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#60 Headache in a box? - The Classic Pinball Podcast

The Classic Pinball Podcast·podcast_episode·43m 13s·analyzed·Aug 31, 2021
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claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.031

TL;DR

George and Dave cover recent pinball industry news, restoration projects, and machine acquisitions.

Summary

George and Dave discuss their pinball activities and industry happenings over the past six weeks. Key topics include Spooky's new connector innovations, the Banning Pinball Museum closure and upcoming 1,500-machine auction by Captain's Auction, Dave's restoration work on multiple classic and modern games, and his recent acquisition of a non-functioning Tri-Zone. The hosts also reflect on the successful Allentown pinball show and discuss various machines in Dave's restoration queue.

Key Claims

  • Spooky's new games use molex connectors to connect all modular components (flippers, bumpers, etc.) for easier serviceability.

    high confidence · George discussing Spooky's technical innovations from their new Halloween and Ultraman games

  • The Banning Pinball Museum is no longer operating because they leased their building for cannabis cultivation in California.

    high confidence · George stating the museum sold their lease to a 'grow' operation in Banning, California

  • Captain's Auction will auction 1,500 pinballs over two weekends in September from the former Banning Pinball Museum collection.

    high confidence · George citing the auction event resulting from the museum's failed relocation plan to Palm Springs

  • The failed Palm Springs museum relocation was caused by inadequate planning regarding renovation costs and effort needed to convert an old newspaper print plant.

    medium confidence · George: 'somebody didn't do their homework... didn't realize the amount of work and money it was going to take'

  • Stern's Star Wars home model uses particle board playfield and has kickers tied together as a cost-saving measure.

    high confidence · Dave detailing issues he encountered servicing a Stern Star Wars home model, including connector problems and design compromises

  • Stern confirmed that having both kickers fire simultaneously in the Star Wars home model is intentional, described as a 'feature' due to cost considerations.

    high confidence · Dave recounting his email exchange with Stern about the dual kicker design

  • The Allentown pinball show had no reported illness or negative outcomes despite normal machine density and no COVID precautions.

    high confidence · George and Dave discussing the show as a successful 'litmus test' for normal pinball shows

  • P3 released new software for their Heist game called 'Silver Falls' allowing playfield reuse.

    medium confidence · George mentioning P3's Silver Falls software update, though he expresses indifference to the feature

Notable Quotes

  • “They listen to me they're just being smart because they want to take equipment out of the or off the play field easily rather than unsoldering things”

    George @ ~4:00 — Explains the practical reasoning behind Spooky's modular connector design philosophy

  • “Stern, just keep turning those games up because you're keeping my friend busy”

    George @ ~20:30 — Humorous commentary on Stern's reliability issues keeping Dave employed in repairs

  • “That's a feature. That's us being very frugal. I could use the other word, but very frugal.”

    Dave (quoting Stern) @ ~23:45 — Reveals Stern's cost-cutting measures in the home model version of Star Wars

  • “I said, you know, you really could use some rubber on this. And I could do that for him... he got the game for free from his brother-in-law a couple years ago... I was like, no, Maureen, this is his budget. We're staying within his budget. Cut bait.”

    Dave @ ~34:20 — Shows Dave's customer service approach and respect for stated budgets

  • “There's always a game for somebody. No one else. This is the Charlie in the Box.”

    Dave @ ~48:50 — Reflects on finding the right buyer for seemingly unmarketable machines like Caribbean Cruise

  • “I thought the show was a lot of fun. I'm looking forward to the next one. I think Pentastic was a good one to go for because now they did more of a normal show, and they kind of set the standard now.”

    George @ ~51:15 — Positive sentiment on the Allentown show's role as a template for future normal operations

  • “It's like, it's worth $400 to $500 for me, top six. She thought she had gold.”

    Dave @ ~57:45 — Shows realistic market pricing for damaged/incomplete Tri-Zone machines

  • “There were no boards. There was a sound board that was missing the MPU, the driver, and the power supply.”

    Dave — Reveals the Tri-Zone acquired by Dave was missing critical components, explaining the low value

Entities

GeorgepersonDavepersonSpooky PinballcompanyStern PinballcompanyP3 (Pinball Brothers)companyCaptain's AuctioncompanyBanning Pinball MuseumorganizationLucas PepkepersonZach MinneypersonTony Zidzikperson

Signals

  • ?

    design_innovation: Spooky Pinball implementing molex connectors on all modular components (flippers, bumpers, etc.) for improved serviceability and ease of equipment removal

    high · George discussing Spooky's new games at Allentown: 'new flippers in their games... a new benhek board set and everything is now connected by molex connectors'

  • ?

    product_concern: Stern's Star Wars home model exhibits multiple quality compromises including particle board playfield, missing connector reliability, and tied-together kickers as cost-cutting measures

    high · Dave's service experience: particle board playfield, connector reseating needed, dual kickers tied together, Stern confirmed as intentional cost measure

  • $

    market_signal: Significant gap between seller expectations and actual market value for non-functional/incomplete machines; storage unit operator expected $1,200-$1,700 for broken Tri-Zone, actual value $400-$550

    high · Dave negotiating Tri-Zone purchase: Pennsylvania dealer quoted $1,200-$1,700; Dave assessed at $400-$500 top value due to missing boards and non-bootable state

