On Wednesday, November 1, 2006, at 6 am, Pingeek caught a plane from Richmond, VA to Rosemont, Illinois for the 22nd Annual Pinball Expo, the first pinball show ever, which took place at the Wyndham O'Hare hotel just minutes from The O'Hare Airport. It was a real treat to attend the biggest pinball show in the world and meeting legends in the pinball industry.

Coverage begins at approximately 10 am, Wednesday, as setup begins.  The first couple Pirates Of The Carribean arrive for The Pinbrawl Tournament, fresh from the Stern factory, barely a half hour away from the hotel.  Around noon, the first pinball machine is brought in and set up, a Gottlieb Stargate.  Next, we hang out with Duncan Brown, former programmer at Williams until the very end with Pinball 2000.  He brought two nice Stern pins:  Nine Ball and Star Gazer.  Duncan shows how both these are played.  Next, it's an interview with Phoebe Smith of Phoebe's Pinball Painting.  She brought a fully restored, somewhat rarely seen Williams Firepower II and a nice Williams' Jungle Lord pinball machine.  Phoebe shares some great playfield restoration tips, by the way.  Next, a look at a rarely seen Atari Hercules in action.  As you might know, this was the largest pinball machine ever made.  

As Wednesday's coverage comes to a close, Sam Harvey, pinball historian is briefly interviewed, then Dave Marston plays a nice Williams Olympic Hockey in the Steve Kordek tribute section.  Next, Brian Matthews, of Global ER, demonstrates something different in the world of pinball: The Ultrapin, featuring a 32 inch LCD screen and some classic pinball tables, including Medieval Madness, Xenon, and others.  

Beginning Thursday's coverage for this first disc includes a special treat: The Stern factory tour, an annual Pinball Expo tradition.  The tour guide is Rob Blakeman, one of the mechanical engineers at Stern Pinball.  From the wire harness to a completed game, see the entire factory.  Then it's back to the show for a seminar, "Pinball For The 21st Century," featuring Brian Matthews, designer of the Ultrapin, which we saw earlier in the program.  Due to the Stern factory tour running a bit into overtime, this seminar is joined a few minutes after it started.  Some topics discussed in this seminar are ball physics, maintenance, and graphics.

Thursday afternoon seminars continue on disc two, featuring Greg Maletic, the guy behind "The Future of Pinball, a film about Pinball 2000."  Before the seminar begins, there is a tribute to Steve Kordek, the last surviving former Genco employee and a  former Williams pinball designer with over fifty years experience.  The seminar then begins, with clips about the history of Pinball 2000, featuring interviews with Williams veteran designers: George Gomez, Duncan Brown, Cameron Silver, and others.

The next seminar "The Voice Behind The Machine," features Fred Young, the voice behind many pinball machines, including most of the voices behind "Pirates Of The Caribbean", "Star Trek", "King Kong", "Batman", and many other titles.

Thursday evening coverage starts on disc three, with highlights from "The Thursday Fireside Chat", featuring Roger, Josh & Zach Sharpe.  Roger Sharpe as you may know is famous for bringing back pinball to New York in 1976, as it had been previously outlawed in that state. Roger tells some stories of how he worked with GamePlan to produce Sharpshooter, which shows him on the backglass. He also tells the story of how "Pinball!", one of the best pinball books published, happened in the first place. Josh & Zach Sharpe share some interesting stories of their tournament experiences.

Thursday evening coverage concludes with highlights of The "Internet Get-Together", with Jay Stafford, co-founder of The Internet Pinball Database telling how the whole thing got started years ago.   

Concluding disc 3 is Friday morning's first seminar: "Amazing Field Engineering Stories," featuring "Dr. Scott" Sheridan and Ron Coon, Jr. of Dr. Scott's Pinball, located in Maumee, Ohio.  Dr. Scott shares some interesting stories of things found in pinball machines, homemade repair jobs, and so much more.  Some interesting items shown during this seminar are a blown speaker glued in several different spots, piggyback fuses, hand stitched rubber rings, a shooter rod with a pool cue tip, and more!  

Friday morning seminar coverage continues on disc 4 with "How Can We Find Good Pinball Games On Location and Reward The Operators?", featuring Dave Marston, a long time Pinball Expo speaker who is quite active in the pinball community.  Also contributing to this seminar are a route operator, a distributor, and a pinball fan. Some of the topics discussed are, what qualifies for a world class location? How do we keep pinball on location?

The next seminar on Friday morning is "Pinball Restoration 101" with Pat Choy and Rich Huff.  Some handy tips include working with adhesives, mylar, cabinet care, AC power cord conversion, and much more!  Concluding disc 4 is the "Gottlieb Induction To The Expo Pinball Hall Of Fame", with guest speaker Mike Gottlieb. Judd Weinberg, a former president of Gottlieb since 1952 is inducted.

Watch for special guests in the audience during these seminars, including legendary pinball machine designers, Steve Ritchie and Steve Kordek!

$20.00, plus $5.30 USPS priority shipping with delivery confirmation.

disc 1: 1 hr. 19 minutes 

disc 2: 1 hr. 51 minutes

disc 3: 1 hr. 32 minutes

disc 4: 1 hr. 54 minutes

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