Another great series of videos, showing how to get a DOA wreck to transform into a screamer of a game. ...would be a fun addition to anyone’s game room. Thanks Ron.
I own one since 1990 and it's the best pinball I ever player! fantastic ! I fixed it a thousand times and now it needs a complete restoration. The playfield is in a quite bad shape and needs some special care, the connectors are bashed not mentioning the burnt bulbs and half burnt solenoids etc... thanks for your awesome videos!
@@LyonsArcade Yep sure ! waiting for the parts to arrive. The annoying thing is there's an intermittent fault on the CPU board. It resets itself randomly... Maybe another resistor array has failed or a bad contact somewhere? we'll see 😊
The wife and I were watching this and talking about how cool things really were in the 80's. You did a really good job on that table Ron. We went ahead and gave you 3 thumbs up for this one. 👍👍👍
Kickback needs some adjustment!!!! (AH you fixed it already!) Such a great game! What an amazing lightshow and those sounds: Top soundtrack, that multiball music is epic!! Thanks so much for this series Ron! Stuck in my head now..... Brings back great memories of playing this as a teen! Definitely need to get one to join my Road Kings and Banzai Run!
What a transformation! I really enjoyed this series! I remember seeing the original Top Gun when it was released. This F-14 really takes me back. Thanks for taking to time to share it with us!
I watched the whole series on this one over the last few days. What a transformation Ron. And what a cool game. Steve Ritchie was a genius at design. Looks like this one was released the year after High Speed. He also did the awesome call outs in this.
I'm going to Europe's biggest vintage arcade soon where they have dozens of pinball machines in a row. I really hope this is one of them! I'd love to play it after watching you bring this one back to life.
Just took apart my play field to clean, using a few of the things you used on the other video. Picked up the secondary decals for the clear ones and now going all in. One difference I'm using led's, it makes the lights look 3D. So if you want to get that psychedelic experience 🤣🤣 lock on👍🏾👍🏾cant believe I sat and watch you play pinball for 40 min🤔😆😆just like old times at the arcade 🤣🤣🤣🥇🔥🔥🔥🔥Can't wait to get mine done. What's a good angle to set the Game???. love the channel.
I wouldn't be the guy to ask about the angle, everybody always complains I don't have it set right, so just set it at whatever you prefer :) Personally I make it as fast as I can, back legs out 3/4's of the way, front legs all the way in. Someone will be along to tell me how fucking wrong I am soon so do whatever they blather on about.
Thanks for taking the trouble of filming all this. Highly enjoyed the whole series. The machine looks great! Man, the multiball "celebration" on this game is one of the best. Remember playing this one "back in the days". Rules wise: the Lock shot will spot you one T-O-M C-A-T letter, so you can go for the Lock if you have one letter left.
Based on the difficulty of this game, it would be a safe bet to say this game alone paid for all the operators kids ivy league colleges, several times over :) Nothing wrong with your skill Ron, this game is brutal!
My best friend has an F-14. One of the things we did was take about 10% of the loops off of the pop bumper coil to give it a little extra POP. Makes the action in the upper playfield crazy.
Good job Joe. Another long set of repairs that paid off. I remember when this game started to show up in the arcades. I couldnt stop playing it. The lights and sound just kept drawing me back.
I'd like to get that one, i'm a big Frankenstein fan. That one was made when the Mary Shelly's Frankenstein movie came out in the 90's... I think it's a Sega but you don't see it too often. Thanks for watching Mark!
i played this one when it was new. I remember it was the only one you could hear when you were playing it (it was at an old school arcade they had tons of pinball games and a huge floor of other various arcade games) also the lights are awesome...I think i managed to get a multi ball once lol
I appreciate the in-depth videos! Just finished up my 3rd machine and I know I couldn’t have done any of it without your help🤘🏻Keep up the good work!!!!!
I first played this game in 1988. at a bar, and it took me several attempts to earn multiball, for the first time. they had it for about a year. The beacons were turned off because many patrons at that particular bar were very heavy drinkers, and when the beacons would kick in they would think the cops are at the bar, and they had the volume turned down where you can only hear it, The patrons also complained about the noise it made when it was in attract mode. Then about 3 years later, at the VFW bar my stepfather managed had this game (by a different vendor) and the beacons were turned on and no one complained since the game was in an adjoining room, and the machine was set at a loud (not too loud) volume setting.
Thanks Jay, we appreciate it, unfortunately it appears it had all kinds of problems with it, just read the other comments! I thought I was having fun, little did I know!
Great series working and cleaning this game. They were all great videos. I'm going to be that guy, but, seems like the lock shot wasn't quite working correctly. When you spell TOMCAT you should be able to lock two balls. Those locks should happen even if you drain and shoot the balls into the locks. Your game seemed to only let it go to the lower trail. I think there was a service bulletin that showed the adjustment to the coil stops to make the top two divert correctly. You did get multiball, but it seemed like it was a lot harder than it normally is. But great work! Glad to see it working again! (sorry for being that "guy", you know I love the videos)
Yeah several people have already told me about it, so don't worry you're not that guy, you're just one of a bunch of guys. By the way you missed about a dozen other things you could have brought up, you know, you're just trying to help. Did you notice the inlanes aren't quite right? What do you think about the playfield glass? Is the room too dark for you? Hey, the beacons shouldn't bleed through the backglass like that, and OH BY THE WAY, it's squeaking. I mispronounced many things; the inserts could have been done better. You may not like the angle I have the cabinet set at. I could go on and on, but I think i'll just let the others do it for me, the good news is I'm not going to upload many more videos like this so that'll help!
