Games Which I Currently Own:

Haunted House - 1982 Gottlieb: Don Shoemaker got me excited about having one the these machines after he described all of the "uniqueness" of the machine and how much fun he had playing one at the mall in the 80's. I had never seen one in person before I bought mine. After a short search,  found it on "Mr Pinball" classifieds located in California - my understanding is the guy that had it just bought it from a guy that bought it new for home use. I bought it site unseen in about 1998 (about $700) and had it shipped from California via the Pinball Machine Mover. I bought it in July and finally got it right before Halloween. The machine mover had it setting in a warehouse in the mid-west for some time. He lost the original legs during the move (grrr). The machine is in extremely nice condition, looks like a home use machine. It had the original purchase receipts, manuals, parts kits, etc. The of the circuit boards have the same serial numbers. I later bought an additional set of playfields (yes it has three) and cabinet off of Ebay. I would like to eventually find a head and back glass to put another machine together, however finding them will be difficult and expensive. Like all pins, even more so, the prices have really climbed - $1,500+.

Monte Carlo - 1973 Bally - Don and I went to look at some pins and video game this guy had for sale in North Raleigh. They guy wanted too much $ for them and we walked away leaving an offer for the lot of four pins and a vid. The guy's wife called Don after a few weeks and said come and get them. I kept this pin and Royal Flush - both electro-mechanical pins (EMs) and in really nice shape. I regret selling some of the other EMs which I've had and plan to keep these two until I get out of the pin business.

Royal Flush -1973 Gottlieb: See the above Monte Carlo story.

Eight Ball - 1977 Bally: I went over to my son's friend's parent's house to look at and repair this machine. While I was there, I found out that they wanted to sell their 1963 Wurlitzer Juke which I purchased. Some time later (6-8 months), I learned via my son that they were interested in selling the Eight Ball machine. The rest is history. The game is in very nice condition - A lot of these games are worn out because they were so popular. At the time was manufactured, it was the highest production quantity pinball machine ever made (about 20,000), only surpassed by The Addams Family 16 years later.

South of Atlanta, bulk pin purchase - 24' Ryder truck packed

Harlem Globetrotters 1979 - Bally: Don Shoemaker and I bought this pin as part of a package deal of about 50 pins south of Atlanta. The pin was very nice, except for the playfield which was worn out. Two-three years later I found out that Bud Zeller had a nice playfield (and begged him for it until he gave in) for this game that he literally picked up beside the road. It seems someone was transporting the pin and it fell out of their truck. Bud salvaged the remaining parts that someone told him about (they had seen the destroyed pin along the road).

The day after the auction, note Twilight Zone on the truck

Twlight Zone 1993 - Bally - I bought it at the auction in Winston-Salem and paid a very high price (for me) - $1,100. I shopped it out, had to buy a new DMD display and fix a couple of other minor problems. The pin is in extremely nice condition. The prices have soared the past couple of years to an average of $2,500.

The Addams Family 1992 - Bally  - I really wanted one of these pins for some time. Everyone I saw for sale was either worn out or too expensive. I eventually "broke down" and got on the wait list to purchase one from Brady Distributing in Charlotte. After several weeks they called me to tell me they got one in and had it for sale. The bad news was the price had gone up considerably since I got on the wait list. I ended up paying the initial price they quoted me, however the deal was that is was for "as is" condition (vs. shopped as initially quoted). After viewing some detailed pictures, I had it delivered to my house in Apex. It is in very nice condition after I finished shopping it out.

The Williams "Fab Four" (below) - Manufactured in the early 80s, these four pinball machines, especially Black Knight, helped hold off the video take over in the arcade scene at the time. Theses machines featured the following revolutionary features:

Talking (not the first talking pins - Gorgar was the first, but early in the game)

Multi-level  - All had two playfields, a smaller one above the main playfield

Multi-ball

Magna-Save - Electro-Magnents which the player could envoke, if there were available manga-save "credits," to influence the ball from "draining."

Drop Targets - Timed

Black Knight - 1980 Williams - I now have the third Black Knight I've owned (sold the first two). I went down to a local Raleigh coin-op dealer with my pin buddy Don - he was looking for/at an Eight Ball Deluxe. I ended up buying the Black Knight "as is" dismantled, not working condition. I got them to throw in an addition nice playfield that was laying around since the one the machine was fairly worn. The additional playfield was nicer (and had micro-switches vs. leaf contacts and no wear on the magna-saves), but some of the parts had been cut out of the wiring harness. I did some surgery and got the new playfield working, ended up purchasing another MPU board on Ebay and sent that off to get it working. I bought a new repro back glass from Alan Meyer and put in the machine. The machine is the nicest Black Knight I've had - nicer than 90% of them out there. Sometimes it still has some "ghosts" and acts up- doesn't want to run right - but after it does, it's nice, crisp, and fast.

Jungle Lord  March 1981 - Williams - I bought one at the Winston Auction fairly reasonable in the late 90s.I ended up selling it to Gary Della so he could complete his "fab four" collection. Some time after I sold it, I bought Black Knight, Pharaoh and Solar Fire and now it was the only one missing which I didn't have. After a lengthy period of time (2-3 years) looking for one at a reasonable price and reasonable driving distance, I found one in Fall 2004 in Lexington, Va. for about $550 (two hundred fifty more than I paid for the first one). I picked it up on my way back from a trip to WV. It's a "blue cabinet" version, vs. the more rare red. It's in about the same condition as the original one which I had.

 Pharaoh - July 1981 Williams - I bought it site unseen off of a guy in Ohio. He delivered it over to my Uncle Bob's house in Ohio, whom brought it down to WV were I picked it up. The back glass is nice, the playfield has average wear, and it plays good.

