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Part 1: 1977 Allied Leisure Getaway Pinball Project Begins!

Pinball Shenanigans·video·23m 38s·analyzed·Apr 10, 2026
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claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.022

TL;DR

Mike Dimes starts restoring a rare 1977 Allied Leisure Getaway pinball machine.

Summary

Mike Dimes begins restoration of a 1977 Allied Leisure Getaway solid-state pinball machine acquired from a large lot of vintage arcade equipment. He documents the initial teardown, cleaning, and assessment of three machines to determine which will be fully restored. The video covers physical inspection, head/cabinet evaluation, leg installation challenges due to non-standard measurements, and discovery of the original maintenance manual.

Key Claims

  • Getaway is valued at $3,000-$3,500 USD according to Pinside pricing data

    high confidence · Mike Dimes referencing Pinside database listing during game research segment

  • Only 19 Pinsiders own a Getaway, making it rarer than Gammatron (28 owners)

    high confidence · Mike Dimes citing Pinside collection statistics

  • The three Getaway machines came from the same lot as two Alaskas and four new-old-stock arcade games (Hesitation, Ricochet, Monte Carlo, Computer Baseball, Computer Space) from an Ontario operator distributor

    high confidence · Mike Dimes explaining acquisition source and mentioning distributor dealt with Allied, Atari, Nutting, and MCI

  • Allied Leisure used LED displays in the Getaway in 1977, which Mike considers impressive for that era

    high confidence · Mike Dimes examining the head internals and expressing surprise at LED technology in 1977

  • The Getaway uses non-standard leg hole widths that don't match Mike's available leg sets

    high confidence · Mike Dimes attempting leg installation and finding incompatibility

Notable Quotes

  • “You said it was raining. This is freaking hail. I'm Mike Dimes and this is Pinball Shenanigans.”

    Mike Dimes@ 0:11 — Host introduction amid weather complications

  • “It is a solid-state game. Oh, it actually has a value 3 to 3,500 US dollars, which is interesting cuz I can't imagine there have been many sales recorded on this game.”

    Mike Dimes@ 3:26 — Noting the rarity and market value of the Getaway

  • “This is even rarer than Gammatron. So, here are some photos. And uh look at this. There's one Getaway for sale for five grand US right now. Bought it new in the box. One of the funniest games I've ever played.”

    Mike Dimes@ 5:27 — Comparison of rarity and secondary market pricing observation

  • “You can smell the decades.”

    Mike Dimes@ 12:35 — Humorous reaction to odor from decades-locked cabinet

  • “Damn you, Allied Leisure. You were doing everything so right up until now. Why do you got to go with non-standard leg hole widths?”

    Mike Dimes@ 18:56 — Frustration with Allied Leisure's non-standard design choices

  • “One of the major reasons our engineering staff decided to use a microprocessor based system is the fact that it is possible design to design a system that can self-diagnose any malfunctions.”

    Allied Leisure (quoted from manual)@ 21:58 — Design philosophy documentation from original manual showing self-diagnostic capability

Entities

Mike DimespersonPinball ShenanigansorganizationAllied LeisurecompanyGetawaygameAlaskagameGammatrongameRob FyhrpersonJaypersonPinsideorganizationInternet Pinball Databaseorganization

Signals

  • ?

    restoration_signal: Mike evaluates condition of three Getaway cabinets to select one for full restoration, assessing playfield condition, cosmetic wear, humidity damage, and parts compatibility

    high · Detailed visual inspection of multiple units comparing wear patterns, humidity damage, and glass condition; decision to make one nice machine and sell other two incomplete

  • ?

    restoration_signal: Allied Leisure used non-standard leg hole widths and bolt sizes (half-inch vs. standard 9/16 or 5/8) creating compatibility issues

    high · Leg installation failed; Mike unable to mount all four legs properly; discovered half-inch head bolts and T-nuts are non-standard North American sizes

  • ?

    collector_signal: Getaway is extremely rare with only 19 known Pinside owners, rarer than Gammatron which has 28 owners

    high · Mike Dimes citing Pinside statistics: '19 Pinsiders, including me, that have this in their collections' and '19 people is pretty low, and check this out compared to my Gammatron, which has 28 people that own it. This is even rarer than Gammatron.'

