Wico Trackballs?

[Chris]

I've been hunting arcade trackballs on eBay; most of the ones out there are 3" used Golden Tee trackballs, either Happ or Imperial, that go for about $40-$50.

In my smallish control panel, a 2-1/4" trackball would probably be better.  I hit Wico's site today to check out their trackball page (http://www.wicothesource.com/new2/pages/page89.htm) and found that their 2-1/4" trackballs are only $24.95, and the 3" balls are $49.95.  This is far cheaper than brand new Happ balls!

Has anyone here used the Wico trackballs, ideally with a mouse hack?  I want to go to an arcade ball instead of my hacked PC ball because of backspin issues, so I'm mostly trying to find out if these backspin... but with Happ balls being three times the price, I wonder if a Happ ball is three times better.... (Someone started a Happ vs. Wico thread once, but it veered into a Betson Imperial discussion and the Wico answers never came out...)

Thanks!

--Chris

[SirPoonga]

Well, I've had weird experience with mine.  BUT I heard many others are successful.  I probably just a bad optic or something.  Actually, I found a cheap happ that I couldn't pass up, so I would be willing to sell or preferably trade my 3" wico.  Your choice of a translucent orange or old white ball.  Will need replacement rollers.

[jerryjanis]

I have 2 15 year old Wico trackballs (from a Cabal control panel) and for me they work great...  I think they are 2 1/4", and they look slightly different from the new ones I saw on their website.  Sometimes when friends really go crazy on it, they get some backspin.  I've heard that it's a problem with windows and not the trackballs.  I personally haven't noticed enough of a problem to have looked into making it work better.  I'm very happy with them.

Here's a breif thread with a few other successful trackball mouse hackers.

http://www.arcadecontrols.org/yabbse/index.php?board=1;action=display;threadid=281;start=0

I wish I could compare mine to Happs, but I don't have a Happs...