Dirty Floppy Disks

[Urchlay]

So I've been going through my old collection of floppies... surprisingly, 2/3 or more of them seem to work just fine, even after years in the attic.

 

A few of them have visible crud on the disk surface (not the jacket, the actual media). I've been avoiding even putting those in my drive until I can come up with a way to clean them...

 

What's good to use for this? I cleaned the drive heads and other bits with 91% isopropyl alcohol, and I've been spraying the dust off the disk jackets with compressed air (which has no effect on the disk crud I'm talking about). I also have Goo Gone (the stuff that's made of citrus, not Goof Off that will melt plastic).

 

Apparently I put one of these disks in my drive this morning and it crudded up the head, because it quit working again (am about to take apart and clean again).

 

Out of my whole collection, it looks there are 10 or so disks full of old code and such that won't be replaceable from any of the archive sites. Once I get my SIO2PC and can copy these to a modern storage medium, the drive and disks can go back in storage (air conditioned closet this time!)

[dinosaur]

As a last resort,cut open the disk sleeve and place the plastic media between

 

two wet paper towels for a little while,to soften up the crud,

 

After wiping the media off with a warm damp soft cloth,let the media dry and

 

put it back in a new clean disk sleeve.

 

I have gotten lucky with old,dirty disks,using this method.

 

Good luck!

[Urchlay]

As a last resort,cut open the disk sleeve and place the plastic media between

two wet paper towels for a little while,to soften up the crud,

After wiping the media off with a warm damp soft cloth,let the media dry and

put it back in a new clean disk sleeve.

 

Might try this if all else fails, but no point in doing it until the SIO2PC gets here. After I've done that to a disk, I'd expect to be able to read it once, then throw it out.

 

In theory I could copy it to another disk, but all the 5 1/4" disks I own are going to be in the same terrible shape.

 

Someone just told me not to blow compressed air on floppies... says the propellant is benzene-based, and will dry out the media. Anyone have any idea if this is true? (I was using a can of air until I ran out... not that it helped much)

[Rybags]

Why would compressed air need a propellant?

 

It's main use is on delicate electronics components and boards, so I doubt they would put any nasties into it.

[ijor]

A few of them have visible crud on the disk surface (not the jacket, the actual media)...

I cleaned the drive heads and other bits with 91% isopropyl alcohol, and I've been spraying the dust off the disk jackets with compressed air...

 

isopropyl alcohol is also the best for cleaning the actual disk surface. Sometimes just a few drops before inserting the disk in the drive is enough. In your case you might need to swab the disk surface with q-tips. Use a motion perpendicular to the disk rotation, ideally pushing the foreign material towards the hub ring of the disk.

 

Some people use plain water, sometimes with some type of detergent. But then you obviously need to dry the disk well.

 

That's the big plus of isopropyl alcohol. Not only that you can insert the disk when the surface is not dry yet. In some cases you actually need to do that, because it helps as a lubricating.

 

As already mentioned here, in extreme cases you need to remove the media from the sleeve.

[Rybags]

I'd not recommend Isopropyl Alcohol, it would probably rip the oxide coating from the disk.

 

Taking the disk out of the jacket then just using water + gentle detergent would probably be the best way.

[ijor]

I'd not recommend Isopropyl Alcohol, it would probably rip the oxide coating from the disk.

 

On which basis are you making that assertion? It doesn't. Isopropyl Alcohol is used regularly to clean all sort of magnetic media, including floppy data recovery applications. You can dip the whole disk in isopropyl alcohol if you want and it won't provoke any damage.

[Urchlay]

Why would compressed air need a propellant?

 

It's main use is on delicate electronics components and boards, so I doubt they would put any nasties into it.

 

I dunno. This stuff is called "Dust Off", and it bears the "deliberate misuse by inhaling contents can be fatal" warning, so presumably there's something in there other than plain old air.

 

In fact, now that I actually read the label, nowhere on the can does it say "compressed air". It doesn't actually say *what* is in there, but it does say it's highly flammable. I've been calling it "compressed air", but maybe it's really butane or something.

 

I don't know about Dust Off, but I used to know a guy who liked to get high inhaling something called Dust Gun... and anything else he could get his hands on, including the acetylene from an oxyacetylene torch (kids, don't try this at home). He is (sadly but predictably) dead as a doornail now.