I got my first pin, Quicksilver on New Year's Eve of 1985 for $295, right before moving into my first apartment. It is the only one of my games that has been serviced professionally while in my possession, and is currently the only one that is working. It has a few minor things wrong with it, but nothing that keeps you from enjoying the game (other than the stuff on top of it).
Game #2 was Paragon, which I think I got in early 2000 for $800. I had fond memories of it from my salad days in college, we had just bought our first house, and I had just discovered that the Internet was a great way to acquire pin stuff. It works after a fashion, but my wife and daughter both claim to have been shocked by it when they touch the metal side rails when trying to pet the cat that sleeps in the bed on the upper right of the playfield. I've always been skeptical of this shocking business, but it's currently unplugged for the purposes of filial harmony. I do know that it's not 100% working electrically. You can still play it, though.
Black Knight was game 3, and the guy I bought it from sold me a project Eight Ball Deluxe at the same time. I believe they were $750 and $650 respectively, plus I spent $100 on a van to drive them down from PA. BK worked great for a while, then conked out and is waiting patiently for my baleful gaze to land on it. When you power it up the bell rings and one of the fuses blows. I fixed up EBD to the point where it is working tolerably well, with only a few switches not working. I took it apart for cleaning before my brother in law came in May and haven't put it back together yet.
My first playfield was EBD, originally bought for $50 so I could practice playfield restoration techniques. My EBD machine's playfield was touched up with what looks like White-out, then clear-coated, so I wanted to try secret techniques on a beater. With the coming of the Playfield Project (PFP), though, I am evaluating it in a new light.
Next up was Doctor Who, which as we know is the impetus for this blog. I've written about its functional status until my fingers are numb, so I won't bore you with more.
The second playfield is Black Knight, which is the first one bought specifically for the PFP. It looks like it's in really good condition, though I have yet to take it out of its shipping wrap. Since it's probably in the best condition of the three, I'll probably use it for my initial experiments.My
final purchase is, of course, the Firepower playfield and cabinet, shown here in its currently resting place wedged between stuff in my basement. As I mentioned, my wife threatened me with offsite storage when I told her I'd bought it, which is like threatening a house-elf with clothes. I had to put it someplace where she is unlikely to run into it on a regular basis. Putting anything big anywhere in our basement is a game of real-life Sokoban... I spent several hours moving and re-moving boxes to not only free up that little niche, but to have enough space to drive the game and cart to said niche.So, that's where things stand right now. I have to say, my wife has a good point... I am collecting faster than I can do anything to the collection. So, I've got to actually start making some progress... it's silly to have almost $5000 worth of pinball hardware and only be able to play one game, I want to get playfields working so I can sell the real games to free up space, and I need to have some working hardware so I can buy more and continue growing the collection.
That said, here's my first goal. Tomorrow is my birthday, so I'm going to clear off Quicksilver and play a few games. Next weekend, I will do the switch work on EBD, clean it, and put it back together. Then we'll see where we are.
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