Skee-Ball
The Story: Ok, lets be honest, vintage arcade gaming isn't all about video games. Although those are the biggest passion of mine in the hobby, they are hardly the whole story. And no, I'm not talking about pinball once again. This time I have something different in mind. Think about it. What games do you remember playing at the arcade? Like most everyone else (myself included), You might hear a rundown of video games and/or pinball games. You might even hear about a few "redemption" games, you know, the one's that reward you with tickets that you can stockpile and cash in for prizes at the counter. Not many people would think to mention Skee-Ball. But if you asked, you'd probably hear something like "Oh yeah, I love Skee-Ball". Whether it's in the back of your mind or not, nearly everyone knows the game of Skee-Ball, nearly everyone has played it, and I'm willing to bet you won't find one person from that group who can honestly say they don't care for it. If they tried to say that, I'd stand back and watch their nose grow, or even wait for them to get struck by lightning.
Ok, maybe I'm just getting silly now, but I'm betting that you get my point. There's just something about blowing a shiny quarter for mere seconds of Skee-Ball bliss. The sights and sounds of the game are truly fond memories for anyone who's ever played it, and to this day it's still one of the most popular games in arcade's and family fun centers all over the world.
The Score: I recently had the opportunity to bring home my very own Skee-Ball machine and, of course, I couldn't turn it down. Especially considering I was getting the game for free. Let me explain. I recently aquired some side work from a local operator who own's a slew of arcade, pinball & redemption games. He recently partnered up with a business owner nearby and they opened up a new family fun center. I was hired on to set up and work on games in a push to get the business ready for it's grand opening. Among the laundry list were a total of three classic Skee-Ball machines. The machines were a little rough, which you expect for these kinds of games of this age, especially when your'e talking about such a popular game. As a matter of fact, these machines literally had a million hits on the coin counters. So there's another sign that maybe it was just time to retire these machines. Yes, they "could have" been saved, but they were missing so many pieces that they were far from ready to be put back on location, and they were all in various states of disrepair. Once I explained all the parts, pieces & labor these games would need to be ready to earn quarters once again, the operator decided to pull them out and put new machines in place. I mentioned an interest in the old machines and from there we reached an agreement. I would take home all three of the old Skee-Ball machines, get them working and ready for home use at my leisure, bring him back one nice working game for his house, and in return I got to keep the remainder. A win-win for everyone, and a few old machines were saved and retrofitted for home use.
The Service: Well, as I mentioned, these games were missing several key pieces of hardware, the most important of which were the legs. Yes, none of these games had legs. I'm not exactly sure what kind of material the original legs were made out of, but I did see evidence that someone's answer to this mystery was a simple piece of 2x2 lumber, which I found broken on one of the machines. I decided that unistrut was a better alternative for these. It's stronger and easily adjustable. I researched the internet and found the proper height from the bottom of the back to the floor was approximately 16". I had also determined that the game originally used only 2 legs on the back. I decided to go one better and added 2 more legs where the lane mates with the receiving end. Here's how that turned out:
Ok, maybe I'm just getting silly now, but I'm betting that you get my point. There's just something about blowing a shiny quarter for mere seconds of Skee-Ball bliss. The sights and sounds of the game are truly fond memories for anyone who's ever played it, and to this day it's still one of the most popular games in arcade's and family fun centers all over the world.
The Score: I recently had the opportunity to bring home my very own Skee-Ball machine and, of course, I couldn't turn it down. Especially considering I was getting the game for free. Let me explain. I recently aquired some side work from a local operator who own's a slew of arcade, pinball & redemption games. He recently partnered up with a business owner nearby and they opened up a new family fun center. I was hired on to set up and work on games in a push to get the business ready for it's grand opening. Among the laundry list were a total of three classic Skee-Ball machines. The machines were a little rough, which you expect for these kinds of games of this age, especially when your'e talking about such a popular game. As a matter of fact, these machines literally had a million hits on the coin counters. So there's another sign that maybe it was just time to retire these machines. Yes, they "could have" been saved, but they were missing so many pieces that they were far from ready to be put back on location, and they were all in various states of disrepair. Once I explained all the parts, pieces & labor these games would need to be ready to earn quarters once again, the operator decided to pull them out and put new machines in place. I mentioned an interest in the old machines and from there we reached an agreement. I would take home all three of the old Skee-Ball machines, get them working and ready for home use at my leisure, bring him back one nice working game for his house, and in return I got to keep the remainder. A win-win for everyone, and a few old machines were saved and retrofitted for home use.