  • ?

    product_concern: System 80B/C era games (late 1980s) exhibit endemic grounding issues causing multiple simultaneous fuse failures; Bad Girls had seven blown fuses traced to floating grounds and improper grounding architecture

    high · Dave explaining System 80 design flaw: 'they had really a bad grounding issue... they put all these different grounds into some mullet connectors when they actually should have done a different grounding situation'

  • ?

    business_signal: Banning Pinball Museum forced to liquidate entire collection (1,500+ machines) after failed relocation due to inadequate planning of renovation costs for Palm Springs facility

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.130

0:30
Hello and welcome to another episode of the Classic Pinball Podcast. My name is George, and today I'm joined by my co-host Dave. Hello, Dave. Hello, George.
0:46
Well, we're outside again. The great outdoors of New Hampshire. And today we're going to talk about the sheet and then Dave's exploits. now the sheet has been around for about two months we didn't discuss it in any of our previous episodes because we had better things to talk about so i've got eight items on the sheet this week bear with me some are old some might not be poignant at this point in time others we can expand on because we didn't have enough information so first things first spooky this is what i wrote on the first of july new games halloween and ultraman old news new flippers in their games from what i understand a new benhek board set and everything is now connected by molex connectors i'm sure it's been updated we saw the game at ultra we saw ultraman at allentown although we didn't play it did you get to play it one quick question molex are you saying molex or rj45 connectors i think molex connectors well rj45 is what stern's using to connect all the node boards isn't that what they're using no i'm talking about flippers bumpers everything's modular so you can gotcha like i do my games and you tell me i shouldn't do it but i do it anyway they listen to george when they're no they listen to me they're just being smart because they want to take equipment out of the or off the play field easily rather than unsoldering things that's the way i understand it but gotcha i didn't i haven't looked at their new game so that was number one on the list number two i think this came from you the hawaiian shirts with all the pinball themes on it yes didn't that come from you it did come from me like attack from mars black knight swords of rage the monsters yeah i don't know i saw a whole bunch of them yep i wouldn't buy them polyester that would make me doesn't breathe yeah i would sweat like a anyway so that was number two on the list number three a lot of information since i wrote this one down the banning pinball museum they're banning pinball how dare no no no no no okay thank the banning pinball museum is no longer in banning california you probably have heard this already folks but they sold excuse me they leased their building not for a pinball but for a grow no not that kind of grow yeah that kind of grow remember it's california green correct so they're not so they are no longer going to have a pinball museum And, folks, you've heard it on this show how many different times, Captain's Auction got 1,500 pinballs to auction off in two weekends in September. Wow. Now, you've heard us talk about Captain's Auction before. We usually comment on, you know, older Bally games or Stern games. But they basically are selling everything. The story goes they were trying to move to Palm Springs, which would have been great. They were going to buy an old print plant, newspaper print plant. But somebody didn't do their homework, from what I understand, and didn't realize the amount of work and money it was going to take to transform that building into a pinball museum.

  • System 80B/C games from the late 1980s have inherent grounding issues with floating grounds that cause coils to lock and blow multiple fuses.

    high confidence · Dave explaining the root cause of seven blown fuses in the Bad Girls System 80 game

  • Dave has approximately 8-9 restoration jobs in queue ahead of current projects, extending into spring.

    high confidence · Dave stating his queue length and workload extending multiple seasons

    • @ ~62:30

  • “Williams and also-ran... If you collect Williams games, people, look, I'm just not familiar with them. Don't take it personally.”

    George @ ~64:15 — Demonstrates George's focus on Bally/Stern games and relative unfamiliarity with Williams lineup

    • Bill Davis
    person
    Paulperson
    Will Wheatonperson
    Allentown Pinball Showevent
    Pentasticevent
    Maureenperson
    Cooperperson
    Tri-Zonegame
    Star Wars Home Modelgame
    Bad Girlsgame

    high · George: 'somebody didn't do their homework... didn't realize the amount of work and money it was going to take to transform that building... Ball dropped, no place to go, have to get rid of the machines'

  • ?

    venue_signal: Allentown pinball show successfully demonstrated return to normal operations with standard machine density, no COVID protocols, and no reported illness—described as 'litmus test' for future shows

    high · George and Dave: 'no fear, no nothing. People were having a great time. And there was no bad outcome... it was a good litmus test'

  • ?

    code_update: P3 released 'Silver Falls' software update for their Heist game, enabling playfield reuse across different theme versions

    medium · George: 'P3 they came out with a new software for that game Heist. It's called Silver Falls... you can reuse one of their play fields'

  • ?

    content_signal: Lucas Pepke created 'Take a Shot Stories,' an interactive decision-tree pinball narrative with positive podcast reception; creators considering collaboration

    medium · George praising Pepke's work on Zach Minney's show: 'it was a 20 minute soap opera about pinball... very very good you should have that gentleman on again if you don't have him on I'm going to go poach him'

  • ?

    operational_signal: High demand for pinball restoration services with Dave maintaining 8-9 job queue extending from fall through spring; customer base includes home users and collectors willing to pay for expert work

    high · Dave: 'I have like eight or nine ahead of me. You're going to be busy this fall... Into winter. Into spring. People are waiting in line... Life is good'

