Data East Flipper light strip installation


The flipper light strip is one of the best modifications you can add to your machine. Our light strips come pre-wired for 12vdc and is powered by the coin door connector.



  1. First, remove the glass and pull the playfield onto its supports.

  2. The light strip attached to the front of the ball guide that guides the ball into the trough. It will be high enough so that the balls cannot hit it.


  3. Remove the apron on your machine. On the Guns N Roses example, it required a 1/4 nut driver to remove two screws from the bottom, and a phillips to remove two screws from the top of the apron.

    This is a good time to clean any dirt out of under your apron area. Clean and thoroughly dry the metal guide under the flippers. If this isn't thoroughly dry, the tape will not stick and the light strip will fall off. Recommend rubbing alcohol or such.

  4. Note, if you ar working with a strip pack from one of our kits, you need to run the strip up through the playfield first. See this image:

    Peel the double sided tape and attach the strip to the metal guide. See where to line it up below

  5. Put some tape behind the wires portion to avoid the wires touching the metal on the guide. Also put some tape over where the wires go under the apron so that the apron cannot break the wires and short the power onto the metal guide.

  6. I recommend taping the wire down so it cannot be accidentally tugged. Run the wires down and into the open area in front of the ball trough.

  7. Reattach the apron. We are done working underneath the apron.

  8. Note: there are 2 power options here. First is by coin door. Second is CN5 in head. Both are shown below.

    Now we will run the power for the light strip to the front of the cabinet and plug into the coin door 12v harness.


    Our cable comes with two plugs:

    The black wire plug goes to the black wire on the very end of the harness. The red wired plug goes to the grey wire on the very far other end. These two together provide 12vdc and ground.



    If you don't have the power adapter shown in these photos, we do have an alternate power adapter available that goes on CN5 of the power board. The connector is 8 pins but only 6 of those wires are used. Here is a photo of how to install our power adapter on the CN5 connector in the head:

  9. At this point, you are ready to push the playfield back into position. Make sure the light strip wire doesn't hang onto the playfield. If you want, you can tape the wire back to the back of the cabinet to prevent it from wondering onto the top of the playfield using some black gorilla tape or such.

  10. The light strip will power on as soon as the game has power and remain lit the entire time.