"Will you buy me a shotgun, Dad?" FDS ERROR 22

[fredJ]

Ah yes, the Dusk system.

Seriously though, I had the error 22 for two months. Even bought two drives (from Japan) one at the time to compare. The second one was sold as working condition so I could compare with it directly step by step. Finally then I solved it.
As I mentioned in my first post, it wasn't so hard.

Still had trouble later after that, because I had the idea the magnetic head should be the other way around for some reason.

But now I think I have gotten the hang of it...

[ericj]

Try putting some slight pressure on the pressure arm as it scans the disk. You can do this by pressing down on it or by pulling up lightly on the back of it. Hope this makes sense.

[petik1]

Disk drives a finicky bastards.  Plus, Xious (as far as I know) gives the system the works and even offers a 1 year warranty.

[ericj]

Once they are working okay, they should work for a long time. My three drives have worked for a few years now with no problems, and I've used two of the drives to read, write, and dump hundreds of disks.

[Xious]

Wow,  I sell restored drives (with a warranty) for around the price you paid for a parts unit. Did it come with the disks, or were they a separate transaction?

Anything more i gave out might as well be a detailed set of instructions, and sorry, I'm not about to do that. As I said, I'd also be willing to trade for the labour, if you have anything that I can flip for the approximate value of a servicing, or anything odd that I might want for myself. Otherwise, if you can't get it running, I pretty much run a nicely discounted FW price on a regular basis, which occasionally fluctuates with my cost of business and psychotherapy.

I had such a pile of these last year driving me bonkers, especially when people broke parts, meddled with things based on the so-called 'guides', or had extra 'features' in them. I managed to restore every one to 100%+, save one that I restored to 9X%+ (which is something like the year 199X from so many titles) that had physical damage and was pretty much a salvage unit that the owner wanted me to restore.

I didn't want to charge him insane prices for labour that would far exceed the value of another drive, so I replaced the parts to which he agreed, and I stopped when it worked most of the time and asked him what he wanted me to do. Working on that one drained a lot of my time and effort--it was possibly the most broken FDS I have ever seen--and was delaying other work. Most people would have broken it down to use as pieces, whilst I replaced parts of the assembly, the motor, the return spring, adjusted the head return and the media pressure tension springs, lubricated everything twice, and mostly did it at a loss.

Suffice to say, i will not be beaten by such a thing. Once in a while. it would refuse to spin a disk, but when ejected and re-inserted, it would work, which is the best you can do with that kind of mechanism. This has to do with the frame, and mechanical faults. the poor thing must have been seriously abused, and yes, i did have to adjust the head, as the factory wax was removed by either the previous owner, or a previous repair attempt, and it was extremely off calibration.

I re-set it, which takes a long time, as when the rest of a mechanism is out of alignment, it is a very touchy procedure to calibrate the read-head, which may as well need be set to a specific micron. After I re-set it, I also resealed it with my special red sealing wax, and I sealed the springs with the same wax, just as the factory had done.

As far as the belt that you have is concerned, it may be correct, and it may not. I have no way to say for sure from here, and only my physically examining it can I determine if it is correct, and in working condition.

[jpx72]

If I may place a related question here - My drive seems to have a little motor problem and I wanted to give the motor some lubrication. I also found this
http://www.famicomdisksystem.com/disk-copy/#speed info about adjusting speed of the motor. BUT since I haven't found any hole on the motor where can I put some oil, I tried to turn the "screw" ..just to see if something happens. But the screw is not a real screw, it's just a rubber flap covering the hole in the motor. I can't seem to "find" anything underneath the flap (with a screwdriver), so my question is - is this hole really for adjusting the speed of the motor, or is it a hole for lubrication?

[Xious]

It's a potentiometer under that hole. You need a very small, jeweler's sized, bladed screwdriver to adjust it. Do not try to lubricate it from there... In fact, trying to lubricate it is a bad idea in general, as the motor is sealed and adding machine oil to anywhere without opening it properly will only put oil onto the electrical contacts. 

[jpx72]

Thanks for the quick reply, I was going to oil it through there any minute  

[Xious]

Aye, you'd have been in for a heap of trouble. I'd love to lubricate the motors on these things, but it's more trouble than it is worth. if you decide to open it be very careful and gentle, as there is a PCB inside that is extremely easy to damage!

Even being careful, they occasionally crack and you'll need to repair traces, which is never any fun. There is no simple way to lubricate it anyhow. What is it doing that you think it absolutely needs it?

P.S. Remember to use machine oil for this, if you decide to try.

[jpx72]

I have a sewing machine oil for stuff like that, no worries. I was going to do a video of my drive's behavior, which doesn't look like alignment problem, more like something motor related, either it's not lubricated properly or it's not getting the right voltage...  anyway I'll post it later.

[newkillergenius]

Well, after another 3 days of 'loosen spindle hub, turn gear 5 degrees, re-tighten' I'm really about to load my shotgun. 
I strted getting 'error 27' and I thought I was almost there.....

Xious, how much do you charge to repair an FDS?  Where are you located?

(and in closing, was I getting warmer with the new error code?  lol)

Thanks all

[Xious]

Pricing and other information is all here. Please contact me by P.M. if you wish to schedule a service. 

[fredJ]

Error 27 is better than Error 22.
You might just need to adjust the speed of the motor.

[Xious]

Actually, Err.22, Err.27 and Err.21 are pretty much all the same thing: They can be from spindle alignment, motor calibration, or a handful of other causes that I'd rather not delve into. The motor speed can be the cause, but it's just as likely the mechanism alignment.

A fun fact: If the mechanism is not aligned, the Err.21/27 speed problems can be swapped. On a correctly calibrated and aligned mechanism, they mean something specific, but if the calibration is off in either direction, then they reverse in function.

Also keep in mind that none of the games being used to align this drive are 'difficult' games, in terms of FDS loading. It might have other problems when you toss a more complex disk at it, unless you use complex disks (plural) during the alignment procedure.

I generally test around 20 (or more) different disks about thrice each, and they must all load, every time, before I am satisfied.