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very familiar! I made one up for someone to help them that had one missing, it was temporary to prove the machine worked, it did and nothing more was ever heard about it! this was my veroboard version lol April 2013, temporary was permeant lol (another thing i never got any money for doing)

Wow that's quite some heat there Bob but what great repair and novel idea of raising the resistor off the new board .

I just can't resist a challenge, it'll be my downfall one day. So, a bit more on the Chico Display PSU board. The original board had got well overheated so the only thing to do was make another one! Here's the before and after... I thought it would be a good idea to raise the power resistor off of the board with some ceramic spacers in case of an overload. All ready to go back.... On the original board the power resistor just fell off as the solder had melted! Also the regulator's joints were all dry!

Hi bob sorry its a electro mechanical machine from around 1978 . Anything from dranfield or carfield is quite rare on the paper work side. Im asking on behalf of ron Clark who is kindly taking the restoration on .. its in quite a state although ive done a fair bit to it already .dranfield still exist and ron contacted a fella there and hes got back to him and is looking so we might get lucky there .

That's a new one on me Nick? Don't suppose you have a pic of the board as it might be pretty close to an existing tech.

Hi all ,bit of a big ask but has anyone got a schematic for 70s carfield /dranfield electeo mechnical fruit machines .id be very interested in a copy if anyone can help .material on these machines seems to be quite scarce. Thanks

Hi You're incredibly well-informed. Impressive. Interesting. That's great; slot machine culture will continue. Looking forward to reading more.

Always great to see these old coin slot mags and read through em.

That was some order, £350k in 1978!

Just reading through this thread and remembered an article in the coinslot archives section, not very readable i am afraid but you can make out the gist. Page 1 headline. 1978 17 JUN.pdf

Christ knows how you get to the bottom of these repairs! Quite a skill 👌

Great efforts again Bob and a nice post to read about .

Just recently I've had a fair bit of PC92 work coming in and with lots of new avenues I've never been down before. As always I love a challenge with a tech that I thought I knew all about but obviously didn't. As most folks are aware the Procon tech morphed from the early PCL right up to quite a few versions of PC92 and the multitude of mods inbetween is extensive! It's well known that no documentation for PC92 exists in the wild (although I bet someone is hanging on to a copy!) so the only thing to do is to try and capture all the differences and get them documented. I have collated most, but certainly not all, the differences between the released diagrams and the later versions. These I will upload soon once they are double checked. Most functions are easy to work out but I have found there are some tricky ones. The first one I came across was Theme Park which on the bench would always fire up a stake % key error (402). This could be bypassed by activating certain switch connections on the matrix. I was expecting the normal stake key board to be fitted but on the machine in question there wasn't one? This issue is still outstanding but I'm sure there's a silly reason why the key isn't fitted? The second one involves Chico and this one had me going for a bit. This game has a 4x20 VFD but it's not driven off of the VFD port on the board, maybe it wasn't fast enough, cleverer folks than me on here will probably know. In this case the VFD is driven from the 14 way DIL socket which has a feed from the SIO chip. Another thing to note is the VFD gets its 5v supply from a separate Display PSU board which is powered from a 12v feed from the same 14 way socket. This little board also has a transistor on it which reduces the 20v P2P waveform to TTL levels for the VFD. I have to say all credit goes to Magik as this was all gleaned from a PC92 video he did about a year ago where he came across this for the first time. Had his head scratching too. I will post the diagram for this board shortly. Another thing with the 14 way is it needs a link between pins 3 - 13.

Hi gang. Has anyone got a 38mm diameter Bell fruit reel washer that they could spare please? I've stripped down the reels and one of the washers has the tab that locks into the shaft missing 😞

Will do. Cheers

And don't forget to regrease the reel motor. I think you'll find that the original grease has gone (off, hard etc.)

Many thanks Ron. The 3rd reel is a bit stiff to turn. It's making the motor labour. The solenoids seem.fine, but I'll give them a clean whilst I'm at it. I'll try stripping down the reels. Thanks for the pics and the heads up on the type of oil. I'm slightly apprehensive taking stuff apart that's 45 years old - not much choice now

If it's a solenoid sticking then the plunger and the inner sleeve of the solenoid will need cleaning but no oil needed, Check the small hole in the top of the solenoid is clear and not blocked.. Also check the lift arm which is attached to the reel solenoid plunger via a metal link, It has a brass bush and secured to the shaft with a metal clip, you can remove it and apply a small amount of grease to the shaft then refit the lift arm as it needs to be free and not sticking.... If it's the reel drum sticking then it will probably need a reel strip down. Each reel has a clutch which grips the reel drum to spin or nudge the reels, it also slips to reduce the torque on the reel motor allowing it to turn freely when the reels are held in position. The clutches are made of a leather disc which is normally soaked in oil, I use Neatsfoot oil for leather, They dry out over time and causes the reels to stick or slow to start or not spin at all. I soak clutch washers in a jar with oil for at a good 24 hours, the longer the better to allow the leather to soak up the oil, When you rebuild the reel mech, you do not need to refit the clutch washers dripping in oil but dab off the excess. Also while the reels are stripped apply a thin covering of grease to the main reel drive shaft which will lubricate the reel drum bushes so they spin freely too.

Can anyone please point me towards some hints/tips on servicing the reels on my Bell Fruit Black Box Upstairs Downstairs please? One of the reels has gone a bit sticky and I would like to service it. Is there a specific grease or oil to use? Does it just need cleaning? Cheers, Pete

Cool machine!

Yes tried another ls08 in a socket, was thinking IC23 I wish I knew for sure it was a switch issue, will look at the pinpoints for the 138 and maybe probe it for stuck outputs ? thanks Ronnie

I don't think there's even a RESET, it's a two wire serial link! I need to set this all up on the bench but 4x20 VFD's cost about £100 a pop!! I've bought an LCD with a serial i/f and will have a tinker with that. Whether it'll do anything or not I've no idea yet but the learning curve will be of value.

Did you not try a new LS08? (always put a socket in ) Lets hope the PIA is OK, it goes via the LS138 (IC23) first anyway. You can always scope the outputs from the 08 chip to see if all is well there. You could have shorted/leaking diodes too. Luckily yours are all separate and not in those horrible 8 way blocks! Both IC33/34 can also be responsible for weird switch issues but easy to check out with a scope.

I removed the Ls08 and tested it in my programmer, it passed the vector test, not sure if this is a conclusive test? The resistor I replaced did not burn again, if this IC is ok could it have damaged the PIA? I wish I knew what the error code meant. Thanks Ronnie