Bringing home an old used pinball machines can be exciting and restoring an old pinball machine can bring hours of enjoyment for those looking for a challenge and wanting to learn new things.
Pinball restoration allows the hobbyist to clean, work with wood, metal, mechanical parts and electronics. Many of the skills needed can be learned and researched online. There is also a large community of pinball hobbyist willing to help out.
That said it’s handy to have a friend in the hobby to help out or a pinball club or league to lean on for tips.
Most of the common parts for pinball machines, even the old ones are available either through dealers like The Pinball Resource or Pinball Life. Bumpers, rubbers, flippers, posts etc are all readily available either from NOS (new old stock), reproduction or parted out machines on Ebay.
But there are a few items that are nearly impossible to find due to the high cost of reproducing them. If the used machine you are look to purchase is missing these items, it might be next to impossible to find a replacement.
Backglasses – Reproduction back glasses are sometimes available in limited runs.
Lockdown bars – A missing lock down bar can be nearly impossible to find. This is a very expensive part to tool so if your machine is missing one, it will be a challenge to find a new one.
Playfields – Playfields wear out. Usually one has to make due with carefully painting in worn areas. Sometimes reproductions of more popular games are run but they are expensive. There are also “Hardtops” available for certain games. These are thick plastic overlays with the graphics printed on the bottom.
Plastics – Plastics subjected to lots of heat from the general illumination bulbs can cause plastics to warp and the steel ball zipping around can make them crack. You can sometimes get reproduction ones or find used plastics on Ebay. But like anything, they will be expensive.
Targets – Targets are not too hard to find but they are expensive to replace considering they are only a little bit of plastic.
So keep this in mind when thinking about purchasing an older pinball machine and make a mental note of the costs of finding replacement parts and if they are even available and let the purchase price reflect this.