Twin Famicom Disk Drive & slight sound issues

[milkmanv1]

Skip down to the last paragraph to see my problem in short, if you don't wanna read about my life-  

Ok guys, I "recieved" a twin fami system a year or two ago, and I say recieved because for helping the guy out he gave me one for "free" ( I gave him SOMETHING for it, cause I felt bad making him do all that for the little help I gave)

Now he had replaced the belts on all of the twin famis he had, cause he had a bunch. When I got it I attempted to load up the two disk system games I have, 3d world runner and Moero Twin Bee. Im almost positive that at that time, it was not working at all. Then after 10 or so attempts, I got 3d world runner to load up, but not very well, twin bee would not load at all. I asked the guy who sent it to me and he said that it most likely needed a head adjustment, being lazy I kinda forget about it.

Now that I'm getting back into the fami (plus I cleaned my room today, and was able to find the power adapter) I decided to give the ol twin fami another shot. I popped in Moero Twin bee and viola! Like clockwork it popped up with no problems, and I was shooting those little bells for power-ups like it was my job. This time around, however, 3d world runner would boot up, but then after the load to start gameplay, it would display some garbled version of the game screen, with Error 27 on the bottom, and "This is a test" off to the right side. FIguring it was a bad disc, I shrugged and played some twin bee, up to level 3 with no issues. I decided to give the disc drive a break, switch over to cartridge mode, and beat Kid dracula. When I came back for some more twin bee it loaded fine again, and I even beat level 4, damn that game is hard. When level 5 was loading I got "disc error #27" boom. My hopes that my twin famicom somehow fixed itself while sitting in my closet have been dampered, and I will most likely need to open it.

SO (heres the problem in a nutshell) I'm getting error 27 at the startup of 3d world runner, and after playing 4 levels of twin bee perfectly, it shits out on me at stage 5 and tells me it's error 27. I want to know if anyone knows what could be causing the somewhat inconsistant issue.

Oh and as for the sound, during twin bee, it would chop out every once and awhile, I'm wondering if the caps go bad in these babies like they do in a Turbo Duo/PCduo and that was causing the problem, or if it was just a flaky connection and cheap chords.

Thanks alot!!
-Joe

[Frank_fjs]

I also have a twin fami that spits out error 27 on occasion. It's weird, it worked flawlessly when I first received it but after some use it now spits out an error 27 practically every time I first try to load a game - it usually reads the game fine the second attempt though, but on games that require you to flip to side B I usually get another error 27 and have to go through several attempts before it successfully loads.

I found that cleaning the head with some iso and a cotton tip has helped but did not completely resolve the issue. I also adjusted the head which also helped somewhat but once again did not completely resolve the issue. This is about as much as I'm comfortable with doing, as I'm not confident enough to dismantle the unit as I will probably make things worse due to not re-assembling it correctly!

So my advice would be to try the basics, try cleaning the head first as this is a rather simple process. All you need to do is remove all the screws and take the top off the unit, the head is easy to access without removing the disk drive, it's that shiny metal rectangle with a black line on it. If you want to take things further, you can try to adjust a screw that moves the position of the head, but make very minor adjustments (maybe 1/8th of a turn) and be prepared for a lot of frustration.

Based on what I've read, I believe that my head might be out of alignment but I have no idea how to rectify this. Well, I have a vague idea but do not have the confidence to dismantle the disk drive.

EDIT: Sound issues are most likely cap related.

[milkmanv1]

Cool, thanks for a quick reply!

I just got a error 27 when trying to load twin bee...tried it again, and it loaded up fine. Tomorrow I'll clean the head and make some adjustments to see if I can get 3d world runner working.

Does anyone have a clue if it could just be a bad disk? I wanna say it isn't because why it would half load, and then give an error that says something is out of alignment. Instead of not loading alltogether.

I'll clean and fiddle with it tomorrow, but lemme know thoughts about my copy of 3d world runner.

[Frank_fjs]

How many disk games do you have?

I have about 20, some of them brand new, and I still receive the error 27 code.

This is a great site to have a read through, it explains a lot of the errors and how to attempt to resolve them:

http://www.famicomdisksystem.com/tutorials/fds-repair-mod/belt-replacement-adjustment/

[milkmanv1]

I only have Moero Twin Bee and 3d world runner. I ripped the thing open today and if im correct, the spindle head was completely backwards? 

I set it to the position in which the article you posted said. But upon putting it all back together I basically have the same exact problems as before...I guess I'll re-open it and attempt adjusting some more and fiddling with the magnetix head screw.

Im pretty sure the drive speed is good, because its having no problems actually reading the discs when they wanna work.

also a quick update on the sound issue. It's getting a bit worse, but it's not horrible. Are there any guides that show what caps need to be replaced? This is only an issue when im playing on the disc system half

Thanks for the help, I'm (slowly) figuring this one out!

[ericj]

Whatever you do, DO NOT adjust the magnetic head (screw with epoxy over it). You're just asking for problems if you do. Error 27 is either the position of the spindle hub, the pressure pad on the arm is worn too thin, or a dirty/damaged disk.

[Frank_fjs]

the pressure pad on the arm is worn too thin

Don't suppose you have a photo of what a worn one looks like, compared to a good one? Also, what do you recommend to use to replace it if need be?

I actually played around with my twin fami today and managed to eliminate my error 27 codes by adjusting the speed of the motor. I decreased the speed by a tiny amount and since then it's started working first time, every time.