  • $

    market_signal: Secondary market pricing shows one mint Getaway listed for $5,000 USD (new in box, 300 plays); Pinside database values range $3,000-$3,500

    high · Mike reviewing Pinside listings: 'There's one Getaway for sale for five grand US right now. Bought it new in the box.'; 'the average price' is $3,000-$3,500

  • ?

    product_concern: Extended storage exposure to moisture/humidity caused paint degradation, swelling, and separation in cabinet materials

Transcript

youtube_auto_sub · $0.000

0:03
All right, getaways are removed. Got to Yeah, there's the rain is coming. It's perfect timing. Isn't that great? Touch, you lied. You said it was raining. This is freaking hail. I'm Mike Dimes [music] and this is Pinball Shenanigans.
0:21
[music]
0:21
[music] >> That's one leap for man, What the hell, man? It's literal hail. This is just wonderful timing. Got two of the three getaways loaded up. My timing is impeccable. This is like 2 hours later and I thought, "Hey, maybe I I should unload these things." And immediately starts hailing again. All right, it is new project day. So, first thing we got to do is call upon Jay the neighbor.
1:32
Success. Thank you, Jay the neighbor.
1:32
Success. Thank you, Jay the neighbor. Once again, always coming in clutch. For your payment, would you like cash or credit? Or some of Milwaukee's finest. A Ziploc bag full. All right, it has been a couple days. It's finally time to get two getaways. Oh, I'm doing laundry, by the way. These are like my three favorite hoodies. Grizzly Garage, Pinball Shenanigans, and London Pinball. Oh, and look, I won that, too, at Forked River. Okay, so I'm excited to check these out a little more thoroughly and clean them up a little bit, put them on legs, or one on legs. Oh, hey Rob Fyhr, how are you doing? You have to watch a couple episodes back to see where this came from. But I might have stole it from Rob Fyhr without him realizing. And uh Minnie Mouse can go right next to Mr. Pineapple Shenanigans. So, thanks, Rob.

  • “Note to Get Away owners, some operators have found that in certain locations lowering the replay or added ball scores to these suggested values has increased their returns and their level of poops.”

    Original maintenance manual@ 22:56 — Humorous deteriorated manual note about operator revenue strategy

    • Hesitation
    game
    Ricochetgame
    Monte Carlogame
    Computer Baseballgame
    Computer Spacegame
    Forked Riverevent
    London Pinballorganization
    Grizzly Garageorganization

    high · Bottom piece sticking out 'cuz it looks like it might have been humid at one point'; visible wear and paint loss; mouse infestation evidence

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Allied Leisure used microprocessor-based systems in 1977 Getaway specifically for self-diagnostic capabilities

    high · Original manual excerpt: 'One of the major reasons our engineering staff decided to use a microprocessor based system is the fact that it is possible design to design a system that can self-diagnose any malfunctions.'

  • ?

    historical_signal: Ontario operator distributor handled multiple manufacturers including Allied, Atari, Nutting, and MCI, suggesting consolidation of arcade distribution in 1970s-80s

    high · Mike describing acquisition source: 'old operator distributor in Ontario that dealt with all these quirky companies, Nutting and um Allied, Atari, and um whatever else...MCI, Milwaukee something or other'

  • ?

    restoration_signal: Original Get Away Checkout and Maintenance Manual recovered with machine, containing maintenance procedures, spinner adjustment info, and operator notes

    high · Mike discovering and reading from original manual pages including self-diagnostic information and operator tips for adjusting replay/add-a-ball scoring

  • ?

    technology_signal: Getaway featured LED displays in 1977, which Mike notes as impressive for that era

    high · Mike examining head: 'Oh, these are all LED displays. 1977. And we're using LED displays. That's pretty impressive, Allied Leisure.'

