If I may ask, what do you mean by "fabricated some shims for the grippers?" I recently took the plunge and bought a used DM1 also and was experiencing frequent strange noises and jams. I took off the case so I could observe what it was doing and I spotted the reason. Every once in a while the grippers will randomly drop the bottom 1-2 cards roughly half a second after the split, which will then collide with the incoming card and cause a jam. I've tried using brand new cards, aligning the grippers via the manual's instructions, etc. with no luck. I was wondering if you made your changes because of a similar issue? I'm pretty bummed out after spending so much on this thing lol. Hoping I can fix it.

As a matter of fact, yes! (kinda)

My gut was telling me this machine was perfect but that it needed new plastic grippers. Unsurprisingly, I couldn't find replacements anywhere. It seemed to work well with paper cards but not plastic (totally unacceptable). Having no other machines to compare, it was difficult to determine why or how to fix.

During the setup routine for my brand new plastic cards, I noticed that the 'grippers' were were not reliably holding the cards when the 'floor' would drop. It seemed that the small 'ridges' on the grippers needed to be deeper and had probably worn away after years of use - OR - maybe the grippers just needed to be 'thicker' and have a few millimeters added behind them because the valid range of travel was not enough to reliably 'grip' the cards during setup. This was also preventing the machine from successfully completing a setup cycle (thus rendering it useless).

I disassembled the grippers and, using a large piece of hard plastic from the new garage door I installed, fabricated new 'spacers' for the grippers which added to their depth. Simply cutting them to the exact size of the current grippers and drilling a hole in the middle was all it took.

When I turned it back on for setup it completed without a hitch.


In lieu of the above, there is a simple fix that may work for you... In the setup screen there is an option to add a delay after the elevator drops. I forget the exact menu and timings but you can add 10-200 milliseconds (or something) which would probably help with this problem. It would make for a longer shuffle cycle, but might just fix your card jamming problem. The cards should NEVER be 'falling' when a new one is 'shuffles' in...


Please let me know if either of these work for you!

Thanks so much for the detailed response! Sorry to get back to you so late, the past week has been quite hectic. Unfortunately, experimenting with the various delay options didn't fix the issue. The bottom 1-3 cards continue to drop seemingly at totally random times and collide with the incoming card. I'm happy to put in the effort to modify the grippers but I'm not entirely sure I understood what I am supposed to do. By any chance, could I possibly trouble you for a picture of what your modified grippers look like? I would be forever grateful.

The grippers probably need to be replaced. The side that faces the cards 'should' have little upward-facing ridges in them that keep the cards from falling and hold them steady when the elevator drops. This wouldn't be a terribly difficult thing to fabricate with some hard plastic and a dremel tool.

In my case, adding some 'thickness' to my grippers fixed my issue which was similar to yours.

- remove both grippers from their arms using an allen wrench (the plastic rectangles that actually touch the cards)
- cut some equally-sized plastic rectangles out of hard plastic using the existing grippers as a template
- drill holes in the center of your new plastic rectangles
- reinstall your new plastic rectangle 'spacers' behind the old grippers

If you live anywhere near southeast Michigan, I'd be more than happy to meet up with you and take a look...

Unfortunately I'm nowhere close :')

I'll 3d print a few variations with your notes in mind and see If I can get it sorted out. Thanks again!

Wow, this is a shocking bad list. I understand not knowing anything about them you wanted to make something up plausible sounding, but this is just babbling nonsense. Are you by any chance a used car salesman?

And it's not a LCD, it's a vacuum fluorescent display.

You mentioned you tried adjusting the drop delay, but did you run the deck calibration?

Since I was asked, I was simply sharing my thoughts on wear and tear parts that might suggest red-flags if I were to purchase another one.

I'll keep my comments to myself and users can continue to wait for others who are smarter and have more experience chime in so I don't risk babbling on or sounding like a used car salesperson.


Sorry for any misinformation - just trying to help...

I for one appreciated your advice, and thought unlucky's comments were shitty. I have no real insight as to who is correct though.

Thank you for your kind words.

I will happily concede the type of display. My point was to overly-scrutinize the display and check that it functioned properly.

Not entirely sure why anyone would choose to suddenly and openly berate and bully me on these forums.

I thought most of my posts and contributions to this thread were appreciated and potentially helpful (at least to some).

The response you got was totally uncalled for. You clearly had good intentions so it's doesn't even matter how good/bad your advice was. (I have no idea about autoshufflers)

Thank you for your support as well, sir.

At a minimum, the items on my list should be inspected and/or tested thoroughly for workability prior to buying something so expensive. I certainly would have liked that list prior to buying mine.

I'm not sure what the point of his post was other than to belittle and disparage.

Came across this today and was reminded of this thread - https://www.stargamespartsandservice...-for-deckmate/

These plastic grippers are EXACLTLY the parts I was referring to and well worth the $20 investment for anyone was has an original Shufflemaster.

Were you ever able to get your Deck Mate working?

Mine's going strong so I'm still gonna lean on the 'definitely worth the investment'.