I just got the word that my Turtles is officially on the way. And according to what I'm reading, whenever it gets here, I get to rebuild the entire fucking thing. What's up guys and welcome to episode one of the Hardy Pinball Podcast, the one about manufacturing. And let's just jump right into it with the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles issues that I'm stumbling across by going down the pin side thread. Now, I have a pro on the way, which is a good thing because evidently the LEs are currently in the lead when it comes to defects or issues. Now, there are a number of different issues that we could go over, but I'm just going to highlight the three main ones. and that is the diverter behind the bus is defective essentially when it comes to opening and closing if it's not adjusted correctly it can dig into the plastic ramp behind it that diverter that has got a fix on the way the other issue is the puddling around post with the clear coat this has been a known issue for many years now and the most troubling to me is grainy artwork that is Right. Now, this is something that I haven't been known to see before, but due to a couple of pictures that a Pennside person has posted, it would seem that there is some sort of printing issue at some point, and the artwork, at least on this machine, is very grainy. That's very worrisome indeed. But on the TMNT thread, the most recent post, at least discussing issues and fixes, was from Pradoshi, and he's got a lengthy little post here going over adding washers adjusting the layer shot the ball feed left ramp ball feed right ramp pizza spinner ball trough and shooter lane upper flipper and a game flow hint as well as including pictures on things that you should do or at least make sure that you see everything is okay upon your game's arrival now i know what you're thinking that you're thinking like oh great this is when Kerry's gonna bust out and get on his soapbox and talk about how Stern's quality control should have been fixing and seeing these things on the line and we shouldn't be getting these out in the wild it shouldn't be happening blah blah blah blah blah blah no that is not where I'm going with this guys because contrary to what those of you might think I do know a great deal about manufacturing and one of the things I know is that quality control is not going to be able to catch everything because they are human. That is the issue. And nothing aggravates me more whenever I have to discuss things about human errors and how can we keep these from happening. Okay, if you want to stop human error, then that's when you go on to machines because that is the most common issue when it comes to human error is obviously the human. We are human. We're not going to be able to catch everything because a machine has parameters in place, whereas there are many variables and reasons why a human would not be able to detect or catch defects. So there are definitely things on this list, as well as other things I read about and hear about where I can kind of like look past and go, ah, yeah, well, they can't catch everything. But there are also other things where I've got to look at and go, really? Why hasn't this been resolved yet. Here's the thing. If a company is getting certain materials or parts for a complete machine that someone's putting together, this means we're talking like small components all the way to the big ordeal that makes the product. If a certain piece of that machinery is not functioning or not doing what the person that's releasing this product would like it to do, they're supposed to be going to that individual contacting them and getting a hold of them figuring out what the problem is and how can this problem be fixed or they're going to be taking their business elsewhere so whenever i see the clear coat puddling around the post i have to sit here and get a little bit aggravated because the chances are they have not done anything the same people are making these playfields sending them through the clear coating process and haven't changed anything. That is what's upsetting is that I wonder if they can possibly send out test playfields to other companies and go and hey we looking for other avenues and possibilities of you know changing companies and providers because our current one not doing what we like it to do And we want to make our customers happy. So see what you can do with this and see if we still get the same issues that we're getting. So when it comes to clear coat puddling, I don't look at Stern like, what the hell's your problem? I mainly look at the person that's doing the clear coat job and go, what is your problem? Either you are not mixing it correctly or maybe Stern's just in too much of a rush and not allowing the cure to completely go through. That is another possibility, is that they are trying to get these things out as fast as possible to keep profits up, that they're willing to look past the little bitty issues of puddling around posts and stuff like that because of the majority of people and operation users and stuff like that location are not going to see them. they're not going to notice it. Now it comes down to mechanical like engineering and design and stuff like that with the flow of the game. These are things that back in the day they used to be able to figure out what the issue was by putting a couple of machines on a test location and getting feedback from people as well as the operators on how well the machine is doing, any kind of concerns or complaints and seeing by all the other little parameters in there what is the issues or things that they need to fix before they go into full production. With this day and age, they cannot do that. Do you think that Stern can make, let's say, for instance, a ridiculous machine that would definitely not be able to be keep under wraps? Let's say Back to the Future, okay? God forbid. But let's say they did a Back to the Future and they go, you know what, we need to put a couple of them on a location over here in, I don't know, Pennsylvania, somewhere, anywhere, doesn't matter. Do you think that they would be able to put a couple of machines