Leon Borre WPC Fliptronics board repair

Bench testing the Fliptronic board.

Some early machines of the WPC series do not yet have this board , Party zone was the first machine using the fliptronic board. You will find Fliptronic type 1 only in Addams family, all others are Fliptronic type2 boards. The Fliptronic 2 board has a extra bridghe rectifier and some fuses and one extra connector J907, and furthermore connector 901 is the same connector as on the Fliptronic 1 board but has another function.

The Fliptronic 1 board.

The Fliptronic 2 board. Red arrow indicates the connector J901 and blue arrow the extra connector J907 , both are used to connect the 70 volt AC in DC out.

Some very strange things could happen when this board is faulty. Only one example: Addams Family , the top flipper on the right, when used stay "up" and came down again when pushing the flippers on the left !!! Of course in most cases it is just the flipper that will not work at all, or stay up once it is energised, or all the time..

Look first if the end of stroke contacts are working properly , it has to close when the flipper is excitated. If you are shure it is the board that is faulty proceed as follows. .

We need 5 and 12 volts to operate the board on the bench. Connect the tensions at J804/904, pin 4 and 5 is ground , pin 1 is 5 and pin 3 is 12.

All connectors have two numbers , ( 802/902) this because the numbers are different on fliptronic 1 and fliptronic 2 type boards. The test is the same for both type boards.

Ground all 4 pins of J801( Only on a Fliptronic type 1 board it is useless to ground J901 on a Fliptronic type 2 board.) Connect a LED strip at J802./902( the LED strip and how to make one,see at repair of Bally driver board) the common of the LED strip is connected at 5 volts.

Fliptronic 1 connected . Red arrow the tensions ar applied here 5, 12 and ground. Blue arrow , the LED strip connected. Orange arrow these 4 pins shoud be grounded during testing. Black arrow here the input pins , ground them one by one during test of the LM339 input IC's.

The Fliptronic 2 board , the same as type 1 blue arrow the LED strip , Red arrow the tensions 5, 12 and ground, and orange arrow the input pins to ground one by one, during input test.

We will check the input circuitry, always one of the ( or both) LM339's that will fail.U4 and U6.

Check with a logic tester or voltmeter the output pins 1,2,13 and 14 at U4 and U6 , these must change from 5 to 0 volt when grounding pins at input connectors J805/905 and J806/906,

Pin 2 at U4 changes when pin 1 J806/906 is grounded. Pin 1 at U4 changes when pin 1 at J805/905 is grounded.

Pin 14 at U4 changes when pin 3 at J806/906 is grounded. Pin 13 at U4 changes when pin 2 at J805/905 is grounded.

Pin 2 at U6 changes when pin 4 at J806/906 is grounded. Pin 1 at U6 changes when pin 3 at J805/905 is grounded.

Pin 14 at U6 changes when pin 5 at J806/906 is grounded. Pin 13 at U6 changes when pin 5 at J805/905 is grounded.

If no change replace the a ppropriated LM339.

Next we check the complete transistor drive circuitry.

As there is a LED test strip on J802/902 , the LED will go "on" if the circuit is ok.

Grounding the apropriated pins at U2 will excitate the whole circuit for one of the outputs.

To check output on J802/902 pins 13 12 ground pin 2 at U2

To check ouput on J802/902 pin11 ground pin 19 at U2.

To check output on J802/902 pins 9 8 ground pin 16 at U2.

To check output on J802/902 pin 7 ground pin 5 at U2.

To check output on J802/902 pin 5 6 ground pin 6 at U2.

To check output on J802/902 pin 4 ground pin 15 at U2.

To check output on J802/902 pin 3 2 ground pin 12 at U2

To check output at J802/902 pin 1 ground pin 9 at U2.

When one of the LEDs will not light up follow the signal change , at the bases of the transistors in that circuit. When applying the ground connection at U2 the base always has to show some polarity change..If not it's the transistor at the left ( on schematic) from the base resistor that shows no change ,who is faulty.

The IC's that are not tested using this repair method, are some input and output couplers U2, U3, U5 these are directly connected to the CPU board and are not connected with the input or outputs, in general it's always the input and/or output circuits that are the trouble makers as there is more chance for shorts or excesive load on these circuits.