Job 4: Cleaning & Waxing

This is one of the bigger jobs and one that will make a huge difference in the game's performance and appearance.  First, I needed to strip the playfield of all the major components and light bulbs.

I made sure to lay out all the removed pieces in their relative positions to make re-assembly easier. The rubbers were so old and out of shape that if they didn't crumble right off their posts, they held their shape. There was no bounce left in any of them.

Here's what I found in the corners of the stripped playfield - years of dust, grime and gunk.

I started with a basic de-greasing cleaner and a clean cotton rag to get the major grime off, used Novus 2 and 3 for the next levels of dirt and touched up with rubbing alcohol and a Magic Eraser for the gunk that was stuck between the grains of wood.  Then, while I cleaned the posts and plastics with Novus 3, everything got three coats of carnuba wax.  

The brand new flipper bats are installed and all the plastics were added back into place with brand new rubber parts.

Look at that shine!  Beautiful once again. And I love how the old off-white posts contrast against the new white rubbers.