INSIDE those OLD pinball machines
INSIDE those OLD pinball machines
First, wear your dust mask. Who knows where these machines have been?
47 comments
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Analog computers are pretty cool, yet underrated tech. Although they aren't very flexible compared to digital computers in the range of what they can do, they do their specific use case very well.
Need to solve a partial differential equation in real time? Don't bother with iterative algorithms, that's fool's math, playa. Just hook it up to an analog computer specifically designed to solve that PDE type, rig up some wires for the input and output to your oscilloscope for real time mathz.
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The old firing computers from WW2 are cool as hell.
Not just analog, but mechanical analog.
They take 25 inputs, some of which come directly from the spotter scope things, some from the ship itself, and then controls the guns directly.
It's all cams, gears, reciprocating whatsits and stuff.
And because it's analog, there is no quantisation, rounding errors, floating point errors. It's continuously and instantly calculated.
Very cool stuff.
https://youtu.be/s1i-dnAH9Y4-
Very pretty stuff. I particularly recommend Ken Shirriff's Reverse-engineering the mechanical Bendix Central Air Data Computer:
He goes into detail about how non-linear equations are implemented using shaped cam gears (and how such functions can be difference-encoded against linear forms). It's insane.
And because it’s analog, there is no quantisation, rounding errors, floating point errors.
Eh, I'd say that runout and stiction are their own demons with potentially more bias than those error types :) Not to mention temperature sensitivity -- hot days will give different answers to the equations!
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Wow, thanks for the link.
The older I get, the more I appreciate things like this, what is basically 19th century mechanical engineering, and what those geniuses were able to do with it. Like fly planes through WWII.
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IIRC, when they were looking at refitting the Iowa class ships in the late 70s/early 80s, they found that while they could make the mechanical fire control computers smaller, they couldn't make them any more accurate.
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Here is an alternative Piped link(s):
https://piped.video/s1i-dnAH9Y4
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I'm open-source; check me out at GitHub.
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"CuriousMarc" on YouTube has a couple videos where he takes apart and restores an electromechanical navigation computer from an old soviet Soyuz capsule. It could show you exactly where in your orbit you were and calculate rendezvous and reentry burns, all with just a shitload of gears and things. It was incredible.
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Ur so right! Diffy-Q has its uses, but analog was too advanced for us to grok so we had to settle for it. Newton 'discovered' gravity, and calculus, then found out how useful calc was!
Non-linear? Hella faster! Nature went with analog long ago. No analog, no music!
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Tbf, the pinball machine is not really the same as an analog computer, it uses relays in the same way that a modern computer uses a transistor. There is no continuously variable part, just lots of on/offs.
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That guy is younger than he looks. He's only 30. Quite the "old soul".
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He’s even serious when he makes a blooper. Brilliant.
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I can't wait to watch this having restored an early 90s Williams machine years back. Doubly so with it being a TC vid, his channel is excellent.
I wanted a machine in college but knew I'd have to understand and maintain it with so many moving parts, thus shelving the idea pretty quickly. Years later, I stumbled into an arcade abused cabinet with a decent playfield and had to have it. It was a challenging few months but a decade later it still works great and I've grown comfortable with crawling in there. Great forums like Pinside were also a tremendous help, I wouldn't have taken the gamble without the Internet.
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My god, if you understand how these systems work, I'm impressed.
I'm good with DC stuff of this era (switches, relays, etc) and man I have to work hard to visualize these things.
I'm seriously impressed with the engineers who designed these crazy complex electro-mechanical systems.
I have some older relatives who were aircraft engineers back when these types of systems were used... Aircraft up through the 70's. I've read some of their manuals... Staggering complexity.
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Well, I'd say I understand enough to get by but I did also grow up building RC cars and later working on electronics/computers, so that definitely helped. That said, there's been more than a few times I had to break out a wiring diagram and consult with folks online because I was too scared to break something.
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With all those noises moving parts inside, playing an OLD machine felt like tickling a hippo.
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For those with an interest in pinball, I strongly recommend looking up Pinball: The Man Who Saved the Game. It may be a bit of a predictable, B-rated movie, but it's a lot of fun to watch and has some good lines. Hulu has it!
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Did i miss where he explained those two big wheel-switch thingies?
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I know a guy who works on Pinball machines as his profession. He sells em too.
Really enjoyed Skylab that he repaired. Seeing the way Electromechanicals run everything so...binary...is fascinating
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Here is an alternative Piped link(s):
https://m.piped.video/channel/UC48AesDYiJ2UYPaRX5ZLgLw
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I'm open-source; check me out at GitHub.
-
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Here is an alternative Piped link(s):
https://piped.video/watch?v=ue-1JoJQaEg
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I'm open-source; check me out at GitHub.
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Apologies for hijacking the thread, as I understand my comment is only tangential towards what is being discussed, but if you love pinball machines it's such a great link to take a look at, so I thought I would still share it with you all.
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I've been there!! Amazing spot to play pinball, just wish they served beer... I'm pretty sure they have over 200 tables and some fairly rare ones. Bonzai Run, and Water world are 2 that had fairly limited runs but can be played there.
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That's SO cool! It's like those extremely complex redstone builds in minecraft, but irl and way cooler. I love it!
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I have to say I think his studio lighting isn't doing him any favors. In the first segment he looks so much better. Maybe it's different cameras.
47 comments
This guy's channel is great!
Glad to hear that! Yep he's got a sense of humor -and- knows his stuff.
I’m always so excited every time he puts out a new video. Granted, it took a while for him to discover his humour but it’s very dry and often self deprecating which I appreciate
Pretty sure he’s a Mastodon user, too.
He’s got a bit of an obsession with light bulbs. I love it.