Happ 3" Trackball - no y-axis movement

[fiscap]

I purchased a Happ 3" Trackball from a seller on eBay about 6 months back and it worked fine out of the box. It's been sitting idle for a couple of months in my test panel, but when I fired it up the other night I noticed that I have no response on the y-axis. The encoder wheel is spinning, so I assume it has something to do with the optics.

I looked on the Happ site for replacement parts and noticed that they are advertising the new "Red Board" A052-1011-00 as a replacement over the inferior "Green Board" A052-1010-00.

1.) Is there indeed a known problem with the older "Green Boards" and failing optics, thus the new and improved "Red Boards?"

2.) Does anyone know if the A052-1011-00 part from Happ includes both optic boards or is just the one board with the encoder circuitry built into it? I know that the x-axis board has just the optics on it with no real circuitry, but it appears that's what has actually failed on my existing y-axis board.

[rwhip41]

I had heard that the green board Happs 3" trackballs develop problems with use/response time. I believe that is what the red board replaces. I'm not sure if this would be an issue with casual trackball games, but I heard some people had issues with more trackball-intensive games like Golden Tee.

[SirPeale]

First: check your wires!  Bad connection will render everything moot.

[fiscap]

First: check your wires!  Bad connection will render everything moot.

Thanks Peale - wiring is fine. The x-axis board plugs into the y-axis/encoder board and from there goes out to the USB port. X-axis works fine and the y-axis is toast, so that tells me the encoder circuitry on the y-axis board is working - the only thing that I can assume from there is the y-axis optics.

[SirPeale]

The way to tell if the circuit is dead is to swap encoder boards.  If the problem swaps to the other side, you have your answer.  If it doesn't, you have other issues.

[fiscap]

If I had an extra set of boards or optics, I'd definitely take your approach Peale 

Here is what the boards look like. I have no problem with the x-axis optics, which feed into the y-axis optics/encoder board as seen in the picture.

I think the easiest solution is to just buy the new "Red Board" (A052-1011-00) encoder.

[SirPeale]

If I had an extra set of boards or optics, I'd definitely take your approach Peale 

No, no, no...don't swap them out...swap the ones you already have in the trackball itself.  If when you do that, the problem goes to the X axis instead of the Y, you know your problem is in the board.  If the problem persists, the problem is elsewhere.

Either way, you can rule out problems in this fashion.