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  Back in the days when I was exploring Germany, I learned that the locals had a thing for orange soda + cola mixes. I had not ever thought about combining those two and was surprised just how good but weird combo that was. Every big soda company had their take on it, even the Coca-Cola company had their Fanta-Coke mix called Mezzo Mix. Everyone seemed to call this mix Spezi. Here's Krombacher Spezi. It tastes just like what it says on the can and it's very good. It's made of actual O...

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  Today's couple of drinks in project was to take WhoDunnit's old, failed slot reel stepper motor apart to see if it was recoverable for a spare. The original symptoms were extreme heat when powered up (closer to 90°C!) and strong, crunchy mechanical resistance when manually turned without power. A stepper should move with very little resistance when there's no power to it. The initial examination shows the bearings being just fine, but the rotors look shot. There's material miss...

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  Now this was an interesting find. After the cherry 7up I wondered if there were other weird 7up variants out there and sure enough, here's 7up Mandarin-Orange. Again as with the alternative 7up/Sprite flavors, I don't know if there's much 7up's original flavor in it, but the mandarin and orange are very strong and it's actually pretty good. As this is an US import, it has high-fructose corn syrup in it, but I'll take that over all the no sugar sweeteners that make everyt...

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  There's a new #peertube release out, patching one vulnerability in Peertube itself and pulling in a patched version of a vulnerable dependency. https://github.com/Chocobozzz/PeerTube/releases/tag/v8.3.2

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  Time for moar goodies from China. Here's Fanta Jasmine Peach. I've already found several peach variants from different continents, but this one adds jasmine into the mix. It has a really strong sweet smell of something peach-y, not sure what jasmine is supposed to smell like but I can only guess that's it. It's one of the funny things that tastes like it smells. Again the peach and then that aftertaste that reminds me of tea. These Asian Fantas never disappoint and here's...

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  A fun difference in modern day and old pins is how their flippers are controlled. Back in the old days they had 2 power settings; full power for the flip and a weaker to hold the flipper up. This was mechanically controlled by the end of stroke switch, that physically cut the power to the high power side of the flipper coil after the flipper had travelled far enough. This switch had two typical failure modes: if the switch got stuck open, it would flip with the hold power, basically rendering i...

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  Dang, it's been a while since I've seen one of these! #finland #suomi

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  Well this is a new one. Godzilla's backbox lock decided to give up on life. I've always just left the backbox locks as is and just have the key in the cabinet. I needed to peek quickly inside and the key felt a bit odd going in but the opened just fine. When I tried to pull the key out, it made a very crunchy sound and got stuck with the lock open. Apparently the tumblers got damaged somehow. These are shit locks anyway, but I had assumed they could take the 1-2 times a year operation. F...

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  After two days it's time to pack up and head for home. Mando saw virtually non-stop action for the whole time and it didn't even have any major technical issues.

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  I did some math about the Mando's use at Kuopio Pelaa game event. The event was open for 7 hours on two days. Mando got 295 games during the weekend, so a game per every 2.84 minutes. That is a lot of games! The longest observed period of it resting was around 2 minutes.

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  A fun detail in Kuopio, Finland. An electrical box covers the wall and the traffic signs partially. The local artist makes the box disappear. #mildlyinteresting #StreetArt

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  After being cat sit by my mom for the extended weekend, Wäinö is back at being my lap warmer. #cat #cats

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  Skritches are requested and delivered on-demand. #cat #cats #catsoffediverse

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  WhoDunnit (Bally, 1995) developed an issue where the under the playfield slot machine's leftmost reel started to stutter and eventually completely die about after 10 minutes since power on. From a technical side this is pretty much like any modern slot machine, which probably stems from the fact that Williams was also in slot machine business at the time. The reel is driven with a stepper motor and it has an opto switch to indicate home position. It calculates all the symbol positions by st...

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  0.96 is the new 0.4. TPU being this caustic was not on my bingo card. The other print head that has done mostly PETG is fine. #3dprinting

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  With the WhoDunnit's slot reel motor being my main suspect, I pull the whole slot machine assembly off the machine for closer look. As it's on my desk, it's very clear just how hosed the old motor is. Without power, the steppers here should spin freely. This bad one barely moves and feels all crunchy inside. Most likely its bearings are FUBAR. So here's a sped of version of the half an hour it took to replace whole thing. The slot machine assembly has 3 identical reel sub-assem...

