5200 Joystick port(s) not working

[Ed Salisbury]

So, I got 3x 4-ports a while back, 1 power supply, and a bunch of games and joysticks. When I went to hook one of them up, I found out about needing the switchbox. Ugh. So, after looking around, I decided to try Mitch's power mod - took a little while, but it worked perfectly! (Thanks Mitch!) The issue I'm running into now is the fact that none of the joysticks seem to work. After trying several of them, I've determined that it must be the system. Looking at the resistors around the connectors, those all seem fine. Any ideas what the issue could be, and where to start looking? I'm planning on doing the power mod on the other 2 machines so I'll have more things to check, but thought I'd ask (after searching and not finding anything) Thanks for any insight anyone can give me.

 

- Ed

[OldAtarian]

So, I got 3x 4-ports a while back, 1 power supply, and a bunch of games and joysticks. When I went to hook one of them up, I found out about needing the switchbox. Ugh. So, after looking around, I decided to try Mitch's power mod - took a little while, but it worked perfectly! (Thanks Mitch!) The issue I'm running into now is the fact that none of the joysticks seem to work. After trying several of them, I've determined that it must be the system. Looking at the resistors around the connectors, those all seem fine. Any ideas what the issue could be, and where to start looking? I'm planning on doing the power mod on the other 2 machines so I'll have more things to check, but thought I'd ask (after searching and not finding anything) Thanks for any insight anyone can give me.

 

- Ed

 

It's not the system, it's the joysticks. I have 7 of them and only two even partially work. Most of the 5200 sticks that are out there now need rebuilding. Anyone who has working ones wants a lot more for them than you would pay for most of the 5200 packages on ebay.

[bohoki]

what do you mean by not working

 

often the start button is the first thing to go on joysticks since its the one thing you need to actually do anything

 

if you have mr do's castle or robotron you can start the game just by pressing fire at least you have a better chance on one of the buttons on the 2 sides working

 

otherwise if you take off the top row clip and buttons sometimes you can get it to go with a paperclip unless one of the printed traces is cracked

[Ed Salisbury]

Not working as in Start not working (as in I can't test anything else without that) - I didn't think that it would really be 5-6 of them dying. I'll try the paperclip method. I'll have to see if I have either of those games to test.

 

Thanks for the ideas guys!

[Ed Salisbury]

So, after rebuilding one of the joysticks (I actually had planned ahead and had some flex circuits on hand - it looks like everything is working fine, all things considered. Man, I knew the controllers were bad, but I had no idea that they were this bad Thanks again for the help guys!

[bohoki]

So, after rebuilding one of the joysticks (I actually had planned ahead and had some flex circuits on hand - it looks like everything is working fine, all things considered. Man, I knew the controllers were bad, but I had no idea that they were this bad Thanks again for the help guys!

 

if you send me a self addressed stamped envelope i will send you prepunched self adheasive aluminum dots enough to fix the carbon dots of every controller you have