  • ?

    venue_signal: Original manual operator notes discuss adjusting replay/add-a-ball scores to increase venue returns in 'certain locations,' indicating location-specific operator strategies

    high · Manual note: 'some operators have found that in certain locations lowering the replay or added ball scores to these suggested values has increased their returns'

    • 2:52
    Uh okay, so I think what we should do before we get started is uh pull up the manual, I mean, flyer for this game and uh kind of learn a thing or two about it. Don't you think? Okay, just on Pinside here. So, Getaway made by Allied Leisure in 1977. It is a solid-state game. Oh, it actually has a value 3 to 3,500 US dollars, which is interesting cuz I can't imagine there have been many sales recorded on this game. Here's the flyer. Allied introduces its new concepts in pinball with a game guaranteed to steal your imagination. Ooh, isn't that exciting? Allied Leisure Industries um out of Florida. Oh, interesting. Okay, let's check out the back of the flyer here. And oh, wow, it's got all kinds of information. But I can't really zoom in anymore. See if I can read a couple of these. Popular extra ball feature. What's it say? New new get a new new way {exclamation mark}. Adjustable three or five ball play, convertible to add-a-ball, adjustable plays per coin, solid-state microprocessor circuitry, and all that kind of good stuff. So, let's scroll down and we can see that the game has been listed a total of 10 times on Pinside. In the past 4 years, we've seen it four times. That's the average price. And uh there are 19 Pinsiders, including me, that have this in their collections. Now, I have three in my collection, so does that just count one per person, or is this like three of these are three of these mine? Either way, that gives you some idea of rarity. 19 people is pretty low, and check this out compared to my Gammatron, which has 28 people that own it. This is even rarer than Gammatron. So, here are some photos. And uh look at this. There's one Getaway for sale for five grand US right now. Bought it new in the box. One of the funniest games I've ever played. Maybe just 300 plays. I'm moving to a new city. New in the box from Texas? That's pretty cool. Documented home use only. Okay, so that must be in brand new mint condition depending on how it was stored.
    6:02
    All right. One photo, eh? I mean, I would take probably more than one, but what you going to do? Anyway, uh that's about all I want to learn about Getaway for now. Let's just dive into the actual machine now. Okay, so this is um
    6:29
    the bad cabinet. Right? No, this is the good cabinet. This.
    6:40
    Uh it's the butt. It's the butt that it's really bad. Yeah, this is the bad cabinet. Okay. So, when I'm all said and done, what I'll do is I'll make one nice one of the three, and then I'll sell the other two together for someone else to make one more nice one. Hopefully that is possible. So, there's this note stuck in here and it looks intentional. And I intentionally did not open it or read it. So, let's see what we got.
    7:17
    Needs needs something. Lock on head. All right.
    7:27
    Not as exciting. I was hoping it was a love note or or something, but Okay. Let's take a brief look at the playfield here. I have to decide which playfield is better. This one is missing a drop target. And it's got the original pop bumper caps. I don't like analyzing too hard upside down. It's more cool to do it right side up. So, let's not spend too much time on it until I get it on legs. Well, this will be the it on legs. So, this is not the original housing. I can steal this guy here, and I'm not sure if that's what it always looks like here with the like or is is the front piece of this broken off? Or can you see these crosshairs? So, I'll have to check on that. And at the very least steal that and or check the third one. And maybe steal that.
    8:31
    This is pretty rusty, but I'm not going high-end on this one. I'm just going to clean it up as best as I can. It's in pretty good shape, all things considered. This came from the same stash that the my two Alaskas came from, and then the uh four new old stock arcade games we got uh recently, the Hesitation, the Ricochet, the um Monte Carlo, the Computer Baseball, and even the Computer Space. All this stuff came from the same lot, an old operator distributor in Ontario that dealt with all these quirky companies, Nutting and um Allied, Atari, and um whatever else. I'm missing a couple, but oh, MCI, Milwaukee something or other. So, there's the lock that's missing.
