Browsing on eBay I found this broken Deckmate 1 selling as parts. The damage from the picture on the original listing showed the pins bent on the VFD (Vaccum Fluorescent Display) which at the time I thought was an LCD. Overall never seeing the inside of a deckmate much let alone ever touched one. I took a gamble. As it's something I always dreamed of having. The worse thing that can happen if I couldn't fix it, I can just part things out and sell it.
I tried realigning the pins etc and nothing worked. Thanks to fellow PCF member Buge, he helped out a tremendous amount by answering all of my questions and providing pictures of his own shuffler on how things were suppose to look.
I stripped the Deckmate down to its bare bones and cleaned it from all the dust and debris.
Then putting it all back together. I still couldn't get it to work
let alone read what the error was with out the screen.
It's very difficult to find a VFD from a Japanese manufacturer who doesn't produce them anymore. I was able to make a couple connection through people and over the next 2 months really got this thing running. Someone told me that the damages that I had on the machine didn't make sense. Initially I thought it was broken because someone dropped the machine or thrown the machine but the damages were deliberate like a missing capacitor here or a missing diode there. They believed a casino was told to retire this machine so they disabled the machine by removing a part or two. Then some how this ended up on eBay from someone who bulk sales items.
If you want to join in the game for a second find the missing capacitor on the back of this screen. When comparing it to Buge's VFD I noticed it was missing after a few days and I finally abandoned the idea of fixing it and started seeking to replace it.
I really enjoyed the challenge but here is a breakdown of what it cost.
$1769 Deckmate, taxes, shipped
$250 used VFD screen
$27 new buttons
$30 sensor 1
$100 sensor 2
All in $2177
Tonight was the first night I got a complete shuffle and ran it for a whole hour shuffle after shuffle with no errors. I'm super excited to start up a home game one day. Thank goodness for Justin's sale on his broken arrow cards. I got a lot of mis print decks. My next big purchase will probably be a table then chips. A little backwards but I save a bit money on the shuffler so glad I took the gamble.
Late night sorry for any grammar errors.
If you found this story and looking for a full guide on what I know so far about the DM1. Deckmate 1 Guide
I tried realigning the pins etc and nothing worked. Thanks to fellow PCF member Buge, he helped out a tremendous amount by answering all of my questions and providing pictures of his own shuffler on how things were suppose to look.
I stripped the Deckmate down to its bare bones and cleaned it from all the dust and debris.
Then putting it all back together. I still couldn't get it to work
let alone read what the error was with out the screen.
It's very difficult to find a VFD from a Japanese manufacturer who doesn't produce them anymore. I was able to make a couple connection through people and over the next 2 months really got this thing running. Someone told me that the damages that I had on the machine didn't make sense. Initially I thought it was broken because someone dropped the machine or thrown the machine but the damages were deliberate like a missing capacitor here or a missing diode there. They believed a casino was told to retire this machine so they disabled the machine by removing a part or two. Then some how this ended up on eBay from someone who bulk sales items.
If you want to join in the game for a second find the missing capacitor on the back of this screen. When comparing it to Buge's VFD I noticed it was missing after a few days and I finally abandoned the idea of fixing it and started seeking to replace it.
I really enjoyed the challenge but here is a breakdown of what it cost.
$1769 Deckmate, taxes, shipped
$250 used VFD screen
$27 new buttons
$30 sensor 1
$100 sensor 2
All in $2177
Tonight was the first night I got a complete shuffle and ran it for a whole hour shuffle after shuffle with no errors. I'm super excited to start up a home game one day. Thank goodness for Justin's sale on his broken arrow cards. I got a lot of mis print decks. My next big purchase will probably be a table then chips. A little backwards but I save a bit money on the shuffler so glad I took the gamble.
Late night sorry for any grammar errors.
If you found this story and looking for a full guide on what I know so far about the DM1. Deckmate 1 Guide
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