on location and it not be out on the internet for everyone else to see within 24 hours no they can't do that anymore so it's all in-house now and the chances are they're not catching a lot of these in-house because all of them are accustomed to playing pinball and are able to make these shots that have been designed easier than the rigmarole individual that's just going to walk up to a machine and for the very first time and hit the ball randomly around and get it stuck in certain places that it shouldn't be getting stuck and causing all kinds of issues and I know this just even from my own machines where I put out and for whatever reason people kept getting a ball stuck underneath something and I was like how are they doing this I can play this game without issues all the time because I know where the shots are at and I can nail the shot so therefore the ball is not going to do the unexpected but when you get somebody that doesn't know the shot layout and they start just randomly hitting the ball around and don't really know how to play that's when you're going to get a lot better feedback is from the people that don't know the game this is why even on the latest interview with george gomez on the saps pinball podcast which was very very good by the way in case you have not listened to that go give it a shot it was a great interview i always love listening to george gomez speak about the company and what's going on he does very well on that so when he goes into discussing vaults he says that one of the main things and questions that they ask whenever they decide to do a vault is like, okay, we need a list of everything that went wrong with this machine. What can we improve or even prevent from happening on the original release? That is something that they can't do on a brand new game that hasn't been released yet, is get feedback from thousands of individuals on what needs to be fixed. So you have people out there that are wondering, why is this not getting caught at the factory? Why is quality control or QC allowing these machines to go out the door that don't work the way they are intended to? And I'm going to tell you why. That is due to muscle memory and training. These people on the line that are assembling these machines, whether you want to call them operators, manufacturing specialists, I mean, the names can go on and on. They're just titles. I mean, sometimes these titles just go off in ridiculousness just to fluff yourself up to make you sound more important. I don't know. We could, like, communications officer, you know, a little bit of a punch out there. But anyways, you could go on and on what these guys are called. But essentially, the people that are putting these machines together, that are running the tools, all they know is how to assemble certain components on this play field. And they do it multiple times every day A lot of these people have been putting these playfields together for years But in the end i guarantee you a lot of the people that are assembling these games don know how they work don't know how you know and why they do what they do and what they should or should not be looking for all they know when they're trained and put into a particular spot on the line they go hey this is a screwdriver put this screw here this screw goes here here and here or this solder goes here here and here these connectors go here I could go on and on and on they are a cog in the machine they are trained to do a certain task and to do it over and over and over again to where it becomes muscle memory and the manufacturing process just continues to flow so when you have that operator putting down the plastics or inserting the flipper bats do you think that that individual is gonna catch a grainy artwork play field or maybe a little small defect in the clear coat no they don't care their task is to put the flipper inside the hole or run the wiring to that that is their job so it's not going to get caught on the dozens of individuals in the whole assembly process unless they are trained to look for that and i'm guaranteeing you they're not trained to look for stuff like that but maybe they should be maybe that's something that stern should look into is cross-training your operators manufacturing specialist, whatever you want to call them, into looking for certain things or bringing certain possible issues to QC's attention or the line manager, whatever you want to call them, whatever their name is, bringing it to their attention. Like, hey, there's a little bit of a chip right here and it's going to be up to, guess what? Not a machine, a human being is going to decide whether or not that play field can move on to the next point. And a lot of these issues are definitely not going to be caught at the factory. Because, like I state, is that you have certain people that are test playing these games that learn the flow of the game and how to make particular shots over and over again to make sure a certain mech is working. Because they're not playing it just randomly, just hitting it around. They are purposefully rolling the ball up a ramp to make sure certain switches are activating. They're not looking for any possible, like, well, this metal is sticking out just a couple of millimeters out too far. We need to make an adjustment on that. that's not something that they're going to be scrutinizing they don't have time to do all that guys they've got to push out machine after machine after machine that's when it gets out to the customer the glorious people that we are to find all the small little things that should have been fixed i say should have been but could have been fixed at the factory now this is coming from somebody that does restorations that has put a plate filled together from nothing i know how drastic a few millimeters can be when it comes to making a nice smooth orbit or going up and around a ramp without any issues. I understand the significance of a couple of millimeters. In the end when it comes to Stern and TMNT I think what they could do is just work on cross training with their operators to look for certain things like hey we're seeing that people are complaining