Need Help With Gottlieb Countdown (All New Boards installed)

[JS Terry]

Just installed all new boards in a Gottlieb Countdown (Rottendog power supply, Ni-Wumph MPU, and rottendog driver). On power up everything looked good. I selected Countdown as the game. In diagnostics, all switches work/test correctly, displays test correctly, all lights work, solenoids work except #8 (Red Target Bank Reset). However, if I manually ground the transistor for the Red Bank reset the solenoid fires and the targets reset.

If I try to start a game, the games gives the initial tune, resets only one bank of targets. Flippers and pop bumper work. However, nothing else works. No displays, no switches, no controlled solenoids (so it won't feed ball to trough or if I put a ball in the upper saucer it doesn't work.)

Sort of stuck as to why everything works in diagnostics (except solenoid #8) but then nothing works when starting a game.

Any ideas would be appreciated. Thanks.

One other note, I had a spare original System 1 board with a Countdown ROM. Not sure if it was completely working. However, I did install it back in the game and I was able to start a new game with everything working except two of the target bank solenoids were stuck on.

Also, I have re-pinned all the connectors.

Johnie

[JS Terry]

Just installed all new boards in a Gottlieb Countdown (Rottendog power supply, Ni-Wumph MPU, and rottendog driver). On power up everything looked good. I selected Countdown as the game. In diagnostics, all switches work/test correctly, displays test correctly, all lights work, solenoids work except #8 (Red Target Bank Reset). However, if I manually ground the transistor for the Red Bank reset the solenoid fires and the targets reset.
If I try to start a game, the games gives the initial tune, resets only one bank of targets. Flippers and pop bumper work. However, nothing else works. No displays, no switches, no controlled solenoids (so it won't feed ball to trough or if I put a ball in the upper saucer it doesn't work.)
Sort of stuck as to why everything works in diagnostics (except solenoid #8) but then nothing works when starting a game.
Any ideas would be appreciated. Thanks.
One other note, I had a spare original System 1 board with a Countdown ROM. Not sure if it was completely working. However, I did install it back in the game and I was able to start a new game with everything working except two of the target bank solenoids were stuck on.
Also, I have re-pinned all the connectors.
Johnie

Figured out the issue. It was actually two different things. First, tried the new Ni-Wumpf with an old original driver board and it had the same symptoms, worked fine in diagnostics except solenoid #8. Then when I started a game it would play the start up tune, reset the green targets but nothing else, no displays, switches, etc. would work. I had a old system 1 CPU and a Countdown ROM so I used it with the original driver board and the game worked except solenoid #8. So, the issue has to be in the new Ni-Wumpf. In fairness to Ni-Wumpf I've used their boards successfully in the past. This particular board, while never having used it, I had in storage for over a year. It's possible I did something to mess it up so I don't want to throw any "shade" their way.

As for solenoid #8, it ended up being the CPU to Driver connector. It was a brand new harness I bought from Docent Electronics so I assumed it was good. However, one of the pins had come out. It was the pin that sent the signal to solenoid #8 (A1J5-2). I pushed the pin back in and everything worked.

Long story short, it seems that I had two brand new pieces (Ni-Wumpf and the wiring harness) that had issues.

As a side note, you may be wondering why I was putting new boards in the game if I had old ones that worked. I was restoring this game for a lady and I wanted to make sure that it was as "bulletproof" as it could be. I figured new boards would be better than using the 40 year old boards I had even if they were still working. Plus my boards had been "hacked" a little over the years.

[JS Terry]

Post by JS Terry

Just installed all new boards in a Gottlieb Countdown (Rottendog power supply, Ni-Wumph MPU, and rottendog driver). On power up everything looked good. I selected Countdown as the game. In diagnostics, all switches work/test correctly, displays test correctly, all lights work, solenoids work except #8 (Red Target Bank Reset). However, if I manually ground the transistor for the Red Bank reset the solenoid fires and the targets reset.
If I try to start a game, the games gives the initial tune, resets only one bank of targets. Flippers and pop bumper work. However, nothing else works. No displays, no switches, no controlled solenoids (so it won't feed ball to trough or if I put a ball in the upper saucer it doesn't work.)
Sort of stuck as to why everything works in diagnostics (except solenoid #8) but then nothing works when starting a game.
Any ideas would be appreciated. Thanks.
One other note, I had a spare original System 1 board with a Countdown ROM. Not sure if it was completely working. However, I did install it back in the game and I was able to start a new game with everything working except two of the target bank solenoids were stuck on.
Also, I have re-pinned all the connectors.
Johnie

Figured out the issue. It was actually two different things. First, tried the new Ni-Wumpf with an old original driver board and it had the same symptoms, worked fine in diagnostics except solenoid #8. Then when I started a game it would play the start up tune, reset the green targets but nothing else, no displays, switches, etc. would work. I had a old system 1 CPU and a Countdown ROM so I used it with the original driver board and the game worked except solenoid #8. So, the issue has to be in the new Ni-Wumpf. In fairness to Ni-Wumpf I've used their boards successfully in the past. This particular board, while never having used it, I had in storage for over a year. It's possible I did something to mess it up so I don't want to throw any "shade" their way.
As for solenoid #8, it ended up being the CPU to Driver connector. It was a brand new harness I bought from Docent Electronics so I assumed it was good. However, one of the pins had come out. It was the pin that sent the signal to solenoid #8 (A1J5-2). I pushed the pin back in and everything worked.
Long story short, it seems that I had two brand new pieces (Ni-Wumpf and the wiring harness) that had issues.
As a side note, you may be wondering why I was putting new boards in the game if I had old ones that worked. I was restoring this game for a lady and I wanted to make sure that it was as "bulletproof" as it could be. I figured new boards would be better than using the 40 year old boards I had even if they were still working. Plus my boards had been "hacked" a little over the years.

Update and correction. There was NOT anything wrong with the Ni-Wumpf board that I used. It was user error. I feel pretty dumb once you hear what the error was. I've been restoring games for 16 years and I work as a computer programmer, so the mistake I made was really dumb. It was like the person who calls into tech support and is told to turn their computer off and on and it fixes the problem or the grandma who call tech support once a week because she can't remember how to get solitaire to play on her computer.

As for the issue, it seems I didn't have a game selected. In my defense, and it's a weak one, with the Ni-Wumpf, the first thing you do is go to the Game Select option and it gives the 16 System 1 games that you cycle through until you find your game and then select it. Well, COUNTDOWN is the very first option and I thought it was selected. It seems that it wasn't selected. So, I re-initialized the board and went to game select mode and cycled through all the games until it came back to COUNTDOWN and then selected it. After that, everything worked.