I noticed it straight away, you can tell when an adjustment you've made is working by watching how the mechanism reacts and also by how it sounds. It doesn't stop now at the beginning of a read and the screen turns black straight away, followed by the game loading successfully.

[milkmanv1]

Thanks alot Ericj, someone stopped me before I did something stupid.

and FrankFjs, I'll try the motor speed then, because the problem you described with your twin fami was almost identical to my problem.

[Frank_fjs]

Whilst I tend to agree with ericj, in that you probably shouldn't adjust things that would have been set at the factory such as the magnetic head screw, in my case I made an exception based on the following:

- The person I bought my twin from had already fiddled with everything (replaced belt, spindle position, head screw, motor speed etc) before the unit came into my possession.

- My disk drive wasn't reading games 100% reliably, so I figured I had nothing to lose.

Before I cleaned the head and adjusted the head screw, it would take 5-10 attempts to get a game to successfully load. After tweaking the head screw, I finally managed to get it to read disks after 1-3 attempts. The last step I took, which is one I was putting off, was to adjust the motor speed and in doing so I have now restored my disk system to a working state, where it reads and loads games first time, every time.

I'm no expert, quite far from it, but I know enough to realise that the FDS can be an unreliable pain in the backside. There are just so many variables involved!

[ericj]

Good point, Frank_fjs. If someone else already messed with it, you'll have to do the same to get it all sorted and working again. Never an easy nor fun task.

Don't suppose you have a photo of what a worn one looks like, compared to a good one? Also, what do you recommend to use to replace it if need be?

Unfortunately, I don't have a pic of a worn one. It's pretty thin to begin with, but you want to make sure it's flat and sticks out enough from the circular plastic ring it's encased in that it will make even contact with the disk surface.

To replace it, I've used thin felt adhesive pads like are used to keep things from scratching surfaces. I've used a small hole punch to make the piece the right size. There is no perfect replacement that I've found.

[milkmanv1]

Ok so after some drive speed adjustments I got 3d world runner to load side A, but it now displays error 27 on side B. I actually got it to load side B once as well, but came up with another error 27. I left the speed at where it (atleast once) booted up 3d world runner. I figure thats my best bet, considering games do seem to work faster now, and Im not getting any errors loading on twin bee.

BUT, remember when I said the spindle head was completely backwards? Well, it likes to stay there. Basically the spindle head set screw is stripped, even at its tightest, the spindle head is completely free rotating.

So, now my new problem, how do I fix the stripped set screw on my spindle head. Every time it reads a disc the spindle head moves all over the place 

[Frank_fjs]

It would probably help if you could take some photos.

Just to clarify, is this the bit you're having problems with, re it being on backwards and the screw not tightening..?



I've never actually touched this bit myself, so can't really advise on how it should be set. I don't think it should be moving freely though and it should obviously be sitting level.

Another thing to clarify, this is the bit I was referring to earlier when I mentioned that you might consider adjusting it:



I had to adjust mine, as it was out of position. It was easy to adjust in one sense (but it still took ages to get right), as when it was turned too far in or out, the disks would either not load at all or other error codes were coming up. I basically loosened it a fair way out, and started tightening in small increments until I observed smooth movement, less error codes and eventually successful reads. When you get it to the point where the head moves in one clean sweep (as opposed to stopping and starting or making funny clicking sounds), the screen turns black and you start getting some successful reads with the occasional error 27 code, you know you're getting close. Once I was at this point, where it was reading successfully 1 in roughly 3 attempts, I adjusted the motor speed until I was getting perfect reads.

Another thing you might consider trying is to clean the head, that shiny metal bit with the black line on it. Gently use a cotton tip dipped in a small amount of isopropyl to rub it clean.

Whilst we're on the topic of cleaning, I'm not sure how helpful this will be but I bought a disk cleaner. When testing I actually used brand new disks to eliminate the possibility of a bad disk being the problem, but I also had some used disks that were rather dirty and would not load well. After using the disk cleaner, these disks started to work reliably. Here's a link to one on eBay: http://www.ebay.com/itm/FAMICOM-CARD-CLEANER-nintendo-famicom-disk-system-import-fc-jp-/320833634081?pt=Video_Games_Accessories&hash=item4ab32cbf21#ht_500wt_1127

It's not that expensive and even if it doesn't help, it's still a cool collectors item!

Hopefully someone who is more knowledgeable can help out more, all I can say is be patient and make tiny adjustments. Observe the behaviour after each adjustment too, you want the head to move smoothly and progressively and to not be stopping and starting etc.

Good luck, and see if you can take some photos of everything.

[milkmanv1]

I'll shoot some photos up across the weekend.

But for immediate clarification



In that picture the object on the right, (the spindle head) is shown correctly aligned with the set screw side/flat side facing the lift pressure arm to it's left.

In my twin famicom, the spindle head/object circled-right. Is free spinning, even when the little screw is as tight as it goes.

Therefore just about every time I loaded something, the spindle head would be in a new positon.

So im guessing, that's my problem

Any suggestions on how to fix that issue/ Insight on if that's my last issue, considering my speed is pretty much optimal.

[fredJ]

How is it possible to load any disk when the drive head is free spinning? 

I wish I knew what the drive head does, but I don't. 

[milkmanv1]

How is it possible to load any disk when the drive head is free spinning? 

I wish I knew what the drive head does, but I don't. 

Well I mean thats the spindle head...so its not exacltly controlling the entire head, just the part thats spinning the disc... I think.

But yeah, regardless, im not sure how it is loading what it is loading.