The 1994 Bally The Shadow is an interesting game in many aspects. It has no pop bumpers, but instead it features a lot of gadgets. And we know gadgets are the first things that break, right? :)

I got this machine in a non-working state. I was warned beforehand it wouldn't even boot. A quick inspection showed that the machine was nonetheless "sane": all its playfield parts were present, and the backbox didn't seem to scary, at least at first sight (more on that later). Yet, the diamond playfield (typical for WMS/Bally games from this era) was covered with an ugly mylar. There was also significant damage in the magnet area of the playfield, and everything was very dirty. Metal ramps were tainted and not shining anymore.

Work on this machine was divided in two parts: the playfield cleanup and touchup, and the backbox electronics repairs.

Finally, the playfield of the Whoopee has been completely restored. Pictures of the complete process can be found here:

I've conducted two operations on the Whoopee lately:

First, I've replaced the broken backbox female connector for which I received replacement thanks to a very nice eBay seller (7059didier). It went relatively smoothly; old solder melts nicely at a relatively low temperature, so despite the fact there there was a lot of solder on each wire, removing them was easy:

I'm waiting to get some rosin flux before soldering back the wires to the new connector, which, as a used part, already has some solder on it.