How to Replace your Magnet and Coil Driver

American Pinball·video·5m 11s·analyzed·May 3, 2023

Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.011

TL;DR

American Pinball tech tutorial on magnet and coil driver replacement for Hot Wheels.

Summary

Dave Brennan, Tech Service Manager for American Pinball, provides a technical tutorial on diagnosing and replacing magnets and coil driver boards in Hot Wheels pinball machines. The video covers resistance testing of magnet coils, mechanical replacement procedures, and coil driver board diagnostics and replacement, including DIP switch configuration for Hot Wheels.

Key Claims

A magnet coil should read approximately 5.2 ohms when tested with a multimeter; readings of open or one indicate a bad coil.
high confidence · Dave Brennan, American Pinball Tech Service Manager, in official tutorial video
The coil driver board is located dead center on the underside of the playfield and contains two sections (red line and blue line) that drive coils.
high confidence · Dave Brennan, American Pinball Tech Service Manager, in official tutorial video
The magnet is controlled by the Q8 transistor on the red line of the coil driver board, located at the back.
high confidence · Dave Brennan, American Pinball Tech Service Manager, in official tutorial video
When a magnet fails, the Q8 transistor is usually bad and can be replaced individually or the entire coil driver board can be replaced through warranty service.
high confidence · Dave Brennan, American Pinball Tech Service Manager, in official tutorial video
For Hot Wheels, coil driver DIP switches must be set to positions 1, 3, and 8 enabled.
high confidence · Dave Brennan, American Pinball Tech Service Manager, in official tutorial video

Notable Quotes

“If you've ever had a situation where the game stops grabbing the ball, there are two things that are responsible for making this happen. One is the magnet coil itself and two is the coil driver board that's located right in the center of the play field.”
Dave Brennan@ 0:16 — Establishes the two primary components responsible for magnet failure in Hot Wheels
“You can unplug this and test this for resistance. Take your multimeter and turn it on resistance. From here take the probes and touch the pins inside the connector and you should get about 5.2 ohms. If your reading is open or one the coil is bad.”
Dave Brennan@ 0:41 — Provides specific diagnostic procedure and expected resistance value for magnet coil testing
“The magnet is Q8 transistor on the red line. When I say that I mean the red wires with the color stripes. And Q8 is all the way at the back here. That drives the magnet.”
Dave Brennan@ 2:29 — Identifies specific transistor component responsible for magnet operation on coil driver board
“Usually, when the magnet fails, that transistor is bad. So, you can either replace the transistor or if you submit a service ticket and you're covered under warranty, you can get a brand new replacement coil driver board.”
Dave Brennan@ 2:46 — Provides two repair paths: component-level replacement or full board warranty replacement

Entities

Dave BrennanpersonAmerican Pinballcompany Hot Wheelsgame

Signals

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community_signal: American Pinball producing educational tech tutorial content demonstrating ongoing commitment to operator and owner education/support for machine maintenance and repair
high · Full tutorial video series addressing common technical issues with step-by-step diagnostics and repair procedures for Hot Wheels magnet and coil driver systems

Topics

Technical Service and RepairprimaryMagnet Diagnostics and ReplacementprimaryCoil Driver Board RepairprimaryOperator Education and Supportsecondary

Sentiment

neutral(0.5)— Educational and instructional content with no emotional valence; delivered in professional, supportive manner

Transcript

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Hello and welcome to American Pinball Tech Tips. I'm Dave Jeff Brenner, the Tech Service Manager for American Pinball. Today I'm going to be going over troubleshooting, particularly for the magnet and Hot Wheels. If you've ever had a situation where the game stops grabbing the ball, there are two things that are responsible for making this happen. One is the magnet coil itself and two is the coil driver board that's located right in the center of the play field. So first step, lift the play field and let's take a closer look. First let's take a look at the magnet. You can unplug this and test this for resistance. Take your multimeter and turn it on to resistance. From here take the probes and touch the pins inside the connector and you should get about 5.2 ohms. If your reading is open or one the coil is bad If the coil is testing bad you need to replace it Take a multi driver with the bit out This is a quarter inch nut driver Unplug the magnet coil and unscrew the screws From here, you can slide the whole mechanism out. Slide the magnet off the bracket. then take your new magnet and slide it back on to the bracket. Put it back in the hole and then screw the bracket back to the playfield. From here plug in the molex plug and that part is done. Now let's take a look at the coil driver This is located dead center in the middle of the underside of the playfield. There are two sections that drive the coils, the red line and the brown line. This is listed on page 34 of your manual. The magnet is Q8 transistor on the red line When I say that I mean the red wires with the color stripes And Q8 is all the way at the back here. That drives the magnet. Usually, when the magnet fails, that transistor is bad. So, you can either replace the transistor or if you submit a service ticket and you're covered under warranty, you can get a brand new replacement coil driver board. With the game powered off, take pictures of all the connectors so you know exactly how they go when you go to put this back together. here pull up on the connectors to remove them. Now that the connectors are removed take your needle nose pliers and you need to pinch the end of the plastic pin and push up to the bottom of the board For Hot Wheels, these need to be set to 1, 3, and 8 are on. You can match this with the board that just took out. Now place the board on the plastic pins, snap down all four corners and then plug all the connectors back in. Now that all the connectors are back in and you've verified with your pictures, you can now lower the play field and power up your game to test it. If you have any questions along the way or anything that I haven't covered in this Tech Tip video, please reach out to me at the email or phone number listed at the bottom of the screen. Thanks for watching!