Custom Astroboy Pinball Machine

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The doner machine was a 1979 Stern Magic. Originally I was going to do a complete restoration but I found the playfield was too worn so what next - do a custom job!! My girlfriend at the time suggested Astroboy a TV show I loved when I was about 5 yo. Original designs had ramps, upper playfields, metal races (I think I used up over 60 m of wire building prototypes) everything you could think of. Unfortunately all previous designs were just not fun to play so I abandoned all complexity and designed a simple single level layout.

   
                     
     
To hone my final layout I simulated it using PinMAME before I moved onto the actual whitewood. The PinMAME simulation proved to be quite accurate. It took about 3 weeks to mark out and cut all the holes, slots etc. that were required. The plywood used was a marine grade Hoop Pine it was the best I could find. I bought all new playfiled inserts and glued them in place using PVA glue. I hand made all the ball guides etc. Shown here are the clear cappings I made they are made from Acrylic but a better material would be polycarbonate - both are easy to come by. In later photos you will see that I abandoned the clear cappings and instead opted for a semi-translucent blue this is because I could not find a suitable method to apply the capping image. I have since found a place which can print directly onto plastic/wood etc only requiring the white backing to be screen printed - I plan to test this method on my next project. Original ball guides etc were made from aluminum and polished, this looked great but the ball didn't bounce well off of it, I later changed the material to polycarbonate which allows the ball to bounce around alittle.
    
                 
   

The original "Magic" cabinet was in bad shape I had to break apart the backbox just to get the backglass out as the previous owner didn't have the key. The entire box was stripped cleaned and sanded and all scratched and dents fixed before painting. The cabinet was spray painted with black automotive acrylic and clear coated. All metal surfaces excluding the stainless steel side rails and front lockdown bar were sprayed with silver 2-pac. The inside of the cabinet had the dried remains of many spilt beers I think this machine has earned its keep over the years.

   
         
                   

The side art is a mixture of vinyl cut lettering, digital print onto vinyl for the astroboy figure and car pinstriping for the red stripes. The layout was first simulated on the computer. I wanted a classic look that would not be too out of place for the era but I also wanted more detail in it than the early sprayed cabinets of the time. I must say I think the cabinet is one of the most impressive things on the machine.

    
         
                   
   
                   

By far the biggest challenge on this project was transferring the images I had generated for the backglass and playfieldon the computer to their respective surfaces. All artwork for this project was generated using Paint Shop Pro.

For the playfield I had the image made as a scaled photograph at the local image processing shop. All holes and cutouts including where the playfield inserts are were cutout and the photograph was glued to the whitewood using PVA glue. Due to the thickness of the photo paper a recess was present at each playfield insert, this was filled with clear resin before clear coating. The playfield was clear coated using 2-pac automotive spray paint and sanded between each application. The playfield is about 3 years old now and shows no signs of lifting, loss of shine or loss of color.

The Backglass was a digital print onto white translucent paper - its a thin white plastic designed to disperse light as it passes through it. It has a similar thickness and feel to the translights of the WPC era. It turned out great and the black does not look faded or washed out. If you are looking to do a reproduction I would highly recommend this method.

  
                   
This image shows a good close-up of the inserts. The text over the inserts you can see was produced using dry rub-on transfers. To enhance the blue capping I used blue coloured globes they look great in real life.
    
     
                   
I added the two upper flippers of the game. My inspiration for the layout came from Black Knight. At the time I started building this machine I was trying to acquire one but the guy would not let it go. There are similarities although this game is single level and BK is two level. Oh I now have a Pharaoh so I am no longer looking for that BK
    
     
                   
I tried to put as much detail into the artwork as possible. As you can see I made stickers for the targets, spinners and drop targets I feel they give the machine that little bit of professionalism.
   
     
And finally here is the finished machine. My next project is a full custom machine to be made from scratch including all the electronics - given this project took 4-years I'm not expecting to finish it anytime soon. Hope you enjoyed!!