Pinball, Resurrected
THE FLIPPER’S SWEET SPOT STRIKES THE be prepared to look at many before finding a good
steel sphere, sending it through a gantlet of one to buy. For first-timers, even those with back-colorful obstacles. Electrical relays fire, bells grounds in electronics or mechanics, I recommend
ring, lights blink, sounds play, and the world vibrates spending the extra dollars to buy a machine that’s
with a dizzying barrage that only sharpens your focus. at least in decent shape. There will still be plenty of
You parse the steel ball’s trajectory, then adjust its things to tune.
course by nudging the 300-pound machine under- You can buy pinball machines in better condition
neath; there’s nothing “virtual” here. You are playing from restorers, who range from hobbyists to full-pinball, and it envelops you in a sense-filling physical- time professionals. The most pristine are “home
ity that video games can’t begin to approach. use only” machines, which were never operated in
Even though the once-ubiquitous pinball machine public places. You can also pick up machines from
is a rare sight in arcades and bars today, you can arcade operators and “route operators” who place
still fulfill your wildest pinball dreams by buying them in bars and restaurants. In my experience, you
and restoring one yourself. The machines and should be more careful with these. I have seen evi-the parts are out there, and many games in good dence of numerous dubious ad hoc “repairs” done
or reparable condition are collecting dust, waiting to on-route machines in order to avoid the effort
for a loving home. Old pinball machines are tough, and expense of taking them off-location for proper
designed to survive with little maintenance in maintenance. The worst offense is the use of spray
rowdy, smoky roadhouses. They’re also built for lubricants such as WD- 40. Pinball machines were
repair; different models share many of the same designed as sealed boxes with mechanical sys-mechanical and electrical subsystems, which you tems that don’t require oiling, so they could work
can easily swap around. I’ve enjoyed restoring sev- maintenance-free in smoke-filled bars for months.
eral pinball machines, and my most recent adoption Extraneous lubricant sucks up dust and smoke,
was a Williams Cyclone, a great solid-state pinball and turns into a thick, damaging sludge.
machine from 1988. Here’s how I did it, along with To find machines for sale, I scanned craigslist.org,
more general advice on pinball restoration. the rec.games.pinball forum, and Mr. Pinball classifieds (see makezine.com/08/pinball for more
resources). I prefer late-80s and 90s Williams/Bally
pinball machines, and my search led to Thursday
Night Pinball ( pinballnight.org), a group in San Jose
that meets in a battery shop. The group’s organizer
had a Williams Cyclone for sale for $1,000. Cyclone
is one of my favorites; it’s a brilliant machine from
Photography by Bill Bumgarner
Find a Machine
Pinball machines can cost anywhere from $100 for
an as-is electromechanical to nearly $10,000 for
a particularly collectable game in good condition.
Prices vary wildly, so unless you absolutely must
have a particular, hard-to-find game, you should
66 Make: Volume 08
