Dutch Pinball
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Technical Support TBL FAQ
rev 0.51
Page 17 bowling operations faq rel 0.86
Principal of Operations
The way the bowling alley-pins work is as follows.
The software calculates the position of the bowling launcher by detecting the left, right and middle
position via switches. It also knows the speed of the launcher so it can determine where the launcher
is at the moment you push the launch button.
It than calculates the trajectory of the ball and which bowling pins should drop if the ball hits them.
The ball passes an opto just before the first bowling pin when moving down and that triggers the
software to activate the appropriate coils which pull the calculated bowling pins up. So, it has
nothing to do with ball physically hitting the bowling pins
! If a bowling pin doesn’t ‘drop’ it means 1)
the coil is not OK or 2) the software thinks the ball is in another place.
Fault seeking
To do some checking you will have to remove the playfield and set it vertical:
•
Carefully remove the lockdown bar and playfield glass.
•
Remove all five balls from the Ball Trough!
•
Lift the playfield a bit and pull the playfield a bit towards you as soon as the playfield support
brackets are high enough to do so and rest the playfield onto the front of the cabinet on the
playfield support brackets
