Commodore Loadstar 81 Posted September 27, 2013 Share Posted September 27, 2013 (edited) This my first post to Atari Age. I'm a longtime retro gamer (all vintage systems and computers, not just Atari), but I've only very recently gotten away from emulation and seriously into collecting genuine hardware again. Anyway... I acquired my first 5200 console a few weeks ago, and the joysticks were predictably horrible (badly tarnished Revision 7 flex circuits inside). I've replaced the circuits with Revision 9's and painted the contacts under the buttons with silver conductive paint, so now they at least work, but I'm not hopeful that they'll continue to work for all that long. Thus began the hunt for some Wico Command Controls. Just today, I've won an ebay auction for two joysticks and one y-cable. (I know that the Wico keypads are super-rare, so I'm pretty much stuck using the first-party Atari joysticks and their horrible keypads for the time being. At least until I get a Trak Ball, but I don't really have any games that need one yet, so that's waiting on the back-burner.) Of course, if I want to play any two-player games, I'm going to need another y-cable. So, I've come here to ask: with ebay and Amazon turning up bupkis, is there anywhere else online to look for a Wico joystick y-cable? Or am I stuck having to make one myself (which I could only do if I had instructions in English rather than Engineerese, since I can't read a circuit diagram to save my life)? Edited September 27, 2013 by Commodore Loadstar 81 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ReflectionAngle Posted September 27, 2013 Share Posted September 27, 2013 Congratulations! I was watching that auction, and it looks like you got a good price. I just bought a Wico contoller the other day, and was wondering how high two might go I have seen y-cables appear on ebay from time to time, but I couldn't help out with price or frequency. Up until recently, I thought my Best Electonics rebuilt joystick would be fine. However, one too many times of forgetting to re-center has got me down, so I thought I'd try one of the alternatives. Good luck with the new joysticks! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bohoki Posted September 27, 2013 Share Posted September 27, 2013 its not too hard to make your own just remember the top row is the keypad the bottom is the fire and directions so knowing that you just need to match the wico's 9 pin to the bottom of the 15 pin only 6 wires are used 3 are the buttons and button ground the other 3 are the x and y directions and the common the main problem is getting a female 15 pin to stick into the system that will stay put i cut off the metal shield and then use a soldering iron to fuse the end pieces Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
imstarryeyed Posted September 28, 2013 Share Posted September 28, 2013 An Easy Wico Atari 5200 Repair Tip for you all!! Just and FYI to all of you Wico Joystick owners. I was having problems, like most, of the POT going out and seeing as getting a replacement pot is very hard I decided to clean mine. My UP / Down POT was going out so what I did was get some Puretronics Contact cleaner and pryed open the pot a little on the bottom and sprayed it in. The Pot doesn't open but I was able to open up a crack just enough to spray it really good with the straw that comes with the contact cleaner. After a few twists I reassembled the controller and it worked perfectly. I now have a functioning Wico 5200 controller. So if any of you all are having problems with your Wico you may want to try that out. I know a lot of people have had problems with the same thing so I hope this helps you all out. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+grips03 Posted September 30, 2013 Share Posted September 30, 2013 Congratulations! I was watching that auction, and it looks like you got a good price. I just bought a Wico contoller the other day, and was wondering how high two might go I have seen y-cables appear on ebay from time to time, but I couldn't help out with price or frequency. Up until recently, I thought my Best Electonics rebuilt joystick would be fine. However, one too many times of forgetting to re-center has got me down, so I thought I'd try one of the alternatives. Good luck with the new joysticks! How does one recenter the joystick? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Seethransom Posted October 1, 2013 Share Posted October 1, 2013 How does one recenter the joystick? Missile Command can help you find center. Also, if you can climb up and down in the pitfall ladder. If u have Pete's diagnostics, aim for the middle. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Seethransom Posted October 1, 2013 Share Posted October 1, 2013 (edited) This my first post to Atari Age. I'm a longtime retro gamer (all vintage systems and computers, not just Atari), but I've only very recently gotten away from emulation and seriously into collecting genuine hardware again. I'm going to need another. Save a search for eBay. I found one for ten bucks. Also, try the chat room, and market place here. Edited October 1, 2013 by Seethransom Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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