An old vending machine in need of rebooting may provide fodder for some electronics tutorials at Squidwrench. To that end, here’s the OEM wiring diagram pasted inside the door:

SqWr Vending Machine – OEM Wiring Diagram

That’s endured a perspective transformation and a bit of contrast stretching; it looks awful, but being able to view it without squatting inside the machine makes it much easier to read…

Each selector and motor cycle switch pair interact with the motor thusly:

Vending Machine – Switches and Motor Doodle

All of the motors have one side connected directly to the 24 VAC power transformer. The wiring diagram shows a pair of transformers in parallel, which seems odd.

The Selector switches (an array of 30 on the front panel, with one broken that will surely call for some 3D printing) are in series, so the lowest-numbered one wins; the NO terminal of each Selector switch  goes directly to the control box. Pressing a switch connects the Red·Orange wire on the C terminal of the first switch to the control box on the same wire as the corresponding motor lead.

Assuming the Motor Cycle switch parks in the NC position, it will disconnect the Orange wire from the Orange·Black wire and connect it to the lower motor lead and the Select switch (which may or may not be pressed by then), although we don’t know the timing. There’s surely a cam on the motor shaft.

Some possibly relevant patents, found after a brief search with the obvious keywords:

• Patent US4917264 – Double-depth modified serpentine can vender – Google Patents
• Patent US4604557 – Vending machine power switching apparatus – Google Patents
• Patent US3752287 – Price selection vending machine arrangement – Google Patents
• Patent US3243080 – Selector switch mechanism for vending machines – Google Patents