Sometimes I hate this hobby.
I just completely dissassembled the original Berzerk joystick. It was working OK, but the diagonals were either not working or very hard to "reach". So I thought the reflective disk must be dirty and so a little cleaning would solve that.
Indeed the disc wasn't very shiny anymore. So I cleaned it simply with some hand-soap and paper-towel and it was like a mirror again.
I also noticed that a cap had either broken loose (it was also dented) or cut loose on the joystick PCB. So I replaced it.
Re-assembled everything, put it in the CP, power up machine and:
Dead. Completely dead joystick ! WTF !
SO sigh, gonna disassemble again.
I'm pretty much out on my own here. Apart from the Berzerk manual. Original Berzerk joysticks are RARE.
On the other hand,I'm not the kind to give up easily....
Indeed I had made a mistake while re-assembling. The optical PCB was too far from the reflective disc because I had mounted it incorrectly.
Fixed it and it works great now. Diagonals are 100% better then before..... Still not too wild on this joystick. It's definitely not the best I've ever played....
The spring was pretty tight on this one. I felt it was more of a muscle exercise machine than a game so I adjusted the spring tension to it's minimum. Let's see how I like that.
Still, hitting the end of the joystick's movement space is not feeling very comfy because there are no rubber stops or anything like that.... o well...part of the game I guess....
Here's the disc "before":
and "after":
Also, sometimes in this hobby, you just DON'T want to know what it is..:
I guess it's the "crud" often mentioned as being the cause for this joystick to fail.
Might just as well post the other pics I made. The CP underside after removing the joystick, luckily Leaf-switches only ! They only need some cleaning. And the buttons need to be replaced. Look at that branch-part in the wood, the branch was removed and replaced with something.....ahhh those were the days
:
The outer "casing" of the joystick. Apart from holding the spring, this also doubles as a "dark room" for the optics...The rust came loose already with some hand soap and scrubbing sponge. Will do a proper job later.
The stick and the optical board. The optical board hangs up side down (parts facing the floor)
For those who don't know how this joystick works: Infrared light is emitted by the four little black opto-combo's around the hole in the PCB. The disc on the other side of the joystick will reflect the light (more) when it's move in the position that that opto-combo is. The reflected lights falls onto the other part of the opto-combo (the photo-diode) and through the Op-Amp chip the PCB "emulates" a closed switch for that direction.
Here's how I INCORRECTLY re-assembled it. The nuts should have gone UNDER the PCB and then the two hex legs should go on top of the PCB. You can see the disc is now quite (too) far away from the PCB now.
You can see the damaged/leaking/broken off cap on the top left on the PCB.