As mentioned previously, I know that my Elevator Action started life as a Jungle Hunt cabinet and at some point was converted with a factory Taito conversion Kit. The documentation included a Jungle Hunt manual, with game serial number of 148070, which matches the number on the back of my cabinet. A Taito America Corporation Conversion Kit, Jungle Hunt to Elevator Action manual was present with a serial number of 504609. That serial number does not match the serial number on the conversion card stapled to the back door of my cabinet, which is 503510. Maybe this was just an operator mix up, or perhaps the manuals got switched somewhere along the way. I also know that my cabinet was at one time located in the Mobile, Alabama area as indicated by the operator sticker on the front of the coin door, which reads “Top Music & Amusement Company, Mobile, Alabama, Phone (205)661-2020, Mobile Alabama, Nick M. Stratas – Owner”.

I got just a bit more history as I was thumbing through the manuals. At the back of the Elevator Action manual, I located three “service call” tickets, one from 1983 and two from 1986. The service call tickets are all identical and appear to be from the same operator, although the handwriting is different on each. The first ticket was from August 4th, 1983 with a location of “Washington Bro. Grd.”. The game serviced was Jungle Hunt and the slam switch was too close to the front door, causing the game to tilt. Sometime between August of 1983 and April of 1986, the game was converted to Elevator Action. The next service ticket is dated April 5th, 1986 with a location of “Bayside Grd.” and the control panel was loose on Elevator Action. The clamp was repaired and the control panel clamped into place. The last service call ticket was dated August 15th, 1986 with a location of “Hayes Bayside, Fairhope” with a blown 10 amp fuse. What I find interesting is the location of each service ticket has a portion of the previous service ticket in it, “grd” in the first ticket and second ticket and “bayside” in the second ticket and third ticket. Was the location the same each time and different operators just called it by a different name? I know on the third ticket, the location is in Fairhope, Alabama.

What happened between 1986 and the time the machine reached my hands is anyone’s guess. Over the course of 22 years, the cabinet has made its way from Alabama to Illinois. Hopefully, someone familiar with the area can provide me some information on the locations provided in the service tickets. I’ve already tried to send and e-mail to Top Music, but their form is not working and I suspect their records on the game are long gone.

I like to start my troubleshooting at the source and work backwards, so I began taking some readings on the joystick with my voltmeter. I took my first set of readings on the joystick leaf switches, measuring the voltages for left, right, down and up. Left, right and down all measured a consistent 4.8 volts, while up produced a reading of 0. The control panel and all of it’s switches and buttons plug into the main wiring harness with a 15 pin molex connector. I took my next set of readings on the wiring harness side of this 15 pin molex connector. Again, the joystick up directional measured 0.

Between the game board and the control panel is a filter board. I’m not really sure of it’s purpose but my guess is that it cleans the signals coming off of the main pcb before sending them out to various components of the cabinet and vice versa. The filter board is made up of 11 headers, each with about 14 pins. I measured the voltage of header R16 (one of two), pin 5 which is the next logical step between the molex connector and control panel. Again, the reading was 0. I went to the other R16 header, pin 5, and again received a 0 reading. I then decided to test the continuity between the two R16 headers and found several cold solder joints. Instead of just repairing the few I found, I de-soldered all of the header pins and reflowed the solder to all of them. I then tested all 11 headers again and found no continuity problems.

I still wasn’t getting any voltage reading on the up directional pins on header R16 so I proceeded back to the game board. I took my next set of readings directly on the edge connector finger board of the game board. The up directional is controlled by the 13th pin on the solder side. Taking my reading directly off the edge connector finger board produced a steady reading of about 5.0 volts for up. This told me my problem was between the edge connector and the filter board. The only logical conclusion was the edge connector was not making good contact with the finger board of the PCB. I took a small flat head screwdriver and bent every connector pin down towards the finger board to ensure that good contact was being made. Like magic, I all of the sudden had good voltages at the filter board, at the molex connector and at the joystick.