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  Well ho-ho-ho everyone in this fine (checks calendar) October night. Here's Laitilan Joulupipari or Laitila's gingersnap. Naturally it's from #finland. If this makes you go "holy mother of god", then yes, you're at the same wavelength as I was when I spotted this one. It has a bit artificial, yet pretty obvious smell of what this is and I think the taste is even more on the spot. I honestly don't know how I feel about this. I've tasted some weird sodas where t...

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  Leena kommentoi artikkelia alueen ainoan rokkibaarin kohtalosta. Älä ole kuin Leena, Leena ei tiedä mistä puhuu. #suomi

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  A leftover clip from the NBAFB video. This thing is relatively entertaining to watch in action. I also note this one probably has one too strong coil in it, can you spot which one? #pinball #mechanism #retrotech

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  I wondered about some of recently replaced 555 lamps being too dim. Looks like I have a bagful of something that has the same socket but wrong voltage. The camera makes the first example seem brighter than it is. It's barely visible through the button plastic. The real 555 is 6.3 volts and relatively bright. Oh and these have no print on the bulb itself. #pinball #repair

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  Seems #prusa3d had released a new major firmware series for their stm32 based printers. I flashed that to my Core One L, didn't instantly catch fire. #3dprinter

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  S-pankki lähetti minulle mailin jossa pyydetään tarkastamaan maksukortin turvallisuusasetukset. Maili on täsmälleen samanlainen kuin kaikki ne kusetusmailit mitä voin onkia spammilootasta sadoittain, viestin lopussa olevaa nappia myöten mitä pitäisi klikata. Peruskuolevaiselle vinkit kuten "pankki ei ikinä lähetä mailia missä käsketään klikkaamaan jotain" menee ihanasti metsään. #tietoturva

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  Alle kahden viikon päässä olisi Kuopio Pelaa-tapahtuma, jossa on retropeleistä indie-kehittäjiin ja paneelikeskusteluihin kaikkea tarjolla. Aika: 17.-18.10.2026 Paikka: Taidelukio Lumit, Kuopio Omalta osalta olen edustamassa Hopeakuulaa, meillä on 2020-luvun flipperi mukana tällä kertaa. Tulkaa morjestamaan jos liikutte sielläpäin. https://kuopiopelaa.fi/ #tapahtuma #tapahtumat #kuopio #kuopiopelaa #pelit #suomi

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  I posted about Pommac, the weird fruit soda originally from Sweden. Here's a local clone, Laitilan Le Pom. There's actually plenty of these clones, this being one of the better ones and it's cheap too. Again, it's hard to say what it tastes like other than generic, fresh undefined fruit. It's not candy-like sweet but it has sugar in it. #soda

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  Oh look, it's yet another take on Vanilla coke, this time called Holiday Creamy Vanilla from Sweden. This is not the standard vanilla Coke in a different colored can either. It smells very close to the vanilla version, but there's something added to it. It has this long, sweet aftertaste of what I assume is supposed to be the "creamy" part in addition to the vanilla taste. Odd. Goes to the category of not terrible, not especially noteworthy either. Just a slightly different v...

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  Inca Kola: The Golden Kola. The choice of golden shower professionals. No, wait. That wasn't the slogan. Anyway, I spotted Inca Kola in a 0.355l can, I think I tried this earlier this year because the candy-like taste is very distinct. Seems to taste about the same as from the glass bottle and I'm very fond of this stuff. One of the weirder takes on colas. #soda

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  Top Score had the distinct smell of coil wire lacquer. Had a hunch something got toasted bad. #pinball #pinrepair #techgore #retrotech

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  I've had pinball leg mounted drink holders since early 2000s, although those were pretty crude DIYs back when consumer 3D printing wasn't a thing. My very first take was just a piece of steel bent into a shape on L with holes for the leg bolts and then a ring big enough for a soda bottle welded onto that. As my collection grew, somewhere in early 2010s the Pingulp was released. Not that it was an unique idea even then, but it was a good product. I own around 30 of those. At that point I...

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  Opened a new brand spool of clear PETG and I'm tuning the settings to make it more clear. This one (Sunlu Clear) doesn't like to operate at its top rated temperatures but lower ones seem fine, except it can't take faster speeds. So cold and slow it is. 260 and 240 celcius examples. #3dprinting #filament

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  Some pieces were falling off Jackbot today. A slingshot star post ended its life. No worries, I have a boxful. #pinrepair