    9:49
    It's got like the sort of old school 3D perspective. This police car is coming at you.
    10:03
    All right, so I got to find me some legs and let's stick one of these guys on them. Okay, I have determined this is the lesser of the two heads. Little bit wear around here. It's not too bad, but this bottom piece kind of sticking out a bit.
    10:27
    Cuz it looks like it might have been humid at one point.
    10:34
    And this guy over here doesn't quite have the same amount of wear. And look at this. It's nice and flush. So, this one didn't go through as much humidity. And I think the back glass might be better, too, but we can pick and choose between the two. The only problem is
    11:02
    it's locked. So, I'm going to I'm either going to have to drill it out or maybe find a key in my stash that might work. So, I'm going with this head. Oh, that was an epic fail. I came so close with these keys, but they did not want to turn. Oh, I lost my uh paper clip. I saw a video recently of someone opening a lock. Oh, no. Uh the fail just keeps getting worse. They opened a lock using um safety What are these called? Paper clips. So, I tried that and I've been going at this for like 10 minutes, so it's time to just bust out the drill. Okay, I think this is about a quarter-inch drill bit. Drilled you know, pretty far down. It didn't go all the way through. And I found a screwdriver, some channel locks, and was able to twist this thing using some force.
    12:20
    I have no idea if this is actually unlocked or not, but let's find out. Oh, yeah. How many decades do you think this was locked up?
    12:35
    Mm, you can smell the decades. All right, like Gammatron, got all these red films for the displays. Oh, that's original tape, I guess. It's on all of them. This back glass is not that bad.
    12:54
    So, I don't know if I will use these or not. I got rid of them on Gammatron. It just looked better. So, we shall see, but and these are all LED displays. 1977. And we're using LED displays. That's pretty impressive, Allied Leisure. So, let's move this out of the way. Oh, I really shouldn't have it on concrete. And I really shouldn't set it on the other back glass. I'll remedy that shortly, cuz that's just a recipe for trouble. Let's see what Allied Leisure back boxes look like on the inside for the first time. Oh, wait. Why is this not opening? There's a trick somewhere. Oh, that slides up. Okay. Now, is it open? Cool. All right. I hear stuff trickling down. Ooh, I think it might be mouse poo. Yes, it is. Okay. Uh good news is they're not there is not a big mouse nest.
    14:12
    What is that? Oh, that's paint. It's not corrosion, but there's zero boards. We've got the displays, a knocker,
    14:25
    some female connectors, some lights. I guess these are boards, technically. Pretty neat. Look at line them up. We got to line things up. Got to light all these guys.
    14:42
    Oh, I'm starting to breathe that in. Just the tiniest little board here with two more LEDs on it. And that's probably going to show up in the car window here for a match, I guess. So, that's pretty cool. >> [laughter]
    14:56
    [laughter]
    14:56
    [laughter] >> The smell
    14:58
    The smell
    14:58
    The smell is not All right, I gave the head a wipe down. An old cloth, a little bit of magic eraser, some simple green, and it looks a lot better.
    15:18
    Wiped pretty much the entire surface. Try and get rid of the the obvious dirt and help with the fragrance.
    15:30
    And didn't go too hard on the back. Definitely losing some paint, but that is what it is. So, time to um maybe I should throw this on the table there, so I don't have to bend over while working on it, and then I can clean the inside. Okay, that's much better. And this frayed edge here, so I think the best thing to do is just rip the Band-Aid right off. >> [snorts]
    16:10
    Making a dust storm.
    16:10
    Making a dust storm. Can't wait to breathe that in. I really should uh throw on a mask [snorts] here. >> [clears throat]
    16:17
    [clears throat]
    16:18
    [clears throat] >> Think I'll do that.
