working on Kick Off

Here are some notes for my Kick Off saga.  I hadn't had time to get it to 100%, and there were a handful of things bugging me.  This all happened earlier this year, but better late than never.  More pics and schematics under the cut, below.

First thing was that the upper lines alternate 1+3 lights and 2+4 lights for rollover bonus.  They scored fine, but the lights weren't coming on for one position.  Where to look?  Check the schematics below

We can see that "12A SCM" is what alternates them, which means stack 12 on the score motor, switch A in that stack.  just needed some cleaning and adjustment.  Luckily it is on the end of the motor stacks, so easiest to tend to.

The big thing with the game however was that the progressive yardage lights weren't  working (schematics below, near numbers 26-28) , nor the Target Goal light (see above schematic,) nor the yardage arrow lights (see schematic below by the numbers 20 and 21 along the bottom)

THIS THREW ME FOR ONE HECKUVA LOOP!

Why?  Note the series of spinner lights (schematic numbers 23-25 area).  Those all worked fine.  The power line and return  (black line along top) and the return line (black line along bottom, labeled W) are the same power lines that connect to the Yardage Left lights (29-32)

So that means the issue was probably in the Bonus Unit disc, right? (Spoiler alert: it's not)

I spent a LOT of time testing this thing and tearing it down and cleaning it and making sure it had no issues

one side

other side, with stepper

here is what the underside of the stepper plate looks like, if you're curious

With the stepper removed I still found that the 2 common feeds (power and ground) that were shown as connected on the schematic weren't leaving the playfield on connected wires!  Baffling design choice.

So I started tracing the connections down through the playfield into the jones plugs inside the machine.

Tracing their continuity further, I found the crux of the problem: THE SCHEMATIC WAS WRONG

Near number 17 in the schematics above, see that TARGET GOAL light?  The wire there connects by number 20.  All of those lights weren't working either.  that same spot is ALSO where the YARDAGE LEFT lights by number 30 connect to.

So the error is that the YARDAGE LEFT assembly doesn't just connect to that White common ground wire.  Nope, it connects to that same wire TARGET GOAL does.

The issue was an adjustment on the Bonus Score Relay.  After that, all of those lights came back on.  Hallelujah.,

After all was said and done, I had actually introduced 2 new problems.  One was that the left target, which normally alternated with the top lanes, was always on.  Take a look near schematic number 19 and you'll see the obvious issue:  in my troubleshooting I had set the game to 3 balls, so it stays on.  I put the game adjustment back to 5 ball.  This makes the game less fun for me, as it alternates what is more lucrative to hit: that target, or the spinner.  If it's always lit, it's always best to go for the lit target.

Other problem was that with only one player lit, it stepped through all 4 players.

I diagnosed the problem to the player advancement logic:

I did an adjustment of motor switch 3B (seen above near the center) and the players + balls now advanced properly!  Instead of just advancing the player, it properly sees that the player up (player 1) is the last player to attend to (1 player game) and then advances the boil count step-up solenoid.