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aging floppy issues

J

JDT

Veteran Member
Joined
Feb 17, 2007
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564
Location
Cicero, NY
dangit, my last "working" 360k just konked out on me i think... which means I wont be booting my 5150 till i fix or acquire a new one.

Does anyone here have suggestions for refurbishing the drive? How about just cleaning the drive? I have a few full height IBM barn door's and a single half height...

might it be possible to to replace a 360k with a 1.2 (would an IBM 5150 use the 1.2mb drive as a 360k drive if the 1.2mb disks were formated 360k?) I only ask because I am quickly running out of 360 floppies (and drives for that matter)
 
Cleaning

Cleaning

I'd definitely try cleaning and lubing the rails first. Are all the other drives dead ?
The floppy you used when you decided the drive was 'wonky', did you create that a while ago ? If the cleaning and lubing don't help, it might have drifted out of alignment.
I don't think the 1.2 HD drives are going to work on a 5150 with the stock controller.
patscc
 
http://www.ibm5150pc.com/docs.html

Follow the Hardware Maintenance And Service Manual about the floppy drive, It's step by step. Of courese when it says replace just ingore it, Swap boards ect lube and clean rails, clean heads also!
Full Height Drives only!




JDT said:
dangit, my last "working" 360k just konked out on me i think... which means I wont be booting my 5150 till i fix or acquire a new one.

Does anyone here have suggestions for refurbishing the drive? How about just cleaning the drive? I have a few full height IBM barn door's and a single half height...

might it be possible to to replace a 360k with a 1.2 (would an IBM 5150 use the 1.2mb drive as a 360k drive if the 1.2mb disks were formated 360k?) I only ask because I am quickly running out of 360 floppies (and drives for that matter)
Click to expand...
 
Last edited:
As others have mentioned, most likely the problem is a dirty tead. I've got 5.25" floppy drives that are over 30 years old and they still work fine. A 20-year old youngster should be good for another decade or two.

One of the problems with reading old floppies is that the oxide coating tends to shed and stick on the heads. I suspect your drive didn't pack up after handling a brand-new disk, did it?
 
patscc said:
I don't think the 1.2 HD drives are going to work on a 5150 with the stock controller.
patscc
Click to expand...

We just discussed this the other day. The BIOS (not the controller) in the 5150 doesn't support double-stepping, and without it 1.2M drives can't read 40-track disks.
 
Controller

Controller

Fallo said...he BIOS (not the controller) in the 5150 doesn't support double-stepping
Click to expand...
I probably should have added on my original post that you need a controller with an extension ROM, so your point is well-taken.
patscc
 
Agreed. 'Aging' disks tend to shed a lot of material sometimes, which collects on the heads. Clean & lube, then check back here. (And quit using those old disks unless you have no other choice),

--T
 
When in doubt, clean the heads first with rubbing alcohol and q-tips. You may need to unscrew and lift up the drive's circuit board to access them. Just doing this has successfully revived several "dead" floppy drives for me, especially after attempts to read a damaged floppy disk gunks up the heads and then renders even good disks unreadable.
 
vwestlife said:
When in doubt, clean the heads first with rubbing alcohol and q-tips. You may need to unscrew and lift up the drive's circuit board to access them. Just doing this has successfully revived several "dead" floppy drives for me, especially after attempts to read a damaged floppy disk gunks up the heads and then renders even good disks unreadable.
Click to expand...

Or use alcohol on a cleaning-disk and boot with it. (It won't really boot into anything else than BASIC, but i'll clean the heads). Unformally I only got a cleaning disk for 3.5" drives, so I'm a little interested in one for 5.25" ones.
 
per said:
Or use alcohol on a cleaning-disk and boot with it. (It won't really boot into anything else than BASIC, but i'll clean the heads). Unformally I only got a cleaning disk for 3.5" drives, so I'm a little interested in one for 5.25" ones.
Click to expand...

I've only got two and they're among my most prized possessions, sorry :)

(big time-saver to not have to open the machine, take out the drive, and clean it)
 
vwestlife said:
When in doubt, clean the heads first with rubbing alcohol and q-tips. You may need to unscrew and lift up the drive's circuit board to access them. Just doing this has successfully revived several "dead" floppy drives for me, especially after attempts to read a damaged floppy disk gunks up the heads and then renders even good disks unreadable.
Click to expand...

I still use Freon TF, but on some really stubborn stuff have had to resort to acetone. If you use acetone, keep it off any plastic parts--it's deadly to many plastics.
 
I have a boxed set of Gem with all the programs and manuals. Some years ago when I attempted to read one of the disks, I got a hi-pitched noise. I quickly removed it and didn't try any of the other disks. I was told on classiccmp that it was "disk-rot".
One possible solution I was told was to lubricate the disk with alcohol and quickly try and copy it. I left it alone because all the package files were on Gabi's copy of Tim Olmsteads site. I'm wondering now if storing them for a while with some solution on them might restore the evaporated binding fluid. Has any sort of miracle restorative surfaced in the last decade or so ?

Lawrence

Chuck(G) said:
As others have mentioned, most likely the problem is a dirty tead. I've got 5.25" floppy drives that are over 30 years old and they still work fine. A 20-year old youngster should be good for another decade or two.

One of the problems with reading old floppies is that the oxide coating tends to shed and stick on the heads. I suspect your drive didn't pack up after handling a brand-new disk, did it?
Click to expand...
 
patscc said:
Isn't alcohol typically more of a degreaser than a lubricant ? (Except for synapses)
patscc
Click to expand...

Yes--and I've tried it on some (fortunately unimportant) old Wabash floppies and it wiped the oxide right off--a see thru diskette. I'll admit that Wabash media comes close to being the worst of the worst, but still.

A little dry silicone lube might work better.

Some folks recommend baking the floppies, but perhaps the best is a non-contact solution. They exist, but are very expensive. I've long wondered about adapting a Bernoilli drive...

But to Micom 2000--that squeaky sound was the oxide coming off and gumming up the works. Clean the drive heads and you'll be back to mangling diskettes in no time...
 
The alcohol might clean off some of the loose oxide coating and make the disk "readable" for a while, at least long enough to extract the data off it, without clogging the heads.

I wouldn't recommend "lubricating" the disk surface though, as this will definitely cake the heads up and in a single sided drive will ruin the pressure pad if you accidentally coat the wrong side.


BG
 
Micom 2000 said:
Some years ago when I attempted to read one of the disks, I got a hi-pitched noise. I quickly removed it and didn't try any of the other disks. I was told on classiccmp that it was "disk-rot".
Click to expand...

I have had this too and if I leave it in there, it rubs off onto the head and I have to clean it. The disk is toast.

If there is a way to save a disk that has that high-pitched whine, I'd love to know. I've only lost 12 or so disks, but one of them had info I really wanted to save.
 
Is there a way to test the diskettes before putting them in the drive?
Maybe taking a clean piece of white cloth, and very gently wiping
the diskette surface , and then examining the cloth under a magnifying glass
to see if any particles are 'shedding'. It might be overkill but I recall
hearing some horror stories of bad diskettes really messing up drives.
 
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