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Stern's reliability and quality issues generating negative sentiment and criticism for cost-cutting practices in home models, with observers noting it keeps repair specialists busy

    high · George's sarcastic comment: 'Stern, just keep turning those games up because you're keeping my friend busy' and sustained discussion of multiple Stern quality failures

  • ?

    collector_signal: Caribbean Cruise machine sold above initial asking price through personal networking rather than podcast/YouTube promotion, suggesting strong niche market for specific machines among serious collectors

    medium · Dave: 'They bought it for more than that... There's always a game for somebody. No one else... He has an apartment... Perfect for his place... came through direct communication not podcast'

  • ?

    restoration_signal: Dave documenting restoration techniques on podcast, including playfield swaps, cabinet refinishing (8-Ball Deluxe), and component-level repairs; queue includes 5+ playfield swap projects

    high · Queue includes: 'Knight Rider is a playfield swap, Centaur playfield swap, 8-Bot Lux playfield swap, Evil Knievel playfield swap... Quicksilver is a playfield swap'

    • 4:24
    Ball dropped, no place to go, have to get rid of the machines. So save your coins, folks, because there's going to be a lot of unique stuff for sale come September.
    4:38
    Comment? Question? And it's going to all be from California. It's going to be all shipped from there. Everything's going to be shipped from California. You're going to pay some money for that. Right, well, there's going to be some unique games. Anyway, so that was number three on the list. Number four. Oh, I think we've talked about this before. Pinball podcast no-nos. We break every rule.
    5:02
    Don't talk about tournaments. Don't talk about fixes. and don't ask anybody how they got into the pinball. Into pinball. Right. We break every rule. Rules are meant to be broken.
    5:15
    So that's number four. But we don't swear much. Number five. Even though he will not mention us, I don't see how we can avoid it this time. Zach Menne.
    5:29
    You had a feature on your show once. this gentleman by the name of Lucas Pepke. He has this thing called take a shot stories.
    5:43
    And the idea behind the story is there's points in the story where you have to make a decision and it's basically a decision tree. Will you do X or will you do Y? And then the story follows and flows from there. It was about a 20 minute soap opera about pinball. I don't know what episode it is folks you're going to have to go find that yourself but it was very very good you should have that gentleman on again if you don't have him on I'm going to go poach him because it was that good you haven't heard that it was pretty good okay that was number five number six oh P3 they came out with a new software for that game Heist.
    6:34
    It's called Silver Falls. Do you care? Is that like Lexi Lightspeed? Well, that thing, right. But in other words, you can reuse one of their play fields. Don't care. Okay.
    6:47
    Okay. Number six, done. Number seven. I think this came from you as well. Were you the one who sent me the text about Paragon and the Arduino sounds that somebody did all new stuff. Yes. Yes, I did. Okay, so you got your platform. Comment.
    7:12
    First comment, why? You can stop breathing heavily, too. I know. Oh, no, that's Cooper. That's Cooper. Close, yeah. Cooper, what are you doing over here?
    7:20
    You're breathing up a storm. Yeah, first question is why? Why, oh, why, oh, why? Cooper. And why are you panting Cooper so much? You're a hot dog. Cooper, what are you doing?
    7:35
    He wants on the mic. Sounds like a porn movie. Yeah. Cooper, I think you have to go inside. Yeah, go inside, Coop.
    7:42
    Okay, comment. So comment, why oh why would you do that to a poor paragon? It just, it was, for me, it just was hack. I don't know. I just wouldn't. I thought it was a nice try But I didn't really get it I think it was hacky I'm being honest here I gave it to other friends of mine Is it just me? They're like, no It was like, I don't know It was like color puke LEDs Fail Okay, I actually had to repair something I actually had to repair The ball gate On my Fireball Classic I hadn't done a repair in a long time.
    8:29
    I would like to say that it went well, but because I hadn't done a repair in so long, I kind of forgot how that thing worked, and I eventually figured it out and was successful, but it just needed a cleaning.
    8:43
    And then I had a fail the other day. Oh, I'm kind of bummed. First time in 15 plus years I went to use my jukebox And it didn't work I don't know anything about jukeboxes I kind of You know what I kind of warned you George I remember you Playing it And saying George This sounds a little scratchy A little No it's vintage It's how it's supposed to be It's a little bit of dirt And it's like Nah I don't want to spend any money It's like You should spend a little something George This thing's tired Well I did I just spent 45 bucks on a manual. Okay, well, that's something. That should be an interesting read. Hopefully I can figure it out. If not, I'm going to put a call out right now. Whether you listen or not, I know people know you, and you only live one town away, Tony. I'm going to say his name wrong. Pronounce it correctly for me. Tony Zidzik. Zidzik, Zidzik, Zidzik. Yeah, the guy with the weird last name. Yeah.
    9:44
    Anyway, don't take that personally. Tony, you just do have a very unique last name. But you're also a collector. I'll put out word, man. If I come up short, please come and help me.
    9:57
