Your first month with a pinball machine
You found your first machine, brought it home, and now the real education starts. Here's what the first 30 days of pinball ownership actually looks like.
By Colin B. · Published June 17, 2026
Photo by Mykyta Kravčenko on Unsplash
Most first-time pinball owners make the same sequence of discoveries. Day one: the machine is amazing and you can’t believe you waited this long. Week one: something small is wrong. Week two: something bigger is wrong. Month one: you’ve fixed three things, learned more about 1980s electronics than you expected, and you’re already looking at a second machine. This is normal. This is the hobby.
Here’s what to actually do, in order, so the first month goes well.
Before the machine arrives: get your supplies ready
The biggest mistake is waiting until the machine is in your game room before ordering anything. Used pinball machines need a shop-out immediately: new rubber, a playfield clean, and a bulb audit. If your supplies aren’t there when the machine arrives, you’ll play on a machine that needs work for a week waiting for parts.
Order before delivery:
- Rubber kit for your specific game title (Pinball Life, sorted by game title)
- Novus Plastic Polish kit (the 3-pack with grades 1, 2, and 3)
- 99% isopropyl alcohol (not 70% — the water content in lower concentrations damages old artwork and inserts)
- Digital multimeter (Klein MM300 or equivalent — you’ll use this the first week)
- Pinball balls (a pack of four; your machine’s balls are probably worn)
While you’re waiting, join Pinside.com and find your machine’s dedicated forum thread. Every major machine has hundreds of pages of documented problems, fixes, and buyer knowledge. You’re looking for: common failure points, which components fail first, what to check on arrival, and whether there are scarce parts you should stock while they’re available.
Download the factory service manual from IPDB.org. Free, scanned from the original. You will refer to it every time something stops working.
Week one: the shop-out
A shop-out is the baseline maintenance pass every used machine needs. Plan for a 3-5 hour afternoon. You’ll need the service manual, your rubber kit, IPA, Novus, a flashlight, and patience.
Step 1: Open it up and look. Raise the playfield and spend 15 minutes just looking. Check for obvious damage: burned connector pins, cracked plastics, broken wireforms, signs of water damage (rust on metal parts, warped wood). These are known quantities — you’re not surprised by them later.
Step 2: Clean the playfield. Work in sections with 99% IPA on a lint-free cloth. Wipe with the grain of the playfield, not in circles. You’ll be surprised how much comes off. After the IPA pass dries, apply Novus #2 to remove ball swirl marks, then Novus #1 to polish. The difference before and after is dramatic.
Step 3: Replace all rubber. Work through the rubber kit systematically, post by post, starting from the back of the playfield and working toward the flippers. Old rubber hardens and kills ball flow. New rubber makes the machine play like it was meant to.
Step 4: Check the flippers. Flip them by hand with power off. They should return to rest with a clean snap. Soft or sticky return means worn flipper return springs or a degraded EOS switch. A flipper rebuild kit (separate from the rubber kit) handles this.
Step 5: Audit the bulbs. Play a test game with the cabinet open and note every dead bulb you see. #44 and #47 incandescent sockets are your general illumination (GI) — these are the ones you’ll swap for LEDs if you choose to upgrade.
After the shop-out, play 20 games. Note everything that doesn’t work right: stuck ball, weak flipper, dead light zone, solenoid that fires weak or not at all. You’re building your repair list.
Week two to four: learn the diagnostics chain
Most pinball problems follow a short diagnostic chain:
- Is there power to the component? Multimeter on DC voltage at the component’s coil or lamp socket.
- Does the switch matrix register? Enter test mode (consult your service manual) and trigger the switch.
- Is the fuse intact? Every fuse bank in the cabinet is labeled in the service manual. Fuses blow for reasons — find the reason before replacing.
- Is the driver board sending the signal? Advanced, but documented step-by-step in the Pinside thread for your machine.
The single most useful thing you can learn in month one is how to use your machine’s built-in test mode. Every solid-state machine from the late 1980s onward has one. It lets you fire each solenoid individually, check switch registration, and run lamp tests. Before you post on Pinside asking why something doesn’t work, run it through test mode.
The most common first-month problems:
- Stuck ball: Usually a missing post, a worn coil sleeve, or debris in a ball lane. Check the obvious physical causes before assuming electronics.
- Weak flipper: Worn EOS switch or a glazed coil sleeve. Both are cheap, accessible fixes.
- Dead GI section: A blown GI fuse or a broken GI connector. Trace the GI string back to the fuse in your manual.
- Scoring display issues: On older dot-matrix games, cracked ribbon cables or failing display boards. Common on 1990s Bally/Williams games.
When you do post on Pinside, include: machine title, era, what you’ve already checked, and what your multimeter reads at the component. You’ll get answers within hours from people who’ve fixed the exact problem on your exact machine.
When to call it a win
Month one is successful if: the machine plays a full game without stopping, the flippers feel strong, the playfield is clean, and you have a repair list of known remaining issues (not surprises).
You don’t need to fix everything in month one. A pinball machine is not a project to complete; it’s something you maintain indefinitely. The right goal is: know your machine, know what’s wrong with it, and have a plan for the next repair. That’s what a real collector looks like.
The second machine temptation will hit around week three. Resist it. Get a full month on the first one first. You’ll know more about what you actually want in a machine and you’ll negotiate better on price.
Ready to buy your first machine and gear? See our pinball collecting gear guide for the shop-out supplies, LED kits, and tools worth buying first.