Long way Journey

[Luigi]

Hi.

As everybody might know I got my grail from the Love Boat: Journey from Bally Midway. Since Journey is my most favourite Band in the world and my search didn't bring up any of these machines in Germany or Europe at all, I decided to import one from USA for my 50th birthday. When Thomas (aka Love) said he was organizing a container from USA I told him that I was searching for a Journey. Well, he found one on Craig's List and I bought it

Meanwhile it's in Dirk's hall.

Unfortunately some moron thought it was a good idea to make some extra money by selling a Journey-PCB-set. So he pulled my PCBs from the cab and replaced it with some nasty Two Tigers-PCBs (also from Bally). They are so dirty that even two 'rides' in the dishwasher couldn't clean them.

A new PCB-set for another $285 is now mine....hope it will make it's wya to me this time 


Yesterday evening I spent some time with my cab. I did some measuring and to my surprise everything seems to work (besides the PCBs, of course). All voltages are present like they should.

It was a good choice to order all necessary artwork for the cab and have it shipped over here with the container.

As you can see the marquee has seen better days:



Maybe better when lit......no 



New marquee will be installed after the cleaning process. But there is more to do. I removed the coin box and took a photo down to the ground plate:



See the corners left and right? Let's take a closer look:


LEFT 



RIGHT 




This cab must have hit the floor very hard in it's history, the drop caused some serious damage I cannot ignore. I think woodfiller will not be the right 'weapon' for this 'fight'. When the cab is empty I will put it on it's back and replace the base plate with a new one.


After that shock I continued the inspection and disassembly.

Etienne, count me in for the next "Alu Sticker Repro Run"




I removed the brackets that hold the tape player. The (very rare) original tape is still in place:






After some cleaning the tape player looked shiney   
This view made my heart sing 




The PLAY-key is pressed all the time. When a specific stage of the game is reached the player is powered from the small PCB sitting on the left side of the cab. It then plays the song "Separate Ways" until the stage is over.

Of course I grabbed a power supply that we use to run our little red laser. After adjusting the output (6VDC) and checking polarity I connected the player to the PS unit and pressed PLAY. Well, it played the song and it sounded familiar....like the self recorded cassettes I used to have back in the 70s     The player will get a good cleaning inside. I hope this will make the sound clearer. Since I know this song very well I noticed it plays a little too slow. I will ask a friend if there is something I can do. I think I remember there are means to adjust the speed.

I recorded this test with my cell phone camera. Quality is bad but you get the idea. I tried to get closer to the speaker but the broadcasting of the cellphone made me move back. Here's a short video, if you want to listen


I removed all the stuff in the back. PCBs and the large (and heavy) power supply. I took those things home for a good clean.





This looks really bad but as I said: all voltages work perfectly


Here are the controls on the left side behind the backdoor. As you can see there are two volume pots. Lower one is for the PCB-sound, the upper one is for the music.

Erm, no, the picture is not rotated. Don't know why they were not able to print a sticker with the text NOT upside down. This should have been possible back in 1983





So far....more to come

[Superully]

really interesting stuff with the cassette player, thorsten, never had a game with a setup like that? how does an endless cassette work? i will follow that restoration closely, not something you see every day. good luck and have fun, enjoy every second with your grail. already looking forward to playing it at your place one day ...

btw, that marquee is hilarious!!!

[Luigi]

Thanks Ully


Any hints from "Mr.Restorator" how to clean the wooden inside of the cab? Did you use a spray or simply a vac cleaner and then a wet cleaning cloth?


For the endless tape....I'm not sure, but I think the tape must be cut, twisted once and then glued together again. Maybe Dirk can jump in here. I'm sure he knows how to do that

[Etienne MacGyver]

Great Luigi !

Etienne, count me in for the next "Alu Sticker Repro Run" 

No problem there, i am happy to help.

But you must source me a good pic, so i can replicate it...

as for the "upsidedownsticker", scan that, and i will "fix" that for you if you want 

[Luigi]

But you must source me a good pic, so i can replicate it...

What? Better than this one??

as for the "upsidedownsticker", scan that, and i will "fix" that for you if you want 

I thin I will leave it like it is...it has this 'charme of originality'

[Q*ris]

Thanks for the details, Luigi.
That tape player rocks (haha), I love all this kind of clever tricks they used BITD (like the color overlays over a BW screen, 8-tracks tapes and that kind of stuff).

[Muerto]

Superb! great read, didn't know about the cassette player, that is totally cool!!
Glad you found a Journey PCB, and I hope it will make it all the way to you this time!! (maby it´s you own your bought twice.... )

-Will follow this thread closely!!! (now, back to my misbehaving Missile Command monitor problem  )

[Etienne MacGyver]

But you must source me a good pic, so i can replicate it...