    I think it needs probably capacitors, dry-dry capacitors. We'll find out. So that's my list of things from the sheet. Okay. I don't know. Not bad, right? Not bad. So why don't we go to you now with the stories. why don't you tell us what you've been doing for almost the last six weeks since maybe it's even longer than that i don't even remember when we last recorded it's been so long why don't you tell us a highlight reel of games you might have acquired calls unique fixes you know break all the rules all right let's see so a bunch of customers been coming in bringing me games to restore for them So back in June Evil Knievel came in a Ballet Rolling Stones two awesome games You teased people about that Rolling Stones You got to get it on the stick and get it done so we can play it and do the recording Actually, I did the play field already. The play field's done. I just have to put it in the game and get that going. But I have a couple things on the cooker I've got to get done ahead of that.
    11:04
    And she doesn't mind waiting until, I don't know, the beginning of the year. Right, but I mind waiting because we need some games to talk about. We will. Well, I've got a Black Knight 2000 we can talk about soon. Okay. We haven't done that game yet.
    11:17
    What else have we got? We've got a World Cup went out. I restored that. That went back to the customer. Thank you, people, for listening to that and bearing with the long intro song. But that was a while ago. We recorded that like a couple months ago. That was in June. Yep. Then down the Cape, worked on a Dr. Dude at this guy's house, and it was so hot. They got no AC, and I'm so glad I bought it. I had a cut-off T-shirt. I had my regular shirt on my, you know, I do work with on, and I said, you know, I'll go to my car. Got that, worked on that. I had worked all day on that. That was a sweat fest, but that was, I don't know. We got her done.
    11:57
    Passed on a nice fun house, home use only. They wanted too much money. I could have bought that, but I have one.
    12:02
    I had a beautiful hot dog, and I restored up, brand-new play field, sold that. That's off to a new customer down the South Shore. did at Silvermania Valley. That's off to the new customer down in Connecticut. And Terminator 2 just did. One with Will Wheaton. Okay, you've made that joke too many times. No more Will Wheaton jokes. So that's off. That's out of there too. So that makes room for... Oh no, go back. Okay, T2 again. So what did your customer say when you left the placard on... Oh, I took that off. Oh. I took that off. I said, no, I'm not going to do it. No.
    12:42
    Even on the YouTube video, I didn't do it. So that's okay. No, so you do it on here. Okay. Exclusive content. Exactly.
    12:52
    What else did we do? We, down the Cape, picked up a home use only Dale Earnhardt, which is a NASCAR 2007 Stern game. Real, kind of a fun game. I actually bought it. Beautiful property, like a $4 million property. and they had this game forever. Didn't play it much, and so I got that. But I put a new DMD into it, clear rubber all around, cleaned it up. The play is gorgeous. I've got someone come and look at that in a couple days. That might be going real soon. So we might not get to play that. Might not. We'll see. I'm going on vacation again. Well, maybe come on down tomorrow or Tuesday. Yeah, probably not. Okay. Probably not. We'll see. Maybe he might not want to deliver right away. So, you know, there's always that. There's always something else in the line, Dave. I got a call for a Star Wars home model, which I never really knew existed. We talked about that. On the show? Yeah. Okay. I know I did. I don't know if I did. You might have listened. Because I didn't go on to it yet. I wasn't there yet. They put that game out a year, almost two years ago, I would guess. Okay. And we talked about it briefly. But you don't, I have details now. Because it's a re-theme, right? No, no, no, no, no, no, no. That's right. That one was... It's a regular-sized pinball, but it's BOM.
    14:13
    It's scaled down. What do you mean BOM? You know, what's it called? You know, the stuff you put into a game, you want to reduce the amount of parts. Yeah. The parts? Yeah, parts. Okay. Right? Build the material. There, see? There you go. I speak the lingo. Didn't know what you... Bomb? I mean, it could have been B-O-M-B. Okay? You know? Duck. Right. so we did talk we did talk about it but you know i don't i was just because it came out and i asked you if you were interested and you said no and now i am though because i had to go work on one of these things okay so not impressed uh they only had it for six months uh the start button stopped working they couldn't start a game the game powered on you couldn't the sound wasn't coming on basically they have problems with their connectors on their some of their node boards so I had to go reseat a couple of those. I had to put one back in. It was out. I had to replace one of the little .100 Molex connectors on it. Stern, just keep turning those games up because you're keeping my friend busy. And then the play field. I cannot believe the play field on this thing. Look, on the play field, it's particle board. The play field is particle board.
    15:20
    Really? Yeah. Good luck trying to put a screw in and out of that a couple of times. A lot of glue.
    15:27
    So it's not going to hold up too well. I mean, that's why it's a home game. But it's... Still, they got a lot of money for that thing. They got four grand for it. And all you can spend is two more grand for the real thing. Not a bad player. Oh, and the other thing they cheaped out on. The kickers in the game. They both go off at the same time. Oh, they're tied together. They're tied together. There's two pump bumpers. I remember hearing about that. There's two pump bumpers. Those are tied together. In fact, I emailed Stern. I was like, hey, is this good? Because I wasn't sure. Is this right? They kind of go off together. It's like, oh, no, that's a feature. That's a feature. That's us being very frugal.
    16:03
    I could use the other word, but very frugal. I felt bad because the husband called me in to work on it, and he was trying to get a warranty on it. It's like, well, if I need a call by Stern, I can do a warranty if Stern gets me in there. But if you're calling me to do it, it's not. You can go back to Stern and see what you can do, whatever.
    16:20
