Merit Industries | Pit Boss Superstar

Merit Industries produced machines between 1980 & the late 1990’s for both arcades and bars mainly. Although, the applications for these games are endless. Weighing 50-70 lbs, these table top bar games featured a wide variety of non-gambling games. From horse racing to trivia, connect four, dice and more table top bar game.

Production of the Pit Boss Superstar started in 1990. At the time, Merit produced 76 games under the Pit Boss title.

Featuring a red cabinet with a black control panel.

The unit is built like a tank. With galvanized steel inlay and thick solid wood outside construction, steel front control panel and all metal back side. The slant back top ensures no one rests a drink on it and the plastic smoked monitor panel protects the internals, stops people from tampering for free games and protects the user from electric shock. Keep in mind these CRT (Cathode Ray Tube) monitors bump the electric current up to 25,000 volts!

The coin box is located in the back with a separate key from the service key. Service locks are on the front control panel center and the rear outward swinging service door.

There is however a linch pin in the design.

Merit Industries decided to use an electronic key designed by Dallas Semiconductors. Think of this as a key to the front door of your house. The game will check for this chip and only allow it to boot up if the chip is working properly; ensuring a boot leg version of the game was not created. This electronic key has a lithium-ion battery inside and is not serviceable. This chip also doubles as the game’s SRAM (Static Random Access Memory) which stores high scores, credits purchased and more. The life expectancy of this chip is 10 years because of that battery. At the time of writing this, we are at 31 / 32 years from its production date. So all of these chips are on borrowed time. Typically if this chip has died, when you boot the game up, the screen will stay blue and display “Error 3”. (Some game boards may use a different error code)
To make the situation even worse, Dallas Semiconductors was defunct in 2002. Purchased by Maxim Integrated in 2003.

The Superstar board set SRAM / Electronic Key chip is marked: Dallas DS1225Y
Posted on Newark, there is a listed alternative currently available part by you guessed it…Maxim Integrated. Part number: DS1225YAD-150

This is worth a shot to bring your game back to life if your Dallas DS1225Y is dead.

The Dallas chip is located on the right hand side rear of the game’s logic board. While these should tolerate heat, it is recommended not to mess with it if it is still working.

****Merit Industries made their Pit Boss units with optional kits to change the games. In 1991 one of the board kits released was Merit Industries Superstar 30. The Electronic key made by Dallas Semiconductors in this model is different than the original Pit Boss Superstar. The “Superstar 30” key (Dallas DS1204U-3 | As seen here in this picture) does not have a modern replacement. We recommend finding a working board of the similar era and tossing it in your cabinet. All the similar era boards are plug and play. This was a marketing effort to have updates to sell to bars and not have to wait for their games to die. When patrons get too good at a game, they stop dropping coins…Where did Deep 6 Arcade ‘s name come from…? The name comes from separating patrons from their pocket change. That is why we enjoy the spirit of Merit Industries so much.

Superstar 30 Dallas SRAM chip

Also worth mentioning, the game has 12 programmable advertising pages. There was a special keyboard sold that can activate this feature. However, We nor anyone else we have spoken to has ever seen one of these.

The monitor is a Hantarex MTC 9000. The cabinet came with both 9” and 13” monitor options. However, the 9“ monitor is much more common.

Screen burn is almost guaranteed by now but, with the smoked screen in the front of the cabinet you can’t see it even when the game is powered on.
If your monitor has issues, collapsing in on it self either horizontally, vertically or both. changing the capacitors may be all you need. If the monitor is not powering on at all, you may have a number of other issues, including but not limited to a dead flyback (What produces the high voltage). Resisters could be burnt out due to capacitors out of spec or more.

Keep in mind, electrolytic capacitors have a life span of 20-30 years. They regulate current surging through your board. When the oil inside the capacitors leaks out or dries up, they will start to ruin other components. This is why changing old capacitors is so important.

a replacement capacitor kit is readily available from places like this one: MTC 9000 Cap Kit the kit does not include a filter capacitor, so pick up this as well: Filter Cap.

The model and serial number are located on the rear of the cabinet. Keep in mind that although the serial number on your game may match the Pit Boss Superstar number listed here, the game board may have been changed at some point in its life. So, identifying the circuit board is key to finding the correct parts to restore it.

Listed here is:
Model number F21800
Serial number 11896
117 Volts
1.5 Amps
60 HZ

If you own one, want one or just like talking about arcade games…Contact Us!

We get all types of games in stock and have deep reach for parts and knowledge. You can count of Deep 6 Arcade to keep these classic games running for years to come.