First off, let me say that I don’t condone the destruction of any working pinball machine or even one that could be restored.
Even pinball machine bodies that lost their heads can sometimes be reunited. Parts are available for many vintage pinball machines and there is a whole community of pinball restorers looking for project machines to bring back to life.
A friend of mine once found the body of a Gottlieb Charlie’s Angels pinball machine and was able to find a head for it among his network of pinball hobbyists.
That said, some machines are long past saving. Their playfields are worn to wood (replacement playfields are available for some popular games!) or the cabinets are full of termites or cracks (cabinets can be rebuilt!).
Certain games or manufacturers are just not as worthy of salvaging as others due to a lack of parts available and a lack of will to reproduce them. Some games are just plain boring and most likely were even boring back in the day.
So in some cases building a coffee table, bar, or wall hanging is a suitable repurposing.
My Jumping Jack pinball restoration project received a donor cabinet from a dull game called “Megatron” and the old Jumping Jack cabinet ended up in a high school production of The Who’s “Tommy”.
