New Life Games LLC
**Reel Slots** Gaming Machines => Bally Reel Games => Topic started by: steven010 on July 24, 2022, 09:45:48 AM
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Got a Bally E2000 machine (E2226-26) to add to my gameroom. I am not a slot guy, but I have Williams and Gottlieb pinball machines with early CPUs (Intel 4004 processors!) and jukebox so I am used to looking at awful hand drawn schematics and terrible documentation. As such, the Bally did not disappoint-not great.
I bought this as a "working" machine that need a switch and drilled lock replacement. Of course the guy would not turn it on to show me and it was wrapped in cardboard and taped closed.
Upon plugging in unit, I was greeted with scrambled segments on the red LED display and of course not working. I downloaded manuals and started reading. First step, measure DC voltages. Oddly, they were way off and moving...? each time I powered it up, I would get different readings. I initially suspected there was a leaky or shorted cap on board, but after disconnecting all the loads from the power supply, I was still getting bad readings. I pulled the power supply board and "eyeballed" it with microscope and discovered that one of the connector pins (turned out to be one of the ground pins) had broken solder and actually some PCB damage where it was mounted.
Once I fixed this, then the LED display was working and I was able to get test mode. Operationally, the unit was not working correctly. first, the hopper test failed. I took this board out and found one bad opto and bad transistor and multiple burned resistors. I did fix it, but the hopper did not always start and ran slow, so I bought new hopper PCB.
Next, I found that the coin relay was always out so the machine would not accept a coin. However, when I hit the reset button multiple times, it would once in a while come up and accept a coin. When I would put in coin, it would allow a spin and almost instantly throw a reel error, either 42 or 42. I pulled both the MPU and IO boards and studied them, seeing nothing bad I put unit back together. Now it was throwing a 90 and 71 errors-not good, the hypocritic oath applies here - FIRST DO NO HARM! So I took it all back apart, rechecked everything, cleaned the connector pins, put it back together. Now, back to 50 with door open.
So here is where my ignorance plays in-after working with machine for a long while, I realized there was a pattern to its "magical" intermittent behavior... For example, I would push the door closed switch, reset machine, and a "1" would come up on right side. then, while jostling around machine, it would change from "1" to "805", then "2", then more numbers, so-on. then, after going through this garbage for a while, the coin bypass relay would fire and it would take coins! This was some sort of book keeping stuff! then it occurred to me- they stupid "tilt reset" switch was in the wrong position and was opening and closing! this was the position it was in when I got machine and i stupidly thought that it was in the "run" position! Also the key can be removed in both reset and run positions. Additionally, if the tilt reset key is held down, the processor seems to stick at "1" display until released, while door is closed. Again, my issue of not any experience using a slot machine!
Ok, now the machine was was stable and would take coins. But kept throwing 42 and 43 errors. So I pulled the readers (converted to 5V already) and was able to easily test the IR LEDs and photo transistors. All was good. So I reinstalled the readers, now the optics were reading numbers in test mode 5, but operationally still throwing 42 and 43 (BTW, I think the old Molex connectors get tarnished and need to be removed and reseated occasionally). I also noticed that the first reel would stop and the third reel would stop at same time...I thought this was odd.
While observing the reel assembly and playing with it, I would open the reel indexing lever for free spin and bump assembly and the index lever would drop back down...odd. So i flipped the assembly over and discovered that someone used what i suspect was WD-40 on it. NEVER NEVER use WD-40! It leaves a residue behind and acts like glue! it gums up everything. Anyway, sure enough, it was not allowing the index levers to move freely. So I got some rubbing alcohol, cleaned up the goo, then lubed it with some very light oil. POOF! machine now works.
So, the message here: make sure you know how to operate your machine before you try to fix it! Also, assume anything you buy on Craiglist is broken...
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Hello! So I am brand new to the forum, and slot repair in general. That said, I found your post and thought I'd reach out. In May 2022 I also bought an e2000 off of craigslist, for the crazy price of $40. It will power up, and I was getting some of the random codes on the display, as you indicated. I started a bit of the troubleshooting process, but hit some snags.
In reading over your post, though, it sounds like you have a much broader fundamental knowledge of working with the boards, etc., and you also got yours working! I'm wondering if I might pick your brain a bit about how to trouble shoot this? I'm pretty technically savvy (studied manufacturing engineering at Northwestern back in the 1990s), so I'm hoping my questions wouldn't be too basic or annoying. Regardless, you definitely have some knowledge that would be of great use to me. Totally understand if you'd rather not be bothered, but if you're up for helping a fellow slot newbie tinker around a bit, I'd love your help!
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A good start would be to download the free E- Series service manual from www.slotmachinerepair.com (http://www.slotmachinerepair.com) under "helpful PDF's"
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Sorry...should have been more clear. I've done that, and actually completed several trouble-shooting steps, as listed below. Kind of stuck now, and trying to figure what to do next.
Completed steps:
- Checked the voltages on the Power Supply Board using the indicated Test Clip loops.
- Removed the MPU board and checked the voltage on the battery (new battery installed by the guy I bought the machine from)... 3.6 volts, so seemingly no issue there.
- Visually inspected all of the chips on the MPU, as well as the other connections; no indication of any unseated chips, broken connections, burn marks, etc.
- Removed the hopper assembly and checked the beau plug for any indications of broken points… all looked good
- Visually checked all the fuses on the main fuse block at the back of the cabinet
- Tested the outlet plug assembly to ensure full power coming through the main transformer
- Removed the hopper board and visually inspected for any burn marks, disconnections, etc.
- Attempted to initiate the manual tests using the TEST switch (no response), and also tried the RESET switch (after three presses I can hear something fire, like a solenoid somewhere, but nothing else changes)