What? Better than this one??

as for the "upsidedownsticker", scan that, and i will "fix" that for you if you want 

I thin I will leave it like it is...it has this 'charme of originality'

I agree on the last one.

I dont have any pics of the "complete" sticker.
Perhaps you can inform on klov or somewhere else and ask there if someone has a sticker on the back of the cabinet and can make a good picture of it which i can use to replicate it.

I would love to help you out, but without a proper source its really difficult to do  

[Belike]

Nice to hear that you finally have your dream cab!
That pcb case is very annoying, but let's hope you will forget about it when you play on Jouney for the first time after so many years.

[gyruss]

Very cool, congratulations!

[Luigi]

Etienne, of course you will get a better picture of the stickers. I juzst had the cell phone to take photos. When I read about the next ASRR I will take pictures and we will try to make it as complete as possible. Good idea to ask the boys over at KLOV

@all: thanks for your kind words

[level42]

Congrats buddy, I know how much you've longed for this

I am imagining that there was a Level 42 game BITD and finally owning one....

About the cassette: might be better to replace it (record from CD yourself) ? => http://www.ebay.de/sch/i.html?_sacat=0&_from=R40&_nkw=endless+tape&LH_PrefLoc=2&_arm=1&_armm=63&_ruu=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.ebay.de%2Fsch%2Fi.html%3F_sacat%3D0%26_from%3DR40%26_nkw%3Dendless%2Btape%26_arr%3D1


If you want to keep that "original only" feeling you could transfer the tape itself to the original cassette housing.....

This is how an endless tape works: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D1OKaQKCVCQ (I've seen better constructed versions, but this shows clearest how it works)

[Luigi]

Thanks André. Don't give up...one day there will be a Level42-cab, too 

I already thought about replacing the original tape. It sounds awefull. Maybe it's better to put it in a safe place and use a new one

[level42]

Thanks André. Don't give up...one day there will be a Level42-cab, too 

Yeah, I'm still thinking about converting that old Journey cabinet I have had here all those years under a tarp in my backyard.......





 

Seriously: I thought about naming my Mame cab "Level 42" and I prepared the marquee file already....it is the logo that I use here. This was scanned from a 12", the inner blue converted to black and cleaned up. I think it would look awesome when back-lit

[level42]

Hey Thorsten, you PMed a question about the TL tube but I figured I'd answer it here as more people might like to know it:

TL tubes don't come in "230V" or "115V" because they running at a much higher voltage. Especially the voltage to start a tube is very high initially (unto 1000V). As soon as it's running this is reduced by the ballast.

So typically when you replace a tube you look at the code it has, usually something with a "Tx" where x is a number that indicates the diameter size. The wattage is determined by the length of the tube. There is also a color code on them. Usually I prefer the cool white one's because they produce a more natural colors from the marquee. (You'd think warm-white would be better, but it makes the colors of the marquee more "yellowish"...

So if you go to a local DIY store or lamp store they should be able to provide you a suitable tube.

Only one time I had to get a tube from the US that was because it was a non-standard (for us) size. It was in my Berzerk. It was extremely cheap to get it, had to buy two and it cost something silly like 5 Euro's or so including shipping, this was because I ordered at RS online and they offered free shipping, even for the stuff that came from their "brother" company in the US (which these did )

It was actually cheaper than buying 1 regular tube at a shop here !

Anyway Midway usually used pretty standard sized tubes so you should be able to get one "around the corner".

The voltage issue only starts when you're talking about starters. You will have to get a 115V/120V one for this, however these too are readily available in Europe because they are  very often used in tube-holders that hold 2 tubes which are connected in series (two starters).

NOTE: Often these starters are still indicated as 220-240V. F.I. Philips does this for it's S2 starter:
http://www.ecat.lighting.philips.nl/l/lampen-professioneel/starters-voor-fluorescentie-lampen/ecoclick-starters/928390720230_eu/

Not sure about now, but they used to indicate both possible uses:



However these are totally suitable and really operating at 115V.

Don't use Philips S10 as these are for 1 tube on 220-240V.

If you want to go fancy you could also get S2-E starters (http://www.ecat.lighting.philips.nl/l/lampen-professioneel/starters-voor-fluorescentie-lampen/safety-comfort-starters/926000192603_eu/) which are electronic and (in theory) never die, start the tube without (a lot of) flicker and turn of the lamp when it's at it's end of life (to prevent it from overheating). You'll have to judge if these things are worth the extra cost, they are about 4 times more expensive then regular one's.