenoids and made some music but didn't really work. Then it would flash 2 lights and stop.  I guess I need to see if I have any more bad traces.

Poppo,  if it is blinking would that indicated that the transistors and such from the corrosion kits would not be needed? 

Which test ROM are you using? But yes, if it's flashing then it has completed a reset. Plus since you got some activity out of it (a little music etc), the reset must be working.

I was using the test rom you sent me.  The music was when I put playboy roms back in.   The funny thing was that I got music to early in the boot cycle.

What does the MPU LED do on power up?  As long as it flashes, the reset is ok.

FYI, the sound board is sort of self contained. It has it's own processor so to speak, and it can generate music or sounds just by the address/data lines toggling. So just because it's playing tunes, does not mean it's being told to intentionally.

with swapping chips and such the playboy board stopped working.  I started to sweat it.  It wouldn't blink with even just the test chip and processor.  Pin one ground seemed weak on u11 but supposedly you don't need 11 in to blink with that test chip.  So I swapped out the socket and now it is working perfect.  It actually had 2 corroded pins, 1 and 2.  I was really afraid I ruined it.  So I decided to order a logic probe to dig in further on the super sonic board.  So nothing more on that one for a little while.

A logic probe really can come in handy.

Corrosion under pins can be a real issue too. Sometimes just using a lot of liquid flux on both sides and re-flowing the joints will help. Easier than replacing sockets unless you have a nice rework station. Corrosion between pins can be a headache too. Using a stiff nylon brush or a toothbrush when using the vinegar/water solution to try and get between the pins will also help. The corrosion can be conductive and while not be a direct short, will cause all sorts of issues. That's one of the reasons I just gave up on the old boards and ponied up for a brand new one. Nothing worse than having a really good game going and have the MPU glitch.

If you have not bought any yet, you might try this guy in China.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/320674406737 (http://www.ebay.com/itm/320674406737)

He took $2.00 a piece offer on 6. They are new, and programmed ok (although my Willem is really twitchy with 2732 chips). The ones I got were 2732A 21V programming voltage.  Got them in 8 days which I thought was pretty good.

I got this other disaster of a board running.  After changing several sockets the thing would blink and never stop blinking.  The root cause was Pin 9 of U7 has a trace on the back side there is a through hole bringing it to the front almost between pin 1 and 2 of U11. This through hole was open and difficult to spot. With that line open the LED just blinks. once I repaired the hole I would get the unique first flash that I am used to and a total of 6 flashes.  The 7th flash was solved by replacing r113.  Now it works.  Who knows if this thing will be erratic or not but the fun was in the challenge.  Considering the cost of a new board my time was probably worth 5 cents an hour.  The logic probe really came in handy and found the open.  I basically went pin to pin on the ICs and any time I found a pin with no hi, low or signal I would investigate.  It seems there are a few unused pins but you can narrow it down quick.  Now I want to set up a test fixture and chase down the rest of the sound on my one no sound ultra board.

Thanks  Poppo I appreciate your guidance.

Glad you got it working.  :244- I can't tell you how many hours I spent fiddling with those MPUs only to be playing a game and have it lock up or something.  :8- That's when I said the heck with it and just bought a new one. BTW, you can buy unpopulated MPUs on e-bay if you want to spend the time transferring all of the components.  :5-

I saw those and considered it. but this is really a spare board anyway so it was more to see if I could make it tick again.

You need a new avatar.  :96-