Discs of Tron (Bally Midway, 1983) (Page 2)

Cleaning and Repair (or, OMG what a job!)

Cleaning

    Here's a short list of things that needed doing, cleaning-wise:
 

• Clean the dust off the monitor, front glass, mirror, behind-the-mirror artwork, cabinet sides and some PCBs.

 
• Remove and thoroughly clean the control panel and buttons

 
• Disassemble the joystick and remove the accumulated crud from the handle

 
• Take a Shop-Vac to the interior of the cabinet to remove the thick build-up of dust within

 
• Clean the portion of cabinet you stand on

    Items that we needed to accomplish our goal:
 

• "Goof-off" - seems to be another name for paint thinner. Fumes are extremely strong. Used to remove gunk from glass that even telephone booth glass cleaner couldn't handle!

 
• 409 brand cleaner. This stuff works GREAT for removing dirt from control panels, buttons, joysticks, side-art, and other surfaces. Preferred method: Spray a generous amount onto the surface to be cleaned. Let sit for a few minutes, then wipe off with a bathroom tile-scrubbing brush. The abrasive foam of the tile brush is just enough to work the 409 in to get that hard-to-remove crud off, but won't damage the artwork on a control panel.

 
• Glass cleaner. We had a supply of telephone booth cleaner, which will clean just about any glass or plastic surface. Unfortunately, it was too strong to use safely on the plastic backdrop art, and began taking the art off along with the dirt. No serious damage was done, but you should always test a small area of the item to be cleaned to be sure the cleaner will not damage it!

 
• Electronics de-greaser. While not shown here, we did work on a PCB and wanted to get the gunk off of it. Radio Shack stocks a cleaner but it's EXPENSIVE. Use sparingly and in a well-ventilated location. In the past, I've made do with automotive de-greaser, but choose carefully! If it is not chemically similar to the electronics degreaser, ie it uses acid or another corrosive chemical, you will melt your boards. Exercise extreme caution if you decide to use an alternative method of cleaning your PCBs! I've seen posts on rgvac advocating the use of a dishwasher to clean boards. This is not a preferred method of cleaning, but if you want to soak the capacitors and ROMs on your irreplaceable I, Robot board in water, you go right ahead.

 
• TARNEX. Again, not shown here, but we bought some in case we had to do some cleaning of chips. Many chips of that time used silver leads, which corrode over time and cause various problems. Advanced corrosion can cause flaky connections, excess heat buildup, power draw increases, and eventually will make the chip unuseable. You can replace some chips with new ones, but for proprietary chips the only solution is to clean off the corrosion by giving them a good soak in TARNEX. Let them soak a couple of minutes, then place them in an alcohol bath. Clean the leads with a cotton swab, taking care to not bend the leads yet managing to get between the leads. Let dry, then replace (preferably in a new socket).

 
• Socks, t-shirts, towels, rags, whatever is handy. What else are you going to use to clean off 18 years of dirt? Paper towels?

 
• Tools. A 1/4" socket wrench (note to self, buy one before game arrives), Phillips-head screwdriver, security wrench (like an Allen but the wrench end has a hole to accomodate the security screws used on the marquee on Bally/Midway games, for instance), hammer, and a flashlight.

    Now that we have our supplies, we're ready to begin! First, we went over the artwork on both pieces of the cabinet to remove the excess dirt. A little 409 later, we tackled the worst job of all - glass-work! The environmental Discs of Tron (and possibly the UR, but I haven't seen an UR in a very long time) has several different pieces which together, help simulate the feel of being in Tron's world. First is the glass directly behind the control panel. Next is the mirror which reflects the image of the monitor, which is mounted facing up. The mirror reflects the artwork on either side of the area between the front glass and the mirror, giving the illusion of there being a larger area shown. Since the mirror may be seen through, there is art behind THAT, a red trapezoid with lines that connect with the mirrored artwork. Behind the red art is a blue art piece, that consists of some lines that coincide with the reflected game playfield. Behind THAT is a large blue piece of plastic that has a futuristic city-scape drawn on it. When all these pieces are in place, and all the lights (normal and black) work, it gives a VERY cool 3-D effect.  Here's some pictures (run your cursor over each picture to get more detail about it. Click the link to get a larger picture):

    We had just a few problems as you saw above :) First, we didn't put the red art glass back in correctly, so it did not match up with the reflected red artwork on the inside sides of the cabinet. Next, we failed to place the blue plastic backdrop with the black rectangle facing in towards the player. After fixing that, we turned the game on... and discovered it WAS possible to put the mirror in backwards! Word of advice, make some sort of mark on the glass in a part that cannot be seen once you re-install it, so you know which way to put things back. A photographic record of the removal of pieces can be helpful, as well.

    Once the dust was removed, the screen burn on the monitor was quite evident. It wasn't too bad during gameplay, but when the machine was off it was definitely an eyesore. Here is a final pair of pictures, showing the difference visually between having the dirty screen and art, and having them cleaned up:

    We cheated a LITTLE by hanging a work light on the back of the game with the access panel open, to simulate the missing fluorescent light that would normally illuminate the backdrop. But, you get the idea! The "trails" on the right image are from me playing while Ed takes the picture - it's limitation of the digital camera, not a problem with the game.

    The joystick, control panel, and blacklight cover were much easier to work on by comparison. All that was needed to clean those was some 409 and a little elbow grease, and time. I think they turned out quite well, don't you?
 
 

Copyright 2001 Madoc Owain