    He was in Europe, and so I met the wife there and worked on it. It's very nice. but after I kind of told her it's like yeah you know there's a home model and the one is not quite the same as the arcade model here's why so I kind of told her too much she started on the phone with her husband overseas and started reading him the riot act and why'd you buy this why did you cheap out you could have bought the real thing instead she wanted a Pac-Man so I'm going to get you a Star Wars instead a lot of women like Pac-Man oh I thought you meant Pac-Man the pinball No, no, no, the video game. No one wants that game. Right, well, why do you think I was making noises?
    17:03
    Yep. Are you expecting me to ask you something? Yeah, go ahead. Are you scrambling to find something to talk about? Hold on, I just got a quick minute. Let me see, where was I? Oh, Bad Girls. Oh, yeah, Bad Girls. What a wonderful, godly system, whatever it is. People like that game. No. Why?
    17:23
    I'm not... Remember who you're talking to. Okay. I don't know if I've ever played it. I can't comment. I can only tell you that I've heard chatter in other podcasts about the game. I'm assuming they were positive. But you're saying no. You're shaking your head violently. The backlash and that thing. What is going on? A lot of short-haired women with... I'm going to have to go look. I have a picture in my head, but I think I'm picturing another game it was kind of kind of a skanky bad am i am i picturing this game falling off the edge of a cliff yeah boat anchor this guy called me up oh i got a bad girls and i want to get it worked on and say okay what's wrong well it it doesn't yeah that's it what's right i just i keep hearing the song isn't that what's her name okay he said he got a bad girl maureen said what's her name but i'm bummed nice no no what's who's the i'm the comedy relief here who's the woman who sang the song donna summer right bad girls nothing but the bad bad okay okay cue the song cue it up unfortunately it's ringing in my head yeah go ahead so this is not a great game no and this guy you know didn't have a lot of money to spend and it's a system it's a late system 80 not really my will so i really want to deal with it so i said listen i'll try to get your work and if it's dead i said it could be just some connector pins maybe but i'm gonna say for a little bit of dough i'll try to get your work and no promises and you know you're gonna pay me anyway so i went out there but but i went out there and you turn it on the whole thing was there except for a couple lights and then i looked at the main board it's like someone already repaired the alkaline damage not too good but they did some kind of repair and someone did some kind of work on it. A little hacky, but it's like, okay. Bad job. Bad job. A hack, hack job. So, I said, you know what?
    19:21
    It's just a fuse. That was going through my head. It was just a fuse. Actually, George, it was seven fuses. There were seven bad fuses in the game. I replaced one at a time. I started getting more and more life out of it. Finally, by the time it was done, the pop-up was more working. Now those were working. The game played after I was done with it. But the rubber was totally trashed more now let me ask a question what would cause seven fuses to go out on a game well on these system 80b or c or whatever they are from the late 80s they had really a bad grounding issue they put all these different grounds into some mullet connectors when they actually should have done a different grounding situation so you got a lot of floating grounds going on, so coils lock on when I'm supposed to, and take a fuse out.
    20:12
    So, depending on... It sounds like a barbecue. Oh, it's a barbecue. So I put new fuses in there. New proper fuses. Slow blow, like they're supposed to be. Game powered up. Nothing locked on. Played a game. I said, you know, you really could use some rubber on this. And I could do that for him. It's like, oh, no, no. I want to keep it to what we talked about. It's like, if you want to do it yourself, I told him where you can buy the rubber, where you can do this and that. He's going to do it himself because he got the game for free from his brother-in-law a couple years ago. He has his family come over and likes to play it. But it barely plays.
    20:45
    But Maureen was there like, let's do some more stuff. I was like, no, Maureen, this is his budget. We're staying within his budget. Cut bait. I can't believe we actually fixed this thing. The guy was so happy. He was happy with the price. It's working. Red tail light guarantee. Walk out with head high. Exactly. And run. and run keep going keep going yep that was everybody always trying to save a buck i know usually not my typical customer but this time around it's like ah i'll give it a shot i had some free time that day why not so what's in the queue what are what we tease our audience from time to time and sometimes we get around to the games Other times it never to come to fruition All right so what in the queue The queue So right now in the batter box or right on the table let say is Black Knight 2000 and the Dale Earnhardt Jr. Once those are out, then I'm going to finish up a Superman restoration, which is newly touched, really nice, professionally touched up by Bill Davis, Playfield and Clearcoat. That's all done. It's going to put that together. Then that's going to go. And then I have a Firepower, another Firepower, an Evil Knievel, a Rolling Stones. So some games that we have not done shows on yet, which is good. An 8-Ball Deluxe. That's going to be the original 81 with a brand-new painted cabinet. You've teased this too many times. People are going to start getting mad. Oh, I know. But that's going to be – that's got the cabinet back. So that's going to be – Oh, the Trando did that, right? Yep. I want to get that done by Christmas. What else is in the queue? Centaur. A guy brought a Centaur from New Jersey. Okay. Let me restore it. That's going to be, hopefully, I get work on that next couple of months. Oh, we've already done that. And I already own one. And Centaur 2, I'm doing a swap with my friend Paul, who is going to swap me. Plus some money either way. We're not sure which yet. But he's going to give me a game, and Centaur 2 is going to be part of it. He's going to get a Centaur 2. I'm getting something he has. so that's those two games I've got to do a quick show for him as well for Paul and a Knight Rider