Refurbished / Rebuilt game, Fall 2005
This was not my game, but belonged to another Chicago area collector. He picked it up from Kirk Weaver in the summer of 2005. Ordinarily, I wouldn't have a project game here that isn't mine, but this one is special because it is such a rarity. I worked on it in parallel with my Motor Show.
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| The backglass | The cabinet |
I got lucky on the electronics. No battery leakage on the CPU, and other than the usual problem with the power supply fuse clips, the boards were all in good shape. The CPU needed new ROMs (thanks to Steve for the images), and I added a memory backup capacitor to provide backup power to the RAM when the game is off. I replaced the fuse clips on the power supply, and testing the power supply, CPU, and Driver board in my Motor Show showed that they were working. But not in the Dakar. Swapping boards between the games narrowed it down, there was no video on the Dakar. The ROMs as well as the 74S288 PROM on the video board in the backbox were bad. New ROMs were easy, and I was able to get a copy of the image data for the PROM, but had no way to burn one of these. Another collector (thanks, Duncan) suggested building an adapter and fitting a standard 2716 in its place.
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| Parts! | Completed 74S288 to 2716 adapter |
Building the adapter, and some fiddling with the switching power supply in the cabinet got the game to boot and run. The hard part over, it was shopped and readied for Pinball Expo 2005.
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| Cabinet overall | Cabinet side | Cabinet front |
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| Playfield - Top Right | Playfield - Mid Right | Playfield - Bottom Right |
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| Playfield - Bottom Right | Playfield - Apron | Playfield - Top Left |
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| Playfield - Bottom Left | Playfield - Bottom Left | Playfield - Mid Left |
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| Inside the Cabinet | Underside of the Playfield |
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| Backglass | Playfield | Overall Game |
Dakar has one video game mode, where the player drives a car, steering with the flipper buttons to avoid the rocks. The display is also used to show the game rules and objectives in attract mode, and to show the player's progress toward the end of the race after each ball.
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| Drive the car - Avoid the rocks | How to play. | End of Ball Display |
| The video display. | ||
I had a good time bringing this game, and Motor Show, back to life. I learned some more tricks for use in the future, I got to add more interesting content to my web site, and I got to work on and play a game that only a few collectors will ever see. And I got to help bring two very rare games to Pinball Expo 2005 to share with other collectors and enthusiasts. In the spring of 2006, Motor Show and Dakar were both sold to PAPA and should be making their appearance there.