Joystick's range of movement seems "hung-up"

[candiru]

Well my 5200 came in last night. I am very impressed! After the 2600 I think this is going to be my favorite Atari system. I was lucky enough that one of the 6 controllers I've accumulated over the years actually worked well enough to enjoy a few games before I set about tearing any apart and rebuilding.

 

Here's my issue. The controller with the smoothest most precise joystick feel seems to be hung-up somehow. Left, right, and up, are perfect. Down works fine to a point, but physically stops before it gets to the bottom of its range. When I push down as far as possible, I can see that it's not able to go as far as it should. It simply has less travel. This is limiting the onscreen action too. For example in Missile Command, I can't move the cursor down to right above my cities.

 

I've had it apart and back together multiple times. I can't see where anything is binding. The pots inside seem like they're still anchored firmly.

 

Anybody else ever run into something like this on a 5200 controller?

[MrRetroGamer]

Well my 5200 came in last night. I am very impressed! After the 2600 I think this is going to be my favorite Atari system. I was lucky enough that one of the 6 controllers I've accumulated over the years actually worked well enough to enjoy a few games before I set about tearing any apart and rebuilding.

 

Here's my issue. The controller with the smoothest most precise joystick feel seems to be hung-up somehow. Left, right, and up, are perfect. Down works fine to a point, but physically stops before it gets to the bottom of its range. When I push down as far as possible, I can see that it's not able to go as far as it should. It simply has less travel. This is limiting the onscreen action too. For example in Missile Command, I can't move the cursor down to right above my cities.

 

I've had it apart and back together multiple times. I can't see where anything is binding. The pots inside seem like they're still anchored firmly.

 

Anybody else ever run into something like this on a 5200 controller?

 

Probably hitting the pins on the bottom most pot - try bending them back toward the bottom of the controller, out of the way. Either that, or one of the white pot arms are bent upward a bit and binding on the slider blocks - if that is the case the arm should be replaced.

[candiru]

That sounds logical. I'll check it out. Thanks for the tip!

[candiru]

...one of the white pot arms are bent upward a bit and binding on the slider blocks - if that is the case the arm should be replaced.

 

That was exactly it! I hadn't noticed, but the bottom arm has a very slight curve upward. Luckily I was able to just swap the top and bottom arms since the the top slider block has more clearance.

 

Thanks MrRetroGamer!

[MrRetroGamer]

...one of the white pot arms are bent upward a bit and binding on the slider blocks - if that is the case the arm should be replaced.

 

That was exactly it! I hadn't noticed, but the bottom arm has a very slight curve upward. Luckily I was able to just swap the top and bottom arms since the the top slider block has more clearance.

 

Thanks MrRetroGamer!

 

Glad to help out! I've worked on a couple of joysticks in my day, happy to share the knowledge.

[lowscore]

I have encountered exactly the same problem with range of stick movement and when I opened it up, I found the bottom pot actually came unglued and was tipping, which interfered with the block. I used a piece of heavy duty double sided tape (presumably for carpet laying) to affix the pot securely and the problem was solved.