I started a new game and everything that was previously not working started working. The second coin slot was now registering credits, the player 1 start button worked and most importantly, the up directional of the joystick was working! I know the up directional was fixed by the bending the pins down on the edge connector. The other two could have been fixed by repairing the cold solder joints. I’ll never know. While my description probably sucks, it’s really not that difficult to troubleshoot basic problems with games. Once you get into the circuit boards, it gets a bit more difficult but the key is to understand the flow of everything and have a good set of schematics to work from and study.

Outside of the control panel, the front of the cabinet is in decent shape.   There are two small holes in the upper right hand corner of the front panel.  If I decide to repaint the cabinet, they will get filled.  The sticker on the coin door should come off with a little “Goof Off”.  The sticker reads “Top Music & Amusement Co. Mobile, Alabama”.  The metal pieces surrounding the monitor bezel need to be sanded and repainted.  There are some noticeable rust spots that should come off relatively easy.   There is one small flaking area on the graphics of the bezel, but I should be able to seal that up to prevent it from spreading.   The marquee is decent but will be replaced if I can find a better looking one.  The coin door counters have the following play counts; 20,480 and 11,829.   That’s $8,077.25 worth of quarters!

The control panel is a mess.  The player 1 start button does not appear to function.  The joystick does not work in the up direction.  Hopefully it’s just a few loose wires but I haven’t investigated the issues at all.   It desperately needs a new control panel overlay.  Even an inkjet reproduction would look better than the one on the cabinet now.  All of the buttons will be replaced.

As you can see, the sides are relatively nice. There are a few scuffs and scratches but for a 26 year old cabinet, I think they’ve held up fairly well. Here’s the dilemma…unlike most cabinets that had a giant vinyl sticker on the side with silk screened side art, the Taito design is actually painted on the cabinet. Stencils sets are available at Game Stencils that would allow me to repaint the entire cabinet but I’m not sure if it’s worth the trouble. That’s a decision I will deal with later.

As I mentioned yesterday, I’m fairly postive this cabinet started life as a Jungle Hunt.  I base this on the cabinet color, which is not correct for a dedicated, original Elevator Action and the fact that a 15 page Jungle Hunt to Elevator Action conversion manual was included with the documentation.  Heck, an original Jungle Hunt manual was also thrown in for good measure.  The upper tag on the back door reads in part: “Subject to the condition that this game was converted without deviation from the instructions which accompanied the conversion kit…”  Maybe I’ll score a Jungle Hunt board at some point which is a plug and play swap with the Elevator Action board.

Overall, I’m pretty happy with the cabinet.  I love the game but need to get the joystick working properly in order to really play it.  While the basement is undergoing construction, the game will be stored in a secure holding facility.  I’d welcome your thoughts on a decision on re-stenciling and repainting the cabinet.

The game is in decent shape but needs a few cosmetic repairs.  The control panel overlay is shot and needs to be replaced.  Most of the metal pieces need to be sanded down and repainted.  The player 1 start button doesn’t appear to be working.  The cabinet itself is solid and the stenciled sides are decent.  I’ll have to decide later if I want to re-stencil and repaint them.  It appears to have started life as a Jungle Hunt and was later converted to an Elevator Action.  My recollection is the dedicated Elevator Action cabinets were light and dark brown while my cabinet is light and dark green.  There is also a Jungle Hunt to Elevator Action conversion manual included with the documentation and a tag on the cabinet indicating that it was converted.  Outside of those few minor details, the game is fully working and should only need cosmetic repairs.

In keeping with my tradition, here are the original marketing flyers for Elevator Action.  I’ll have pictures of the actual cabinet tomorrow.

I’ve set up a dedicated Elevator Action category and a dedicated photo gallery for the game. Keep in mind that there won’t be much arcade related work taking place while the basement remodel is underway.