I've got a Knight Rider coming up we've got to figure out how we're going to do that if we do a show not very complicated we won't spend a lot of time with it I own one I've got a lot of playfield swaps on the plate Knight Rider is a playfield swap Centaur playfield swap 8-Bot Lux playfield swap Evil Knievel playfield swap I think that's four Oh Quicksilver is a playfield swap There's five I think Is that all You're going to be Oh no Doctor Who I've got to do I have a Doctor Who in the queue I've got to do that one too Coming up That's an interesting game I played that when I was in Texas Just because People had talked about it so much That's an interesting game Fun to play I even have the moving Dalek head I bought for Someone made that years ago There you go Just to have it That's going to be going there And what else Any thoughts I've got going on there I think I have like eight or nine ahead of me. You're going to be busy this fall. I'm busy this fall. Into winter. Into spring. People are waiting in line. I said, take your deli ticket number and wait. Life is good. Yep. Okay.
    24:10
    Oh, yeah. And Caribbean Cruise has finally cruised out of the living room. Oh, did somebody buy it? Yes, they did.
    24:18
    Did somebody buy it for the price we discussed? They bought it for... No, they bought it for more than that. No. Yeah. Yeah, George. Sure. Really? Yeah.
    24:32
    Wow. They paid some, you know, reasonable money for it. Good for you. I was half with the money. He's half with the money. It all worked out well. Good for you. And that said. I didn't think that would sell.
    24:42
    He called me at the Cape and I said, well, here's what I got. It's like, oh, that sounds great. It's just the game I want. You know what? There's always a game for somebody. No one else. This is the Charlie in the Box. So how did they hear about it? Through me. They asked me what games I had for sale, and I told them what I had. So they didn't come through the podcast or through YouTube? Nope. Good. He has an apartment. He doesn't have much room. Perfect for his place. It's a fun game. We had fun playing it. Take the next day. I helped him load in the car. It didn't quite fit in his SUV, but I made sure it did. We might have dinged the wife's headliner a little bit, but I didn't care. It had to go in. See ya. Here, let me give it an extra shove. There you go. Bye.
    25:23
    Bye. No charge for that. Here's something we didn't talk about in the last episode. And I was wondering, did you hear whether anybody got sick from the Allentown show? I listened to podcasts and I didn't see anything on Pinside. I didn't hear a peep. Nope. I've talked to people that went to the show. No one got sick as far as I know. No one's saying they got sick. I think it was actually a good test of the whole thing that, I don't know. No one got sick.
    26:03
    And everybody, there was no, as a regular party like 2019, all the machines were close together. People were walking around with regular faces and so forth. And there was no fear, no nothing. People were having a great time. And there was no bad outcome. No, I thought the show was. It was a lot of fun. I thought it was a lot of fun. I'm looking forward to the next one. I'm hoping that these all go off this fall. Yeah. I think Pentastic was a good one to go for because now they did more of a normal show, and they kind of set the standard now. It's like, see, we did it. There are no repercussions from it. There's no bad things. So now going forward, you guys can do it too. So hopefully that's how it's going to go. I think it was a good litmus test. Yeah, exactly. That's the word. There you go. Anything else that we have not talked about that we should have talked about?
    26:53
    Oh, yeah. Well, thank you. Today's episode? Today's thing or no? Yeah, definitely. Okay, so why? Well, first, let's back up a little bit.
    27:08
    Dave and I have been trying to get together for, I don't know, a week or more. and I was away, he was away. I had to play catch up. We went to the show. Just a lot of gravity.
    27:21
    And Dave texted me yesterday, last night actually, I was at a concert, and he said, Hey, I got an opportunity to buy a game tomorrow morning at 10 o'clock. You're going to be around? And I said, Yeah, I'm not going anywhere. I'll let you go from there.
    27:40
    So I got a call from this lady, and she's like a storage war kind of lady. So she goes and that's all she does. She goes and buys storage units that no one wants anymore. The guy died or whatever for a dollar sometimes, whatever. So she always gets treasures and so forth. So she, at the end of this one, she had a bunch of, what's it called, cast iron stoves and all that kind of crap. Did you actually go to the storage unit? No, no, no. She just told me, but she told me the whole story. Okay. I felt like I was talking to Sharon's sister. Oh, no. It was a Sharon situation. Oh, no. Okay, so she was going on and on and on. It was funny. You know, she's definitely a character, but she's definitely hard-nosed, and she's used to wheeling and dealing, and she's kind of a tough character like that, you know. So she said, well, I got this tri-zone. It's like, well, you know, I said, send me pictures. She did. Pictures look good. Nice play field. Nice back glass on it, you know. It's in my van. I want you to take it as it is out of my van because I need my van to do more stuff, more getting rid of stuff. She wanted the light box to be gone. She wanted it to be gone. She wanted to flip it real quick. She got it for probably nothing. She just wanted to flip it. But she called around. She called this guy. I don't know who this guy was from Pennsylvania. Whoever you are from Pennsylvania, I don't really know what you're talking about.
    28:59
    Supposedly, she said that the guy told her, yeah, that game is worth $1,200 to $1,700. So she's coming to me. I said, listen, you're talking with me. You're talking hundreds, not thousands. I said, the game is not booting up. I see lights coming on, but it's not booting up.
    29:16
    Is that your stomach? I don't know what that is, George. I think it's a bear peeing in the woods over there.
    29:24