Solar Fire October 1981 - Williams -  Final member of the "fab four" including the above three pins. Gary Della found a guy in Chicago with two of these for sale. They are very had to find - only something like 780 total were made. Gary and I bought both of them and had the Machine Mover deliver them to us. Gary already had one, but now has two. This machine is in fair condition. It play pretty well and is fun to play.

Pinball reached it's modern day peak production in 1979-80 with over 80,000 machines made per year (by all munufacturers combined).

P&B out in the driveway, preparing to replace the right side of the cabinet

P&B after new body stencil, before head stencil applied

Pitch and Bat - 1966 Williams  - I traded a Williams Phoenix pin with Don Bartge for this machine. This is the same machine (same model) that was in the batch of 50 that Don Shoemaker and I bought South of Atlanta. Don kept the one in that batch for himself. This P&B was a basket case - the right side of the cabinet was rotted out. I bought it with several of the parts literally in a box. I replace the entire side of the cabinet, sanded down and repainted the entire machine (which had very little paint left on it) with stencils I made from the existing paint pattern before sanding it down. I replaced the bottom board inside the cabinet that the EM components mount on. It's in pretty good shape now with the exception of a dented coin door and the back glass which has significant paint peeling. Both Don and I have been looking for repro back glasses for a few years, which may someday be made.

Line Drive - 1972 Williams Pitch and Bat - I bought this machine off of Don Bartge in North Durham, NC. It's one of the last pitch and bats with the running man unit. It has analog sound boards with crowd noises, explosions, sirens, and like the all the old P&Bs, is fun to play

Upper Deck - 1973 Williams Pitch and Bat - The very last EM pitch and bat made with the running man unit. It is very similar to the '72 Line Drive re. features. I also bought this machine from Don Bartge as a "basket case". The machine had experienced a "fire" in the scoring motor (EM CPU). All of the wires on the scoring motor unit were burnt back to other components in the bottom playfield. Don had acquired another scoring motor and had it in a box. I replaced the unit and wiring - quite a job replacing all of those burnt up wires connecting to the "EM CPU." Several of  wire colors didn't match the schematic and several of the wires were burned off the connectors on the scoring motor (where about 40 wires terminate). After I replaced-rewired the scoring motor, I didn't do any testing on the machine and it has set in the barn for a couple of years. I didn't have any room in the house to set it up and the back glass on the machine was flaking pretty bad. Despite the back glass flaking and the fire damage, which is not visible, the machine was is very, very nice shape. I just found a new repro-back glass (Feb 2005) after looking for quite a long time. I plan to bring the machine in and set it up next to the Line Drive (in order to stare and compare the wiring which is probably the same - esp. since the wire color coding doesn't match the schematic)  to "finish off" fixing any wiring problems and get this machine working correctly.

Slugfest - 1991 Williams Pitch and Bat -  I bought this machine at the Winston-Salem auction. I bid on it and was outbid. Sometime later after the auctioneer moved on and people began breaking the sold machines down for transport, I approached the guy near the machine. It turns out he was the seller and had been bidding against me and "got stuck" holding the pin. I made a deal with him which ended up picking it up where I stopped bidding (I think about $450). I had to buy a new lock-down bar laminate and a pitch button for it, which turned out to be moderately hard to find. It's in nice shape. It's missing the "topper" on top of the head which is next to impossible to find.

Wurlitzer Juke - Model 2700 - It's in very nice condition - chrome, etc. My son started a fire when he was small and damaged one side, I replaced all the vinyl wood grain with teak veneer and rebuilt the amp. It's in nice condition again. I sent the amp in to Bill Bickers (Jukebox Friday Night) to look at in Spring 2006 -he fixed a dead channel (it was only playing in mono since I had it).

Coke Machine - Vendo 64 (small, tall vertical glass door to access the bottles, late 50s model) - Bought it at the Winston Auction for $100. I didn't know much about Coke machines at the time. Turns out, it was missing all 10 of the gates which lock the bottles in place (like a yoke around the bottle neck to prevent the bottle from being pulled out until coins were inserted, etc). Luckily found someone who knew someone in Texas that may have the gates. Paid $100 or so for the 10 missing gates. The machine had been "updated" by Coke when out in the field over the years (new paint scheme, updated front plastic coke sign, etc). I completely disassembled the machine, did a fair amount of body work, put in new insulation, fiberglass gel-coated the interior of the cooler compartment, bought repro replacement parts (in order to take it back to how it was originally made). My Uncle Bob repainted the machine with Dupont paint in the Coke colors.

Zodiac - early 70's Bally Bingo Machine - I bought this at the Winston auction for something like $30.  The head (Vertical part) is huge on bingo machine and contains enough wiring and parts to make 3-4 pinball machines (probably has $30 worth of salvageable copper wiring in it). Needless to say, the head is very heavy. These games were made for gambling. You loaded it up with coins which gave you credits, you chose how many credits you wanted to bet and what extra gaming features you wanted to buy (for a credit) at the start of each new bingo card, then you start launching pinballs, one at a time, which land in the bingo holes on the playfield. This model has the "magic screen" where the player can manipulate the horizontal and vertical numbers on the "bingo card." When the fourth ball is played, this feature (magic screen) is disabled. The payoff is dependant on the amount of the bet and the final bingo card. Winners received the game winnings in the form of additional credits on the machine (similar to a slot machine) - you don't want to give the customer cash to make it easy for them to put it in their pocket and walk away. At any time you could see the parlor operator to get your payout for the credit balance shown on the machine. Some of these machines had a coin payout hopper, again, similar to slot machines. There was a lot of individual state laws concerning these machines, a lot of these machine were operated in the "back room," and a lot of these machines were destroyed due to law changes, etc.

Lava Lamps -

 Of course I have a few of these including the discontinued giant, the new grande, and others..