Summit Conversion - Grrr - Reel brake never activates

[ThirdGenAmusement]

A friend asked me to look at his new slot he picked up on the cheap.  lol.  I hadnt seen these in person but everything I'd heard about them I wasnt very interested in it but agreed to take a look at it.

After cleaning all the connections including the jones plugs, board connectors, fuses, reseat the chips, etc there is some life.

When I power up the machine at this point, I get the insert coin light.  I also get the coil to fire for the machine to accept coins.  I can put in up to 3 quarters and they register.  However, when I pull the handle to spin the reels, about the time you'd expect the 1 reel stop to trigger the coil on the pull handle fires and then errors out mostly 16-.  I am to understand this is reel 1 failed to stop.  The mechanism for the reel stops all work freely and as you'd expect.  Except they wont release during game play.  I have read this could be everything from the eprom to a driver triac is the culprit. 

I dont have any other spare parts for Summit Sots to swap and am aware of 'Dennis' with HMS as a last resort.  These things aren't worth much but I dont think there is much interest in putting a lot of money into this. 

What are your thoughts?


Link to my Google Pix with short video of how and when the error occurs.  https://photos.app.goo.gl/T3ufDw9HwykXLrxf8

[Op-Bell]

At the time when Summit conversions were being made, EPROM technology was very young. Those early EPROMs were specified to hold data for ten years. It's been at least fifty now. So that would be the first thing I'd check - not that I'd know what to check for!

[ThirdGenAmusement]

At the time when Summit conversions were being made, EPROM technology was very young. Those early EPROMs were specified to hold data for ten years. It's been at least fifty now. So that would be the first thing I'd check - not that I'd know what to check for!

Thank you for the reply.  After more research, etc I decided it could possibly be a bad transistor on the interface board.  I was lucky to locate a tested/good board so its on its way.  I will report back once it's installed and results are in.

You are totaly right on the eprom!  If the machine works after replacing the interface board, I plan to make  copy of the eprom for safe keeping.  I think you can have Dennis make a new eprom but understandably, they are pricey.

[ThirdGenAmusement]

Ok, it isn't the interface board unfortunately.  If the eprom were bad, would the machine function at all? 

[Trisail]

I don't know anything about Summit machines and didn't see anything in the download section.

Is it an electro mechanical (EM) slot? Does it stop the reels by mechanical device or are there optical sensors that detect the reel symbols ad home position?

[Op-Bell]

Ok, it isn't the interface board unfortunately.  If the eprom were bad, would the machine function at all?

Maybe, maybe not. In modern machines, the entire ROM is checked at power-up against a stored checksum and the machine won't start if there's a mismatch. However, Summit conversions were very early and probably don't have that check, so if an instruction deep in the program were corrupted it might well run normally until that particular instruction were executed.
 
If I could get a hex dump of the EPROMS, I could probably disassemble the program and find the problem. I've done it before, for the Aristocrat/IGT Esprit and other machines. It would be an enoyable exercise.

[ThirdGenAmusement]

I don't know anything about Summit machines and didn't see anything in the download section.

Is it an electro mechanical (EM) slot? Does it stop the reels by mechanical device or are there optical sensors that detect the reel symbols ad home position?

'
I dont know anything about them either lol.  Actually I am learning.  Its been a journey for sure but every little thing that wasn't working that shows life makes me want to keep going. 

The reels are stopped by firing coils which pulls a stop that allows the brake to fall into place stopping the reels.  It works much like a regular em Bally except instead of having the clock on the side, it uses the control board to fire the coils.

[ThirdGenAmusement]

Ok, it isn't the interface board unfortunately.  If the eprom were bad, would the machine function at all?

Maybe, maybe not. In modern machines, the entire ROM is checked at power-up against a stored checksum and the machine won't start if there's a mismatch. However, Summit conversions were very early and probably don't have that check, so if an instruction deep in the program were corrupted it might well run normally until that particular instruction were executed.
 
If I could get a hex dump of the EPROMS, I could probably disassemble the program and find the problem. I've done it before, for the Aristocrat/IGT Esprit and other machines. It would be an enoyable exercise.

I really appreciate the thought!  I did continue to bang my head against this.  I did go through and clean all the jones plugs, etc but apparently didnt do a very good job on the electronics portion which is probably the most critical.  Both sides of the power supply was dirty including the connector the boards slide into.  I did clean the boards and even the removeable chips but failed at the connectors.  Doing this got me a constant issue which was I could coin up the machine and spin the reels but now instead of erroring the machine just did nothing further.  This I believe was due to a dirty switch that is pressed with the lever is pulled to spin the reels. 

With the above done, the machine works!  Kinda.  Now I am battling some hopper issues.  I am going to clean and lube it and go from there but now I am looking to see this to the end!  lol...

Only other issue I see is the payout line is off and I think its possible the reel glass may have slid a bit during the 300 mile trip in the bottom storage area of an rv my friend hauled this in and who knows what else this machine had been through before that.