    I don't know, George. So I said, listen, I tried to set expectations. I said, you know what? She thought she had gold. She did. I said, you know what? I said, I know what it is. I said, it's like, it's worth $400 to $500 for me, top six. It's like, well, I can't, I'm more like six. I go, can you do $550? No, I want six. I go, tell you what, that's fine. I'll come take a look at it. I'll look at it. It's a beautiful day on Sunday tomorrow. I'll just come take a ride. I got to see, I'm going to see George anyway. I said, George, hello. Can I, I want to come up and see you. Great, we'll get together. So we'll do a multi, if this thing didn't work out, I'm going to see George anyway, do some stuff with him, you know. So we, well, can you be here before 10 a.m.? So we got up extra early and got there right before 10. There it was in her van. We pull up. The husband comes out. I think it was her husband. Not quite sure. A little rough and tumble. Kind of almost like the whole place was a little bit like it had a feel of a trailer park. Sort of a trailer park situation, George. Okay. A little in Nashua. So I didn't really know the Nashua. Oh, I know exactly where you were. Yeah. You hit a highway. I know where you were. Okay. So, you know, it was a little, the nerve endings were hanging out of society, let's call it, in this area. Oh, boy. So. Wow.
    30:40
    Didn't your mom teach you? You don't have something polite to say? Jeez. Poor lady's not even here to defend herself. Although, I'll chime in in a minute. Tell the rest of the story. I just wouldn't really move near there anyway. Let's just say that. So, anyway, so he said, well, I need to look at it some more, you know. So, I mean, we pulled the game out. She's nowhere to be found. He comes out, nice guy. Helps me pull the game out. He has to take something out of the thing to get it out of the van, and it's stuck. So let me take the head off. Oh, I don't know how to take it. I said, I will. Where's the key? Oh, I don't know. So finally, we took it out, put it on a platform out of the van, turned the key to the head, took the glass out. I think I'm going to see some battery damage on there, but it's okay. I'll be able to fix that. Because, you know, it lights up. But I just know there's a problem with the main boards. George, there was more than a problem with the main boards. There was a big freaking problem with the board. You know what the big problem was? There were no boards. There was a sound board that was missing the MPU, the driver, and the power supply. Now, again, I'm not familiar with this game. I went out and looked. I was actually shocked they made 7,200 of these. So, pretty popular. But in the pecking order of pinball companies. It's a B. Well, in 1979, would one say 1A and 1B, depending on who you are, Bally and Stern were 1 and 2? Yeah. And everybody else was kind of an also-ran? Williams and also-ran Williams, yeah. So Williams is... Down low. If you collect Williams games, people, look, I'm just not familiar with them. Don't take it personally. Just a fax man. Like what you like but I don think they the greatest of games They an also So if you were to tell me about a Williams game for our audience is there something there where I familiar with and I say oh, that's a pretty good game? Yeah, like Firepower, Alien Poker, Blackout, not a bad game. Okay, I'm familiar with those. Flash. That's me the last time I played one. And I just went to a pinball show. Folks, I didn't play a lot of pinball there, unfortunately. did a lot of walking around and a lot of talking around the problem is the williams game in that time frame their flippers sucked and but nowadays you actually can make a williams game a lot better by replacing the williams flipper mechanisms with the modern wpc style where williams actually had a clue the modern 90s games they had better stuff so you kind of incorporate some 90s stuff in that late 70s stuff and now the game behaves you know approaching a bally it's approaching that still not the same build quality it's still the cheaper build quality than a ballet was like a cadillac and i don't know the other williams like a chevy you know something like that you know maybe a little maybe more uh pinto a pinto like a yugo no or pinto let's call it a pinto sorry harry williams or chevy vega with the aluminum engine so let's get back to the story sure so so anyway so this lady yes got well you'll see well you'll see so i i basically told the guy i said oh dude it has no boards in it so when i said 600 bucks it's like i can't give you 600 bucks this thing i said no i'm i'm definitely a six i'm more like i'm four tops right here i'm 400 bucks tops and that's being generous oh i gotta well i gotta go talk to her then he went inside i mean while looking at the game some more and looking at the play field i see there's a little bit of planking in the play fields but all these williams games started planking but it wasn't bad yet it said it's serviceable but i did i even 400 bucks is being too generous because i i need to there's not much meat in the bone so he came back with nervously smoking a cigarette like he just kind of went to mommy mommy's pissed off at him she came out and she goes what's going on it's it's like i can't give you 600 bucks there's no boards in it well you took the game all apart it's like no i didn't take the game all apart i took the back glass out to see the game well you promised me 600 it's like you we talked about a complete game this is not a complete game for a lady who does this, I'm guessing, for a living, it's not a sale until you have those Benjamins in your hand and you're walking away.
    34:46
    Exactly. So I dodged a bullet. So I basically said, listen, and again, I was like, I'll give you $400 for a license. No, I want $600. No, no deal. And then she walked off. She just walked right off. Never injured herself. Walked off. She's all pissed off. Okay. So I still felt bad for her because I know she had to get the game out and she had to go do more shopping when she's doing. So actually I put the back glass back in for the guy I put it all back the way it was so I don't have any hard feelings at all I said I can tell if you take the head off people want to take the head off anyway it's not doing any good with the head on the game oh and the power supply that goes to the transformer there were like 5 wires cut from that too this was a project game this was a game aimed at somebody who is looking to do the work themselves and not turn it for a profit. Like, right? Right? I mean... It is. $200 tops for this game at this point. Right.
