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Main => Main Forum => Topic started by: jeffremiller on December 10, 2008, 08:27:43 pm

Title: U-Trak jitter
Post by: jeffremiller on December 10, 2008, 08:27:43 pm

Anyone have experience with the Ultimarc U-trak trackball?

I just received mine and plugged it into usb (ordered the usb interface too)

It is working, sort of... but very jittery... especially on the horizontal axis.

Any thoughts?

Title: Re: U-Trak jitter
Post by: Turnarcades on December 11, 2008, 10:01:27 pm

Check there is no dust inside, check your USB drivers and give the ball chance to settle in. Just give it a damn good spinning for the first few days in every direction and it should feel smoother.

Title: Re: U-Trak jitter
Post by: solowCX on December 12, 2008, 02:43:33 am

Mine definitely has this issue. What I found by taking it apart is that it seems like the rollers that the ball moves do not fit perfectly, causing them to move left and right sometimes. I am still working on my cab, so I don't know if it will hold up, but one thing I did that helped was to push the circular metal end pieces as close to the roller as possible and then tape them down. Not exactly the most ideal solution, but in the early tests I did it seemed to help a little.

The other problem I have is that sometimes I can get the ball to jump up off the rollers if it is a somewhat fast or sudden roll, not sure what to do about that though...

Overall it seems like a pretty good trackball, but I was expecting something a little smoother when I got it. It could just be I got a unit that was less than ideal.

Title: Re: U-Trak jitter
Post by: Turnarcades on December 12, 2008, 11:51:56 am

Andy, any thoughts on this?

Title: Re: U-Trak jitter
Post by: jeffremiller on December 12, 2008, 11:58:28 am

Well after a bunch of tinkering... I  have it isolated to the horizontal axis.

Even a huge spin on the ball only moves the pointer a little on the horizontal.

Working with Andy via email to resolve.

Thanks everyone.

Title: Re: U-Trak jitter
Post by: Ummon on December 13, 2008, 01:19:26 pm

I had some slight worries about something like this when it came out because of its height relative to where the rollers would have to contact.

Title: Re: U-Trak jitter
Post by: AndyWarne on December 14, 2008, 02:10:28 pm

Quote from: Ummon on December 13, 2008, 01:19:26 pm

I had some slight worries about something like this when it came out because of its height relative to where the rollers would have to contact.

This height is exactly the same as the Happ trackball. The contact points on the ball are the same. This was one of my design requirements. This effect is no greater on the U-Trak than any other trackball, when spun to the limit.

The problem sounds like a faulty optical encoder PCB. This could be confirmed by swapping the 2 PCBs over.  A replacement is on the way anyway.
Andy

Title: Re: U-Trak jitter
Post by: Ummon on December 15, 2008, 05:29:10 pm

Ahh, thank you. A mistake I made by eye-balling it.