Motherboard cleaning - CBM 4016

[Atomtan]

Folks

I am a newbie to the board. I owned this machine from new, and being in my mid 40's decided to get it (and a few other classics I have accumulated in the last few years) up and running and remember fondly the 6502 era.

Unfortunately for some years in the late 80's it lived on a carpeted floor and most of the back 1/2 of the motherboard is covered in a 2mm thick layer of what looks like dust and carpet fibres combined. The machine itself is excellent and runs well but I have never before 'lifted the hood' to see the extent of the dust inside, until now.

I have restored an Apple II+ recently, but its ICs are socketed and I felt safer cleaning that board as I knew it was easier to replace chips that were broken.

I tried an air duster on one area of the CBM, and it did not move the residue. I used a Q tip and some ispropyl alcohol on the top of a couple of I/Cs and it removed the dust/fibres. I guess this means that I could carefully clean the board with a lint free cloth and alcohol. Assuming I am careful, do you guys recommend doing this or am I likely to cause issues?

Any tips of what I should do, or not do. I am not sure whether to leave it as it is, but it bugs me to see the inside in such a mess.

Many thanks.

 

[dabone]

I use a paint brush to clean boards, or if it's caked on, wash it in the sink and/or dishwasher, but don't use the drying cycle of the dishwasher, I use the oven on a cookie sheet set to warm (around 200) to dry the board. After that give it a while to completely dry before powering it back on.

Later,
dabone

 

[azog]

I've stuck mine under running warm tap water, no detergents or anything, and used a fingernail brush (not-quite stiff bristles). It was the deep slop sink in my basement, with a sprayer head, and the sink is plastic, so I didn't have much concern about conductivity. After that, I used several cans of compressed air to dry off as much as possible, paying attention to nooks and crannies. The cans of air tend to freeze up after a few seconds, so I had several on hand to switch when one froze. Then stuck it vertically under a 100 watt lightbulb with the lightbulb pointing at the component side. I forget, but I think I had used two desklamps, since the board are was rather large.

 

[MikeS]

I blow off the main dust with a vacuum cleaner exhaust or compressed air and clean with a toothbrush and dish soap or a spray cleanser like Fantastik or Formula 409, depending on how greasy it is; rinse under warm water, optional final rinse with distilled water, drain, blow off standing water and dry with a small heater fan.

Never lost one yet, and some were pretty filthy from factory environments; afterwards I usually treat any socketed ICs and connectors with Stabilant 22, although I think there are cheaper equivalents out there.

 

[billdeg]

wow an original 4016 owner.

 

[Atomtan]

Yep, one owner from new. Sad thing is that it was so damned expensive back in the day, I could only dream of a disk drive and 32k........Trouble is, I started looking for a disk drive on ebay recently and realise they are still so damned expensive. I view the CBM as the Saab 9000 of the original computer world, not the pretiest, but built to last (and not suffer the dreaded case yellowing of so much technology of the time).

Many thanks for the replies, there was me lucking stupid cleaning gingerly around chips with alcohol, an antistatic wrist band and constant fear of damage and you guys get the board in the sink with water and a brush!. I never fail to be amazed by what I learn!

 

[MikeS]

Just make sure you rinse well and it's completely dry (especially under the ICs etc.) before powering it up again.

They were expensive all right; I paid close to $800 for my blue bezel 8K chiclet 2001 when it was new, and around $2500 each for my 8032 and 8050... the VIC20s were $49.00 and the C64 was $99.95, but they'd been around for a while when I bought them.

Yeah, unless you're lucky disk IEEE drives are fairly rare and relatively expensive, but if you're interested in using as opposed to collecting there are now some pretty good (and cheap) SD card replacements and emulators out there.

 

[dhoelzer]

I'm sure I'm going to get yelled at for this one, but I typically will remove everything socketed and then run it through a rinse cycle or two in the dish washer. It is absolutely critical that you make sure to turn off the "Heated Dryer" or you're in for trouble. Also, absolutely no dishwasher soap.

Especially when the board has a caked on coating of dried and crystallized mouse urine, this works fantastic.

After washing I typically allow it to air dry for several days. Just in case you're thinking of air drying it out of doors, make sure that any eproms have covered windows or you could create additional issues for yourself.

 

[Dave Farquhar]

I'm sure I'm going to get yelled at for this one, but I typically will remove everything socketed and then run it through a rinse cycle or two in the dish washer. It is absolutely critical that you make sure to turn off the "Heated Dryer" or you're in for trouble. Also, absolutely no dishwasher soap.

I don't think you'll get yelled at. Cleaning boards that way won't hurt anything. I've put entire, completely assembled IBM Model M keyboards through that same routine. Though removing socketed chips is a reasonable precaution.

 

[MikeS]

I don't think you'll get yelled at. Cleaning boards that way won't hurt anything. I've put entire, completely assembled IBM Model M keyboards through that same routine. Though removing socketed chips is a reasonable precaution.

Fairly standard procedure for some folks; in fact, dabone had already suggested it in the first reply.