The Service: Well, as I mentioned, these games were missing several key pieces of hardware, the most important of which were the legs. Yes, none of these games had legs. I'm not exactly sure what kind of material the original legs were made out of, but I did see evidence that someone's answer to this mystery was a simple piece of 2x2 lumber, which I found broken on one of the machines. I decided that unistrut was a better alternative for these. It's stronger and easily adjustable. I researched the internet and found the proper height from the bottom of the back to the floor was approximately 16". I had also determined that the game originally used only 2 legs on the back. I decided to go one better and added 2 more legs where the lane mates with the receiving end. Here's how that turned out:
Once I had the main pieces assembled, the next project to tackle was the netting. These game's did have most of the side netting and hardware associated with it. However they were all missing the top netting and hardware that mounted over the scoring rings. Now maybe you'll understand why I mentioned these games were not location ready. Without the netting over the rings, it makes it too easy for anyone to "cheat" and simply place the balls in the highest scoring rings every time, which, of course, pay's out more tickets and eat's at the operator's bottom line. However, for home use, where the game is on free play and the ticket feeder is disabled, this piece of missing netting won't be a problem. With this in mind, I still had to get creative and figure out a way to secure the side netting on, since it no longer had the support of the missing top netting & pieces. I added some tubing straps and mounting brackets into the mix and mounted them in a specific manner, which gave sufficient support to the side panels (again, for home use)...
After I finshed with the side netting, I played a few rounds and came across another problem. If the ball was thrown too hard (which does often happen), it would often launch so high that it would hit the main plexiglass. Well, we didn't need the top netting to deter cheaters in our home, but now we need something to prevent the ball from leaving the lane and smashing thru the main plexiglass or, even worse, thru the ceiling. At this point, I contacted the manufacturer. To my suprise, they still support this model and still stock parts for it. However, they gave me an insane price quote for the top netting. I don't remember the exact number but I do know it was in the hundreds of dollars. Ouch! Obviously I was going to have to get the creative juices flowing once again and construct something myself. I thought about fish netting, and someone else even mentioned a volleyball or tennis court net. In the meantime, I was implementing a temporary and somewhat "redneck" remedy. It was in the form of an old metal refrigerator shelf that I happened to have laying around. It did the job, and I also noticed the metal shelf added even more support to the side netting. So I decided I was going to try to find a couple more shelves. I went to my local Lowe's store and asked if I could raid their scrap pile for a couple of metal shelves from an old refrigerator or freezer. Well you can probably guess what happened. I was turned away. They said they couldn't allow that for insurance reasons. Well, it didn't hit me until that moment to look in the home storage department for metal racking. I thought maybe I could find a piece that I could cut and hack to where it wouldn't necessarily be an eyesore. Well I found one size in particular that turned out to be a perfect fit, no hacking necessary. I simply attached it to the side panels with a few zip ties. Here's the results:
At this point, the game is fully assembled and working. The only other issue left with these three games in particular were some blown lamps and some segments in the LED display's that weren't working. This seems to be a very common problem with these old Skee-Ball machines. As a matter of fact, I think I have yet to see one on location that never had at least one segment that didn't work. I feared they might have been "burned out", but in all three cases the problem was just some bad solder joints. I reflowed all the solder points that pertained to the displays. All the segments are now fully operational. All that was left was to clean the machines, polish the plexiglass displays (which were in dire need), remove the coin mechs and install free play buttons. I kept one machine and gave another back to the original owner as promised. My brother has claimed the third machine. It was in the worst condition of the three, but it's still going to good use. I'm sure my niece's and nephew will enjoy it for years to come.
