All Work and No Play

As a change of pace, I thought I'd let you guys in on one of my latest projects that has been a real trip down memory lane.    

Dumb luck led me to a lead on this 1992 Data East Star Wars Pinball machine.    A very nice medical professional in Daphne was cleaning out his storage unit and sold it to me for a deal.    

I bought it without even seeing it.  I'd been looking for this particular machine for over a year.  Had found them but boy were they pricey.

When I did meet him up, he fired up the machine with a generator in his storage unit.    All the major stuff worked, it just needed a little TLC.    So, I ordered a bunch of parts and last weekend, knowing very little about pinball, I stripped all of the plastics from the machine, cleaned them, cleaned the playfield and waxed it, then proceeding to replacing every single lightbulb in the machine with new, LED's that will (mostly) never go out and will reduce heat on the machine.

I gained new respect for the techs in the 90's that did this for a living.   The overall project took an entire Saturday but the result is pretty awesome, in a nerdy way. :)

At any rate, this machine should get another 20 years of play if all goes well!    I guess, they really don't make them like they used to.

(Literally.  As far as I know, only one pinball manufacturer remains in business today.