    16:19
    Think I'll do that.
    16:19
    Think I'll do that. But if the other side is similar, then uh I'll give it the same treatment. Are you ready? Here we go.
    16:34
    It wasn't actually that bad. A lot of this black stuff is just speckled paint. So, I'll give this a wipe down and a little more thorough of a vacuum, but that actually is not bad at all. Okay, I gave the inside of the head a good wipe down. Just a little bit wet still.
    16:57
    And hopefully, maybe I'll leave the door open overnight. Just kind of air this thing out. But with the back glass removed, there's enough air flow, so that should uh help. Now, it's time to move on to the body. I think I will give it a preliminary wipe down before I put it on legs. It's pretty crusty. And I think these are the legs I'm going to use.
    17:38
    but they're not amazing. As long as the threads are still good, then um it should be okay. All right, I got three legs done. One was a little stubborn. This one is also going to be stubborn, so let's see uh how this goes.
    18:19
    Okay, that one was actually uh not as bad as I thought. So, time for leg levelers. All right, legs are cleaned up with some new levelers. And I cleaned up the cabinet.
    18:37
    I gave it a first pass over. I'm sure I'm going to have to do some more. But you saw how dirty it was. Much better. All right, so time to stick this on legs. Damn you, Allied Leisure. You were doing everything so right up until now. Why
    19:05
    do you got to go with non- Let's try and do a better view here. Non-standard
    19:15
    leg hole widths? These legs are not going to work. And I don't think I have Allied Leisure legs anywhere. So, not sure what to do. I may just set it up with one bolt for now, but look at that. All right, she's on legs, but only on four bolts' worth, but it's secure enough. I may go on the hunt for some proper legs. This is a very remote chance I may have a set in storage. I've got some chrome ones, maybe those are the Allied Leisure legs. In other non-standard measurement news, these were in the head. So, we've got three head bolts, which is pretty sweet. We have a lack of T-nuts, but I did drop one in here. There it is.
    20:18
    And they're I'm pretty sure they're standard, like North American sizes. So, that should be fine, except like the heads, they are half inch. They're not 9/16 or 5/8. So, we got to use this one. Half inch wrench for these guys. But, no biggie. I can live with that. But, I'm going to wrap up this video. But, before we do that, look what we get here. Well, definite evidence of mice, but possibly some usable Oh, there's the mouse nest. Oh my god. >> [snorts]
    21:09
    [snorts]
    21:09
    [snorts] >> I really hope
    21:10
    I really hope
    21:10
    I really hope I didn't bring any friends home with me. Shouldn't be, but you never know. If so, Ellie should uh make quick work of our new friend. All right, let's see what we got here. This is kind of exciting.
    21:36
    Get [snorts] Away Check Out and Maintenance Manual. What does this say? Their game with the brain. Yes, it's true. One of the major reasons our engineering staff decided to use a microprocessor based system is the fact that it is possible design to design a system that can self-diagnose any malfunctions. The next few pages describe how to effectively use the self-diagnostics to fully check out the machine. All right, cool. Well, I'm sure there's some informative stuff here. I wonder if this is available on Internet Pinball Database. Oh, look at this mech here, big giant disc that spins through. Probably some optos or something. What does this say? Spinner value adjustment information.
    22:38
    Pretty cool. And then, is this our love note? It's our poop note. Nasty. Uh I really have to wash my hands pretty thoroughly after this. Note to Get Away owners, some operators have found that in certain locations lowering the replay or added ball scores to these suggested values has increased their returns and their level of poops. All right, I think um we're going to wrap up this video in order for me to even install the head. I need to install some T-nuts, and that's going to take more than a minute. So, I'm pretty excited [snorts] though about this project, despite all the poop and stank that will air out. And uh we'll be back at it possibly tomorrow, so stay tuned.