Big Rob's Pinball Repair

Home
United States
Calhoun, GA
Big Rob's Pinball Repair

Call Directions Website Contact the establishment

North Georgia based pinball repair/restoration services specializing in electromechanical machines.

08/29/2026

House call to service a Bally Alladin's Castle from 1976 today. Never played one of these so it was cool getting to check it out. It had several issues related to the ball count unit and other switches. Cleaned & adjusted a whole lot of switches & contacts and tweaked a few springs and everything is working great. Also cleaned the contacts on the bonus unit as hardly any of the bonus lights were coming on.

Replaced about 30 bulbs throughout the game & fixed probably at least 10-15 flaky sockets. It looked like an entirely different game after returning all that light to the playfield and backglass. Also cleaned the playfield and the rubbers. Diagnosed a bad chime coil. Have to order that and return another day.

Another satisfied customer here at Big Rob's Pinball Repair. I always enjoy working on (and getting to play😬) machines I've never seen in person before. Had a great time fixing this one up and seeing how happy the customer was afterwards.

08/23/2026

What's the best kind of pinball machine? I'd say the answer is a FREE ONE. Took a drive down south of Atlanta to pick up number 32 for my collection. Williams Grand Prix from 1976. Also got the head, motor board, coin door and a box of parts from a Chicago Coin Sky Rider. Everything is in rough shape with crumbling wood and rat chewed wires, but hey you can't beat FREE.

08/19/2026

Was driving back from a job the other day and an idea popped into my head. I have a background restoring old cars & car culture from way before I started this whole pinball thing. I've always loved the wild hot rod creations of the 60's & 70's. Especially the work of Ed "Big Daddy" Roth.

Now full disclosure, I'm not much of an artist when it comes to drawing. So I fed my reference photos and ideas into an AI prompt and then tweaked the details myself in Photoshop. I think the results are pretty damn cool. While I do have my own opinions on AI, I think this usage is acceptable. I'm not selling this or claiming I made it and taking credit for it. AI helps us creative types who have ideas but can't draw make our ideas into a reality. I even like the crude, gritty, distorted style it came out in. Think I might use this to make a new Big Rob's Pinball Repair shirt soon. 🤔

08/17/2026

Picked up number 31 for my personal collection last night. Gottlieb Jack In The Box from 1973. Didn't have to drive too far for this one as it was owned by a couple of pinball friends right down the road. They were reluctant to let it go as it was one of the 1st machines they bought when they started their own pinball adventures. But rest assured it's in good hands with Big Rob's Pinball Repair.

This one might be bumped to the front of my list of personal machines to restore as it's one of my wife's favorites. I've tried to buy one multiple times over the years but they kept getting away from me. Happy to add it to the collection. Now I just gotta figure out where I'm gonna put it......🤔🤷‍♂️😂

08/16/2026

Busy Saturday for Big Rob's Pinball Repair. House call to revive a Williams Line Drive pitch & bat from 1972. The owner had moved the machine recently and plugged it into an outlet that had a dimmer switch wired into it. Well, I guess EM's don't like dimmers because it blew a fuse. Went ahead and cleaned up all the fuse holders and put new fuses in there. Several had the wrong amperage of fuse in them. Also replaced the power cord as it was a hacked up mess. Definitely a fire hazard. Lol

It fired right up and we played a few games. It was really cool to see this thing in action. The back box animation was really cool as was the mechanism that drives it. Also interesting to see that this machine had electronic sounds. There are several small circuit boards in the back that control sounds like crowd applause, boos, whistles, and cheers. Being built in 1972 I really never expected to see something like that. Most manufacturers stuck to simple chimes until the late 70's.

Afterwards, I headed back over to a friend's basement arcade to finish up a few things. Did a flipper rebuild on a Cue Ball Wizard. Before the flippers weren't strong enough to shoot the ball up the ramp. Now you can hit the ramp easily. Installed a few add-ons in the Elviras house of horrors. Installed a few more mods on the Alice machine. A really cool shooter bezel, some spinner card guys, & a bezel for the control panel.