    35:44
    The boards, you're going to pay between $600 to $800 for it to populate the game. Right, and as I said to you, and correct me if I'm wrong, and if you collect these games, I couldn't find any instances of that game selling for more than $1,000. And I said to you, I think I'm being generous. If you could sell it for $1,500, you might get it, but you might wait a long time too. A long time, you're going to spend a lot of time, a lot of effort into it. It's an okay player. If I'm going to put that game up or my Stargazer, I'm going to put my Stargazer up, not that game. I'm always waiting its turn to come into the light. There's always better games in the queue. If I had a 10,000 square foot place, sure it would be up, but otherwise, no. So I said, ah, no. So I basically left and we went to breakfast before we got over to here and I got a text right away. oh I'm sorry I get an apology from her I'm sorry I was rough that way I had a bad thing on the phone with somebody else whatever a tenant or something so I'll do $3.75 to give you $25 back for your gas so she's willing to kind of but at that point I was like no now you've got a box of lights that's all you've got then she tried calling me good project game I was already off like I'm not getting this game let's conclude the story So then we went out on Facebook Marketplace, which is where she wanted to market the thing anyway. When she was calling me, I can just put it on Facebook Marketplace and get $1,200 for it all day long, but I'll give you a shot at it. I said, go ahead. Go do it. So she did. She put it out there, I see, and it says $700. Like right after she was trying to text me, $700, and said not sure of its condition or not sure if it works. Yeah, she was playing coy. She's playing coy. I told her what it was. Right. She didn't come clean. Not coming clean. And I said to you, if anybody traveled an hour or more to go see this game and opened it up and then defined like you did, no boards in it, I think they would be ripped. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I mean, like you said, you had some other things to do, and this is what you do for a living. Right. You've got to go check them out. Sure. But, you know, for the hobbyists who go look at this game saying, oh, you know, one of my favorite games, I want it, only to open it up and say, there's no boards in here. What am I going to do? well, you're going to pay up is what you're going to do because brand new boards, like you said, $700 or $800. And it does say, though, to her credit, it says $700 but make an offer. Right.
    38:14
    It'll be interesting to see what she gets for it. We won't know. But if you do happen to listen to our podcast and you bought the game, you can email Dave because I won't give you my email.
    38:29
    Smart, George. Very smart. very wise it's easy on my life anything else we might have forgotten I say that every time more than once in a show you folks are always nice to me well most of you are well most of them are George but you know I take the feedback it's ok so if you don't have anything else Dave and I said so again still trying to break that habit so-and-so yeah me if not i think we'll conclude this show and uh how about uh hello to grant in australia hello grant yeah hey grant yeah shout out to grant grant we uh you need to move over here maybe or uh i don't know somewhere where you can uh relax we should ask grant this will be probably sometime in september when this airs have you had the chance to play the new fathom 2.0 that's what I want to know. Yeah, that's a good question. So what I'm still looking for I never published it but I'll put it out there. If there's somebody in the New England area that has purchased one of these and actually gets delivery of one and would like to be on a podcast, Dave and I would like to come out and play your game. So if you do get one contact Dave and we'll come out and we'll play the game with you. How's that?
    40:00
    I like it. And we'll be able to put our names and the initials in the high score. What do you think, George? I think those people would be very mad at you. It won't be me anyway. So until next time, this is George and Dave saying sayonara. We'll see you in the pinball future. We can be cute and say, this is George and this is Dave. Like that.
    40:24
    I lift things up. I put them down. Everybody, peace out out there. Yep. Till next time. Dave. Who? Dave. D-A-V-E. Yeah, Dave. Right.
    40:39
    Dr. Dave's Pinball Restorations restores games to look and play like the first day they hit the arcade. Buy a piece of your childhood back with one of the following games in our restoration queue. If you're looking for that late model pinball machine, well, we currently have three available. A Stern NASCAR, the rare limited edition Dale Jr. with only 600 made.
    41:03
    Bally, we have a Doctor Who and a Twilight Zone. And for your classic pinball fans, we have the following Ballys. A Kiss, Supersonic, Paragon, Skateball, Flash Gordon, Embryon, and Fireball 2. For classic Stern, we have Sea Witch, Stingray, and Nineball. For Williams, we have a Firepower Atari, we have a Superman Gottlieb, old school EMs Top Score and a Flipper Pool And for Bally, old school electromechanicals We have a Bally Captain Fantastic and a Bally Flip Flop
    41:53
    Shake it, shake it Shake it, do it now Show them how we do it now Shake it, do it now Show them how we do it now Let's show the world we can dance Better not to Stuck our stuff The music gives us a chance We do more Down on the floor Bloomin' news Our hearts are locked We put in motion Every single one Folkies sound Wall to wall We're bumpin' booties Havin' us a ball, y'all We're shakin' through things Shakin' through things Yeah, yeah Show them how we do it now Shake it through things Yeah, yeah Show them how we do it now