Joe you did a fantastic job on this, it looks absolutely Great, whoever this belongs to is getting a true gem back, as rough as it was I have to admit I had my doubts, but rest assured it looks superb, even with incandescent lights, GoodUp! Liked vid
Don't forget to subscribe, Ron! I'm so subscribed it's almost an ongoing meme at this time. =) Chris Granner is the guy for sound and music on pinballs, no equal, IMHO.
Hahaha never put Yagov connection together til now. I'm still scared of fingers in slingshots, pops and kickbacks. I always test my rollovers with a ball because sometimes pushing them down, technically my finger can squish down just below the playfield and push the switch down further than what the ball can. This has caused me to think a switch is correctly adjusted a few times but then won't work when the ball rolls over it but works when I use my finger. Maybe I just have overly squishy fingers lol.
I believe it is better to test it with the ball, yes but hey you know the ball is round what if it sticks down in the lane too far :) Thanks for watching Ryan, we appreciate it!
There are also games where the flippers rotate which lane at the top is illuminated, a detail that isn’t necessarily in the rules on the deck. I don’t remember if that applied to this one.
Great series Ron, Glad you could have some fun after all that hard work. Love the speed of the game. Did it have leds or standard bulbs? Glad you received the multiball at the end, crazy light show. Thanks Ronnie
This one had just regular incandescents, we did one awhile back with full LED's though so you can see the difference.... thanks for watching Frank... GORGAR SPEAKS
if you actually did award the jackpot after a long major amount of play, and whenever you get the multi ball, and probably do all the things that the instructions tell you to do, or at least do some of them, then at the end of the game after all, if your balls are drained you’ll get the jackpot music after the game ends while you type in your initials and the jackpot music is actually the Navy seem a.k.a. anchors away, which is a really nice touch that Williams programmed into the software
If i remember correctly that right flipper takes a hell of a beating from the eject on the right side. or it may be left flipper. it seemed when i played in arcade one was always weak. yeah it the kill yagov funnel and it kills the left flipper.
Real good fine job on this popular pinball machine. I do not why someone would by a brand new game then neglect it. They should donate it a boy or girl club in there town so they could use it.
This one was pretty expensive, because there was a ton of work done to it... the parts were I think about $900 altogether, the labor was a little less than that. Whew!
That’s kind of my memory. I played this machine a lot. If that’s how it works, that means that a longer game involving multiple people make it more possible to get the advanced features flowing. When the game was over, it kicks out the held balls with the flippers deactivated just to taunt you. I have vague memories of balls getting stuck, and having to power cycle the machine to clear the issue. When it couldn’t find all the balls, it would cycle through all of the solenoids hoping to kick the missing ball free.
@@ArtStoneUS I remember once getting the ball jammed in part of the playing field, between plastic shelf and top glass, and the poor machine was fruitlessly running through that kicker sequence nonstop...
Hey Joe, Enjoy watching your stuff. Question for you. Family has a Ted Nugent weekend warrior, pinball that has hasn't seen use sense it developed scoreboard problems. What's the market for something like that?
I haven't, that's one of my favorites though! If I ever get one, I wouldn't' dare film myself working on it though, the newer they get the more jerks you get telling you on youtube you're not doing it right :) Thanks for watching Austin, we appreciate it!
@@LyonsArcade I know that one and The Addams Family Generator which is very rare is two good games. The Generator machine I have not seen since I was very little at a chuck E cheese and I would love to play that one again
If only the machine had a CD Drive on board the machine so you could have the Top-Gun album playing while you play the F-14 Tomcat game,Just think that the machine has to be bolted down to the floor so that you cannot tilt the machine.
Multi-ball rules: 1. Complete both TOM and CAT targets one time each to light multi-ball. 2. Shoot 3 balls up the right ramp to lock them. 3. Complete the TOM and CAT lights again to light the final lock. 4. Shoot the 4th ball up the right ramp to start the 4 ball multi-ball.
The first time you play a multiball, spelling T-O-M-C-A-T the first time lights two locks(all subsequent spellings light a single lock, but you can stack the locks). Spelling T-O-M-C-A-T again lights the third lock. After three balls are locked, either lock a ball or shoot the Rip-off to start Multiball.(For subsequent multiballs, spell T-O-M-C-A-T once to light the lock. Spelling T-O-M-C-A-T again lights the Rip-off.) During Multiball: Shoot the Lock to score Landings: First landing scores 150,000. Second landing scores 250,000. Third landing collects the Fighter Jackpot(starts at 757,000; maxes out at 1.1 million). Complete T-O-M-C-A-T and the 1-6 targets during Multiball to light the Outlanes for Special (operator selective; can score a Replay(free game), Extra Ball, or points).
