Hey Guys,

Yesterday my kid started to play the DM and he comes and says "the left flipper is dead".  I went and looked, and the left gun handle button would not fire the lower OR upper left flippers at all, but the cabinet button fired the flippers, except that the upper left flipper would not hold up (lower left flippre worked fine). (Right flipper works fine, no problems at all with it)

So odd that something with the gun handle siwtch AND a flipper coil or something would go at the exact same time.  So today i went into test mode today, it was not workin in test mode either (doing exactly the same thing).  For shits and giggles, i ran tests on everything, lights, coils, music, etc.  I happened to push the left cabinet flipper button in while the music was going (i was bored) and both flippers were suddenly working just fine.  I tried the left gun handle button and the flippers again were working just fine.  I went back to thw switch matrix and this time the gun handle siwtch was showing that it was working and the filppers were holding properly and everything.  I went out of the test mode, started a game, and now the flippers are working perfectly.

What in the hell could that be? Bad solder joint somewhere?  A connector problem?  I haven't looked into it beyond the test mode and everything working properly now, but if anyone knows, do tell.

Sounds like wonky switches, optos or the fliptronic board is giving you a problem.

I would check board connectors, clean optos and switches, including EOS's and if it still is intermittent the two LM339's on the fliptronic board can get leaky and create odd things to happen.

I never owned DM but I am assuming the cab switches are opto and the handles are micro switches?

I have not looked into this yet, but a possibly important piece of info i noticed:

The flippers had been working lately, but I turned the machine on to play a game before bed, and oddly was having a great game, still on ball 1 and had been playing for awhile, then suddenly both flippers on the left side won't fire with the gun handle, and so i switched to the cabinet buttons, with the bottom left flipper working fine, but the top left flipper firing, a little stutter at the top, then the flipper falls back.

So, I just shut the game down, and the next day came back to the game.  Turned it on, started a game, flippers worked fine on the initial flip with the left gun handle.  Just for sh*ts and giggles i squeezed the left gun handle button and held it, and both flippers stayed up for about 2 seconds, then both flippers died again.  I was able to go to the cabinet buttons again, but still the top left flipper is firing funny.

I think this leads me to suspect something with the flipper board.  Does anyone have any further advice given this new information?  Is it possible that the transistors could cool down and work for a few seconds initially, then die, or once blown always blown?  

I'm getting ready to tear into it, but I just wanted to know if someone might know off hand where to look first, or if I need to start tracing everything from the board first.  I do have a Judge Dredd which I THINK has the same flipper controller board.  I might just be able to swap those around and see if that solves my problem, then i know it's a problem on the board.

Problem Solved, was the ribbon cables and/or connectors.  At least so far anyways...it's working good.  I unplugged the ribbon cables from the CPU to the fliptronics board, and also all the connectors on the flip board, so far it's working great.  Hopefully that holds up.