Symptom: After moving machine, powering up causes all solenoids/coils to energize. Loud buzzing from speaker. Smoke visible.
Location: Frederick, Colorado.

The owner or movers had disconnected the backbox cables in order to remove the backbox from the machine to make moving easier.  Unfortunately, the connectors were not plugged back together properly after the move.

Backbox connectors not reconnected to proper connectors. White is going to black, and black is going to white.

The is the second repair job I’ve had where this situation had occurred, so I thought I would write about it.

Unfortunately, Williams didn’t key the connectors in such a way to prevent the wrong connectors being plugged together. They did make them different colors, but it happens anyway.

Black goes to black and white goes to white.

Swapping the connectors can cause significant problems, burning out chips and the sound system.

Since this is the second Black Knight I’ve seen with this problem, I’ll refer to it as machine “B” and the one I worked on last year as machine “A”.  Below is summary of parts I had to replace to get each machine working.

Machine A:

• Speaker in the bottom of the cabinet.
• IC1 on sound board (TDA2002V).  This is the amplifier.
• Q2 on sound board (2N4401).

Machine B (didn’t fare as well as machine A):

• IC1 on sound board (TDA2002V).  This is the amplifier.
• LM323K voltage regulator on the power supply board. (Some Black Knights might have a different power board that uses a 2N6057 transistor with a separate regulator circuit. The parts are not interchangeable).
• IC7 on MPU board (7404).
• IC12 on MPU board (7408).
• IC11 on Driver board (6820/6821).
• IC17 on Driver board (7406).

In both cases, once the repair was complete, the Black Knight proclaimed “I will slay thee, knight!”

Location: Fairplay, Colorado (home of South Park).
Symptoms: Speech only, but no background sound; Multi-player bonus round not working; Some drop targets not resetting.

I tackled the sound problem first.  When I started the game the speech was working fine, but the background sound effects were not there.  I checked the connections to the speech board.  On this era of Williams machine, the analog sounds leave the main sound board and go to the adjacent speech board, where the analog sound and speech are mixed together.  Then the sound travels back to the main sound board for amplification and then to the speaker.

The connections were all good.  I disconnected the speech board and jumpered W1.  This will send the analog sounds directly to the amplifier, bypassing the speech board.  Still nothing.

With my oscilloscope, I could see the sound coming out of the digital to analog converter (IC13). From there it goes to a transistor (Q2) which acts as a current to voltage converter.  The transistor was acting like it wasn’t connected. I pulled it from the circuit and tested it with my meter and determined the transistor was bad (normally they short when failed, but this one was open).

D/A converter with Q2 transistor.

I replaced the transistor, and for the first time in 5 years it made sound!

Next, I decided to check the drop targets.  A couple of the drop targets in the middle bank would pop up during reset, but would not stay there. This turned out to be a missing screw that held part of the assembly together.  I found the screw in the coin box and reinstalled it.

Next, I noticed problems with other switches in the matrix.  I removed the balls from the machine and ran the switch diagnostics.  It showed that switches 5, 13, 21, 29, 37, and 45 were all closed. They all share the same row (White/Green Row 5). so it looked like they were shorted to ground someplace.  To isolate whether the problem was in the machine wiring or with the driver board circuit, I unplugged 2J3.  The diagnostic still showed the switch row shorted to ground.  IC16 was bad.

The shorted switch row was the reason the multi-player bonus round was not working.  One of the switches in that row is the shooter lane, so the machine always thought there was already a ball there and wouldn’t deliver another to the shooter lane.

The switches all worked once IC16 was replaced.  Next I solved some minor connection issues with the flippers and G.I. lighting.  The Black Knight was ready for battle again!

Fairplay, CO, aka South Park. Cartman’s face is missing.