Last but not least, the owner surprised me with a special plaque he had made. I was at a loss for words and very honored. Thank you Michael! I've had a great time working on your games and I really appreciate you giving me the opportunity to learn and gain experience on the newer machines. But beyond that I got to make a new friend in the process. Oh, and thanks for the frosty beverages along the way too! 🍻

08/13/2026

Things are moving right along on the Gottlieb Bank-A-Ball here at Big Rob's Pinball Repair. Every switch, stepper unit, & relay bank has been cleaned, adjusted, and/or rebuilt. Found a few broken switches and busted/missing parts. Got those all repaired & replaced. Put some new tracks in to hold down the score reels. Those worked out nicely. Mechanical work is done. I'm patiently waiting on replacement pool balls from PBR but man are they taking a long time. Apparently they get them from someone who makes them and they are currently back ordered. Also replaced all of the insert lights under the playfield with Yoppsicle Socket Free LED Sticks & repaired all of the GI sockets that stick through the playfield. Shouldn't have any more flaky lights on this machine.

I've moved on to the cosmetic side of things now. Cleaned all of the GI sockets on the playfield. Cleaned & polished all of the rollover wire forms, ball guides, & targets. Getting some very exciting results from the playfield cleaning. I was pretty worried that wasn't going to go well. It was covered in some kind of coating that had yellowed & cracked. I don't think it was original clear coat as what's under that crust is buffing to a nice shine. Leading me to believe this is something someone applied on top of the original clear to try and shine up the playfield. After some cleaning, polishing & a whole lot of elbow grease, it's coming out great! What a huge difference!

08/09/2026

Abra Ca Dabra has been delivered back to Portal Pinball Arcade for everyone to enjoy. I've been told it's a customer favorite. It had a few issues. Mainly, the game would only start occasionally. It would pop the ball out but nothing worked. Drain ball and it'd pop out again in an endless cycle. Traced the ball count unit circuit cleaning and adjusting all the switches as I went. Finally narrowed it down to a short in the ball count step up coil. New coil fixed that right up.

2nd issue was a "dead ball" popping out after what should have been game over. Turns out this was also caused by the ball count unit. Someone had monkeyed with the ground wiring on the rotating disc. Rewired & soldered that and then figured out 2 of the fingers weren't making good contact. Cleaned some old gummy grease out of those and no more dead ball.

Finished it up by doing some cleaning on the playfield, replacing several bulbs, and doing a little lighting mod on the backglass. On game over the eyes light up on the evil looking creature. I put red lights on the eyes so they light up red. Small, simple modification but I think it looks pretty cool.

08/08/2026

I usually only share my work on here but occasionally I find something pinball related that's too cool not to share. A giant pinball machine where you ride in the "ball". How cool would that be??

08/03/2026

Well, another Southern-Fried Gaming Expo is in the books for Big Rob's Pinball Repair. We had a BLAST playing all the games both old & new and seeing all the cool stuff. There were a handful of EM's there and I managed to roll over a Stern Rawhide TWICE for a decent score of 206, 490.

I took 3 games to the show & they performed flawlessly the entire time with just a small bit of regular maintenance here and there. Don't know how accurate these numbers are as I really don't know how accurate the counter mechs are, but Circus racked up 831 plays, Pinball got 501, and El Toro 470.

I had a lot of people stop me and tell me I had their favorite game(s) of the show and a guy from Barrels of Fun tried his best to buy my Stern Pinball. Unfortunately, he wouldn't accept my offer of trading me a brand new Wi******er Mystery House for it so Pinball went back home with me. 🤣

Always a good thing to bring EM enjoyment to the masses. Other than a flat tire on my pin-hauler the 1st day I couldn't have asked for a better time. Until next year !! Already counting the days.

07/19/2026

Back out to my friend/customer's basement arcade to assemble his Alice Goes To Wonderland. It's a home use pinball machine made by Wonderland Amusements. It's surprisingly a nice quality machine, just a bit small as it's 3/4 scale. Went together smoothly and I added a bunch of mods that were purchased for the game. Had a fun time putting it together. I'm always up for trying or learning new pinball related things.

Address

Calhoun, GA
30701

Telephone

(678)7678177

Website

https://bigrobspinballrepair.com/

Alerts

Be the first to know and let us send you an email when Big Rob's Pinball Repair posts news and promotions. Your email address will not be used for any other purpose, and you can unsubscribe at any time.

Contact The Establishment

Send a message to Big Rob's Pinball Repair:

Want your establishment to be the top-listed arts & entertainment in Calhoun?