trak ball question

[stringfellow]

well I went to use my trak ball today and to my surprise it doesn't work. I took it apart and everything seems to be moving freely. What else could be the problem? I get up and down movement by not left to right. Would a 2600 trak ball work with a masterplay? thanks in advance.

[CRTGAMER]

Take the top off and pull the "cue" ball out of the way. With the trakball plugged in, have care not to short out anything. Try turning each encoder wheel assembly to verify if a game such as Centipede picks both of them up. This will confirm if mechanical (dirty roller) or if there might be an electrical connection issue such as a broken wire inside the controller cable.

 

Usually the problem is the encoder rollers that get caked up with grime.

 

5200 Trakball Maintenance - http://www.racketboy...=726298#p726298

Edited June 8, 2013 by CRTGAMER

[boxpressed]

Are you using the trak ball with a Masterplay? (I do this sometimes to bypass the bad fire buttons.). The 5200 trak ball is very flaky with the Masterplay, I've discovered, sometimes working, sometimes not, even in the middle of a game.

[bohoki]

use an ohm meter with the cable and it taken apart are you not getting any thing? buttons keypad?

 

test the buttons to verify

 

i like galaxian to test buttons as each number is a different level plus start

 

the tracball uses the bottom middle pin make sure its pin isnt broke my 5200 is living on header pins that i shove in the jack when the little pins snap off

[sqoon]

Could be the optical encoder for horizontal movement went bad. Colecovision steering wheel controllers are famous for this and they use similar optical serial encodes for on-screen movement.

[stringfellow]

I am not using it with the masterplay but was wondering if a 2600 trak ball would work with it. I don't think any pins are broken but I'll check I leave an extension permanantly plugged into port 1. When I get a chance I'll clean the rollers and post my results.