october 1994
STAR*TECH JOURNAL
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ICE
PUTTING CHALLENGE FIELD REPORT
Field report.on the game, Putting Challenge
by Innovative Concepts in Entertainment of Buffalo, New York.
Rob Monaco
FM Sound & Amusements
Hamilton, Ontario
We had a couple of these out on
the road due to customer request.
They had seen them in other lo-
cations and insisted we get them
for them.
The two biggest problems were:
1) The balls get jammed occa-
sionally under the playfield on
their way back to the ball return.
You sometimes have to disas-
semble the deck to get at it.
2) Theft. The putter and balls
have a tendency to disappear. We
had to keep leaving balls with the
bartender to replace the missing
ones. The putter we had to chain
to the cabinet, and we would still
lose on from time to time. It re-
quires some supervision to lessen
the theft problem.
They did reasonable well for the
first few weeks, but dropped off
very quickly. We have both of
them sitting in the rafters here at
the shop, and I don't believe we
managed to break even on them.
They kept our customers happy,
though, and the other pieces cov-
ered the investment, but on an
individual basis, not a big money
earner, especially when you have
to keep buying new putters.
Brett Perrego
A&JGames
West Wyoming, Pennsylvania
We have one of those putting di-
nosaurs at a location one hour
from our shop.
Too many service calls to remove
a cue ball ( the pool tables are
right next to the putting machine)
that was jammed inside.
If you do buy it, the first thing to
consider doing is making the
opening smaller with Lexan or
sheet metal, to help prevent for-
eign objects from getting in.
Don't use Plexiglas, 'cause the
bastards will break it.. ....
Kerry Messana
Game Tech
Syracuse, New York
The Putting Challenge game is
fairly trouble free provided you
keep the optics clean.
When the optics get dirty you get
some weird stuff happening. The
biggest "problem" optic is the
one in the ball eject assembly.
Keep that puppy clean.
The latest version of the software
is 6.1. I believe it is the only bug
free version and you have to buy
it from them, it is a 68705 CPU/
ROM combo.
Another weak link in the system:
Watch your harnessing, things are
just long enough, easy to have
things unplug themselves, espe-
cially going to the displays.
I would recommend cleaning the
optics at least once every other
month, more if it is in a back road
dirty location.
If I had a boat I could use it for
an anchor ...
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