There is one thing that all pinball fans can agree on – the bass on a factory standard pinball machine is lacking.
If you’ve experienced an upgraded sound system on any 1990+ pinball machine, you know what I’m talking about. I hadn’t played my friends Addams Family pinball machine in a few years and was surprised by some amazing bass rumble.
My friend had replaced the small woofer with a larger one using a custom made adapter. Pinball machines typically come with the cheapest speakers the manufacturers can source, so any upgrade will be an improvement. (Here is a guide to this method: http://www.dziedzic.us/wpc_speaker_replacement.html
The sound was much improved using this method but there might just be a better way…
A pinball machine cabinet isn’t an ideal subwoofer enclosure: the volume is too large for the size of speaker and the cabinet can’t be sealed or vented for a flat response curve.
Adding an External Subwoofer to a pinball machine
External subwoofers for pinball machines have several advantages.
- You can keep the subwoofer if you sell your machine
- The subwoofer can be shared by several machines
- Hooking up an external subwoofer is easy
- The sound quality of an external subwoofer is superior
- You can reach down and turn the bass up or down
Great Subwoofer at a Great Price
Pinballers love the Polk subwoofer, typically $99 on Amazon and sometimes every less on sale. It seems to range from $79 to $129. You can also get refurbished ones for about $5-$10 less depending on availability.
The Polk Audio PSW10 10″ powered subwoofer featuring high current amp and low-pass filter, handles up to 100 Watts and pumps out big bass at a Great Value.
Choose Your Signal Input: Stereo Line-Level or Speaker Inputs
The Polk Subwoofer can handle high speaker inputs (amplified signals that goes to speakers) or low stereo line-level input that gets amplified by the powered subwoofer.
- Audio Inputs: Stereo Line Level – (2) RCA, Pair (L/R) Analog RCA.
- Speaker Inputs: (2) Pair of Spring Terminals.
Your choices are multiple. You can tap off the existing subwoofer for a speaker input. Or get a stereo line-level off of a PinSound board or a Pinnovators subwoofer conversion. Another option is to convert the speaker line to a low-level stereo line using an inexpensive device such as this:
This attaches to the existing speaker lines and then converts to the signal to a lower stereo level.
You might find one method provides a cleaner sound than another. It is also possible to share the subwoofer with multiple pins using a pin subwoofer mixer.
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