about this whenever you're assembling this certain thing could you just make sure that this is not pointing this direction or maybe we could push this in a little bit more and everything should be better than it was before but chances are they're doing that guys but who knows they're not going to let us know that but if they aren't let's just work on cross training just a little bit more that's my suggestion that's my two cents when it comes to stern and tmnt let's move on to Jersey Jack pinball. Now we all know that they have gone from the East Coast all the way over to Elk Grove Village, Illinois to continue their manufacturing process. And we have been getting little updates here and there via Facebook and stuff like that to let us know that, hey, the factory is complete and we have games on the line and they're showing pictures and stuff like that. But I get that they have to keep themselves relevant in this hobby. Because honestly, I don't think they've got anything going on right now. They're not doing anything with Guns N' Roses. Guns N' Roses is not on the line. There's no way. If it is on the line, I worry drastically about QC because I'm seeing that they have their job listings right here for production manager, quality control inspector, production group leaders, assemblers, production support supervisor, inventory clerk, stock chaser, quality control specialist, production support technician, logistics specialist. So they're looking to fill these positions here. Do you think that they got Guns N Roses just moving across the line and being put together and everything going to be hunky No Chances are what they got going on right now is the residual of their Wonkas They may be doing some assembling there and getting them out to most recently what was it Australia They had like 30 games on. Of course, they didn't want to specify what games they were on the picture. Just said shipping some games out because it might have been everything, but what everybody's looking forward to is Guns N' Roses. Now, I'm going to go ahead and call this and say that definitely Guns N' Roses is not on the line. We are not going to see Guns N' Roses until October. So everybody just kind of chill out. If it gets shown before October, color me surprised. The thing is, and what I know they're doing now, is that they are definitely not wanting to reveal their cards until it's ready. And I get it because that has been their problem in the past. is that they get super excited about revealing their new game and they just can't contain it any longer and they want to show the world and everyone gets shown it, everyone gets excited, but then they can't get it for at least six months. And that has been their problem, is that they've been just blowing their load and then there's not much to back it up after that because they've got to get the game put together and get it out there and it loses steam. That is what Stern has that almost everybody else doesn't, is the fact that they can show a game and get it out to people in two weeks. Jersey Jack is waiting for this game to be ready to go. I have a feeling that when they do reveal Guns N' Roses, this game is going to be ready to ship. I think that's what it's going to be. They're going to be like, here's Guns N' Roses. It's more than likely going to be amazing, guys. If we still go by all the hype that Canada's built up on this game, chances are Eric has done an amazing job, and this game will be amazing. Even though, me personally, I'm not a Guns N' Roses fan, but there's plenty of games that I've played and owned in the past that I have not been a fan of the theme, but I enjoy the hell out of the gameplay. And this is more than likely going to be it. I'm not a Guns N' Roses fan, but it may be fun as hell to shoot. So they're going to reveal this game, show us how awesome it is, and go, guess what? Your distributors are getting this shit next week. Something like that. I pray that's what it's going to be like. I hope that's what it's going to be like. But do not think that they've got guns and roses on the line right now. If they do, then I would worry about quality control like no one's business. Because they have not got the time and place to train all these new operators, to put these things together that more than likely these people probably have never done it before. Of course, they would prefer them to have experience, that's noted here, to have manufacturing experience. but the chances are oh man there's going to be a lot of starting up and beginning issues and there's going to be a lot of training in place and they're going to need time to get those kinks worked out so i'm hoping that they don't jump the gun and get too excited and premature this thing out to where it's going to be a flop i don't think they will and i think they're just playing their cards real close to their chest and being careful about it because i think they really want this game to be great and they want it to be better than what they've done before and i think if they keep doing what they're doing then they will get that and at least they're going to get a game out this year more than likely which could say a little bit more about my most recent information with deep root i know my last episode if you caught the very end of it i specified that we would be getting more information with in this summer now my most recent information has changed the thing is it's changed but technically not enough to where i said on my previous episode is untrue all i can say is there is that the dates that i have been told are not what they were but it still falls in the time frame of where i said that we should be getting more information by the end of summer of course who knows something else could go wrong and that could change again And if it does, I'll let you know. But until then, I think I'm going to wrap this episode up, guys. Please, by all means, spread the word about this podcast if you do enjoy it. If you have not already, check out my YouTube channel. It's YouTube.com slash Kerry Hardy. I do all kinds of things, talk and do everything pinball. Until next time, guys, peace out. you