Robotron centering grommets

[Brad Lee]

I picked up a pair of ball top leafspring joysticks that are NOS repalcements for robotron et al. The joysticks are complete except there's no mention of the centering grommets
Fortunately they are almost always avalable on ebay and other sources

I geuss my first question is how is the response/action without them? If it's not good then my followup is are there alternatives? They appear to be just rubber boots that cause some tension and cause the stick to snap back to center. Is there something maybe in a auto parts store that would have the same effect, anything that's been done before? Maybe some way to replicate the actionwith springs?

I don't have em in my hands yet so I'm just flying blind so to speak and geussing

[OSCAR]

The grommets do all the work in the joystick.  Without them there is zero tension and the joystick would be unusable.  I doubt you could even activate the leafswitches because the grommet also provides the pivot point which the joystick shaft pivots about.

I would be a bit surprised if the sticks came without the grommets, since they are the "guts" of the stick.  

http://www.flippers.com/prt4sale.html has the Wico grommets for $7.50 each just in case you need them.