Issue with 49 way rotary hack

[88mph]

Hi there,

I recently set about installing the rotary hack on two of my midway 49 way joysticks, using the kit purchased from this site:

http://www.markoates.com/rotary/TechSupport.htm

Upon disassembling my joystick, I noticed that on my joysticks, there is no 'upper sleeve' piece on the shafts.  There is just the shaft, the lower sleeve, and the e clip.  This being the case, when I removed the lower sleeve and installed the rotary hack, there was noticable push pull slop in the joystick shaft.  i.e. while playing the joystick may lift up a half inch or so.  In my case, the nylon shaft connected to the rotary switch is too short--if it were a bit longer, there would be no push/pull slop in the stick. 

Has anyone else encountered this?  My joysticks are not new from Happ.. they came off a NFL Blitz machine that had issues with it's 49way circuitry.  The owner ended up switching over to 8 way joysticks to cut down on the expense of the repair.  I'm considering shaving a bit off the 'upper sleeve' included in the kit and placing it on top of the nylon shaft as a means of getting rid of the slop.  I think this should work fine. 

-88mph

P.S. I just picked up a pair of used 49 ways for a friend, and those appear to be missing the 'upper sleeve' as well..

[fl0yd]

Hmm...

The ones that I used to prototype the kit were the ones I'd bought from Randy.  I wonder if the stick that was used in the actual Blitz game had a different length of shaft.

I don't have a caliper, so my measurements aren't exact, but on my 49-way shaft the overall length is about 3-3/16".

How long is just the shaft portion of your 49-way?

Floyd

[Kremmit]

There are two versions of this stick out there:  The Happ 49-way, and the Midway 49-way.  (and then there's the Williams 49-way, but nobody can mistake it for one of the other two!)  The Happ and Midway look identical when assembled.  The Midway type is the older one, before they sold/licensed the technology to Happ.  but when you take them apart, there are some differences- maybe this is one of them?

I think RandyT may have one of each; I know he bumped into the differences when he was working on the new 49-way balltop handles. 

[RandyT]

There are two versions of this stick out there:  The Happ 49-way, and the Midway 49-way.  (and then there's the Williams 49-way, but nobody can mistake it for one of the other two!)  The Happ and Midway look identical when assembled.  The Midway type is the older one, before they sold/licensed the technology to Happ.  but when you take them apart, there are some differences- maybe this is one of them?

I think RandyT may have one of each; I know he bumped into the differences when he was working on the new 49-way balltop handles. 

This is true.

The old Midway shafts are narrower than the new HAPP produced versions.  I would expect the rotary conversion not to work with the old ones at all, unless a special version were made for them.

RandyT

[88mph]

Ahhh, thanks guys, that clears up a few things.   

Suprisingly, the hack does work on these sticks, and the only problem that I am seeing is the vertical slop, which I think I will be able to correct with a properly sized spacer.  Either that, or I could just buy some of Randy's new shafts.  Then the question becomes whether or not his new Happ 49 compatible shafts will fit into the older Midway 49 bases..

-88mph

[Kremmit]

I think he has stated that they don't fit.

[fl0yd]

The new ball tops don't fit the older bases, unfortunately the 2 bases that I have are incompatible too.  I'll be ordering a 2nd set from RandyT in the near future.