Posted March 6, 2015 by FrizzleFried in Games Sold or Traded 3368

Omega Race

Manufactured by Midway Manufacturing Co. (c)1981

Condition When Purchased:	B
Current Condition:	B+

Omega Race is a game I remember playing quite a bit at only one location. That location was a Chinese restaurant in it's own building that was situated between Charlie's Liquor and the Alpha Beta center on 4th Street in Ontario, CA. The restaurant had only ONE game… Omega Race. Where I lived there were no "arcades" within walking distance. There were, however, at least 15 or more games along a "route" that I would walk to the Alpha Beta Center and back. Some of those locations included Yum-Yum Donuts (Pac cocktail), Denny's restaurant (Ms. Pac mini), Charlie's Liquor (4 or 5 games that rotated out somewhat frequently), this Chinese restaurant with Omega Race, Stu's Liquor (4 or 5 games that rotated out pretty frequently), Ace Hardware (3 or 4 arcade games and always a pin or two), Alpha Beta grocery store (Asteroids), and Finley's (a candy aisle that seemed like it was a mile long and an old school 8oz Coke machine).

To be 100% honest, at this point, I can't even remember WHERE I got Omega Race… it's been probably 5 years or more since I got it. I do remember that when I picked it up that it was in VERY NICE original shape with only the side art showing some cracking. No major scratches, gouges, breaks or chunks missing at all. The control panel was in fantastic shape and everything worked. I also "think" I got a good deal on it at the time. The game DID work and the game was fully playable.

There was some blooming on screen which indicated I did need to re-cap the monitor, which I did, but it didn't rectify the pulsing. The pulsing seemed to get worse the longer the game was on which, to me, at the time, seemed to indicate it was likely a heat issue. Unfortunately, before I had a chance to investigate any more I turned on the machine one day. A number of seconds later I heard what sounded like a freakin' .38 postol going off!

I am not exaggerating when I say that it scared the living S*#T out of me. I immediately turned the game off and it was about that time that I caught the first whiff of that god awful smell. The smell of a capacitor exploding. If you've ever smelled it before, it's not pleasant, at all. And man did it start smelling. Pulling the game from the wall and opening up the back revealed that a rather large capacitor had self destructed, BIGTIME. It took out a few components nearby as well… including a resistor and a poor LED… plus it was a hairy mess (as you can see in the photo). But what CAUSED the cap to explode like that? My hypothesis is that a diode took a dump allowing the flow of energy to reverse and cause catastrophic destruction.

I spent the better part of 6 months attempting to fix the problem. To keep the story short, the issue was beyond my capabilities and I ended up sending the PCB out to a KLOVian in Canada to be fixed… by that time they had to fix some of the traces I managed to screw up as well (I am a hack at best… no training… but at least I am getting a little better with time). In the end I received a PCB back that worked. Unfortunately… that didn't fix the blooming issue I was experiencing with the monitor. After a little research I read about the potential for the HV Diode to cause blooming. I purchased one off ebay installed it using silicone to insulate it and… it worked! The monitor looked fantastic… for about 5 minutes… then as it got hotter the image got larger.. and when I checked, as the image got larger, the B+ voltage dropped…I tried everything I knew to try… I changed out the pots… re-flowed the connectors… double checked all the caps… etc… etc… I also checked/tested everything suggested in the KLOV monitor forums… nothing seemed to work. For the 2nd time with this cabinet, i bowed my head, pulled the chassis, and mailed it off to a KLOVian to work on. It took a while to get it back (I even gave up getting it back and started looking for another chassis) but eventually it showed up. When I dropped it in. WHOOP THERE IT IS … it worked! 10 minutes later… it worked! An hour later… it worked! FINALLY!

With all the hell and expense I went through with this machine I am guessing I won't be selling it any time soon. On top of the fact that it's a fun game, the fact of the matter is that there is no way in hell I would ever sell it for enough money to cover the expense of repair let alone the time I put in to the bastard. Even with all that happened with this machine it STILL isn't the most problematic machine I've had… that honor goes to Battlezone, my nemesis… another machine that I still own and will likely own until the day I die. But that is another story.

As for Omega Race, she still plays great and still looks great. I have the original controller in it which works awesome, but being they are known die I also have a replacement repro controller for it (that actually came with the cabinet if I do remember correctly). I probably play Omega Race more than any other vector I have because it's easy to step up, select a 2-man game, play a game or two, and walk away … all in 5-7 minutes. Yes, I suck at the game, but it doesn't matter… it's all about the fun! Isn't that why we do what we do? 🙂 Thanks for reading.