Pressing both flippers causing reset on Williams IJ

[Dave]

Hi all,

Just fired up the game and when I press both flippers at the same time the game resets. Can play a game if I press one flipper at a time but as soon as I press those flippers at the same time game resets.

Have checked all connections, made sure the boards are all firmly in place and the grounding screws are all tight. I rebuilt the flippers myself just over 12 months ago and replaced all components except the actual coils which are still strong and show no signs of having any issues at all and the game has been working well up until today when the reset issue started.

From research I have done in the past when I was getting random resets I was advised that the issue at that time could be a bad BR2 bridge rectifier, its associated C5/C4 filter capacitor, and marginal terminal pins on connector J101. Turns out at the time it was simply a couple of missing grounding screws that had caused the boards in the backbox to become a little loose but once I replaced these screws AND tightened the other ones to make it all nice and tight with no movement, I had no more reset issues and game has played beautifully for the last 12 or so months. Until now.

This problem I have now though, is very targeted and happens ONLY when both flippers are pressed at the same time compared to the other time which was more random. Pressing one flipper at a time I have no issue and can play game. Press both flippers together and bang, reset!!

Question. Anyone else have this exact same issue and if so, what ended up being the problem and/or fix?

Thanks in advance.

David.

[Dave]

Post by Dave
Hi all,
Just fired up the game and when I press both flippers at the same time the game resets. Can play a game if I press one flipper at a time but as soon as I press those flippers at the same time game resets.
Have checked all connections, made sure the boards are all firmly in place and the grounding screws are all tight. I rebuilt the flippers myself just over 12 months ago and replaced all components except the actual coils which are still strong and show no signs of having any issues at all and the game has been working well up until today when the reset issue started.
From research I have done in the past when I was getting random resets I was advised that the issue at that time could be a bad BR2 bridge rectifier, its associated C5/C4 filter capacitor, and marginal terminal pins on connector J101. Turns out at the time it was simply a couple of missing grounding screws that had caused the boards in the backbox to become a little loose but once I replaced these screws AND tightened the other ones to make it all nice and tight with no movement, I had no more reset issues and game has played beautifully for the last 12 or so months. Until now.
This problem I have now though, is very targeted and happens ONLY when both flippers are pressed at the same time compared to the other time which was more random. Pressing one flipper at a time I have no issue and can play game. Press both flippers together and bang, reset!!
Question. Anyone else have this exact same issue and if so, what ended up being the problem and/or fix?
Thanks in advance.

Looks like it might be the connectors. When I removed the connectors and cleaned the pins a little the reset with the flippers stopped. Still reset halfway through one game though so will have a closer look at these connectors and maybe give them a bit more of a clean and check all the other connectors while I’m at it. So hoping it is just a bit of dirt on the pins that may be causing the issue.

Cheers, David.

Post by Dave
David.

[seymour.shabow]

Post by Dave
Looks like it might be the connectors. When I removed the connectors
and cleaned the pins a little the reset with the flippers stopped.
Still reset halfway through one game though so will have a closer
look at these connectors and maybe give them a bit more of a clean
and check all the other connectors while I’m at it. So hoping it is
just a bit of dirt on the pins that may be causing the issue.

Probably not, it most likely will reoccur. See pinwiki.com in the wpc
section for lots of possible reset causes.

My personal favorite on games like IJ that have the Z connector is to
get rid of it as a start and solder the wires together (and heatshrink),
as a first step.

The mantra used to be "replace c5 and br" but that's not 100% correct
any longer. You need to follow the troubleshooting tree at pinwiki to
nail it down 100%.

Connectors are most common issue as you've noted, but you didn't "fix"
anything by reseating them, or cleaning them - the plating gets
compromised and they need to be replaced. The official molex rating for
this type of connector is *25 cycles* - once you're over that, nothing
is guaranteed.

[Dave]

Post by Dave
Looks like it might be the connectors. When I removed the connectors
and cleaned the pins a little the reset with the flippers stopped.
Still reset halfway through one game though so will have a closer
look at these connectors and maybe give them a bit more of a clean
and check all the other connectors while I’m at it. So hoping it is
just a bit of dirt on the pins that may be causing the issue.

Probably not, it most likely will reoccur. See pinwiki.com in the wpc
section for lots of possible reset causes.
My personal favorite on games like IJ that have the Z connector is to
get rid of it as a start and solder the wires together (and heatshrink),
as a first step.
The mantra used to be "replace c5 and br" but that's not 100% correct
any longer. You need to follow the troubleshooting tree at pinwiki to
nail it down 100%.
Connectors are most common issue as you've noted, but you didn't "fix"
anything by reseating them, or cleaning them - the plating gets
compromised and they need to be replaced. The official molex rating for
this type of connector is *25 cycles* - once you're over that, nothing
is guaranteed.

Good advice. Will certainly check this info out and have a good read through. Thanks.