Battlezone (repair rant!)

Is it just me or is Battlezone a pain in the ass to keep running? Maybe
it's because all three of mine cost a grand total of about $200, but still--
they're tempermental!

I'm been trying to get one machine (the "nice" one) ready to bring into
work:

1) Power on. Spot killer on. No signs of life. Reseat all connectors and
try again-- self-test comes up with Mathbox Timeout error. (It's 9PM-- no
problem! I'll be blowing up tanks in 20 minutes!)

2) Removed PCB's. Edge connectors are grimy/scorched. Looks like someone
sanded them down with a rock. Lots of bad solder joints on the board to
board connectors. I sand down edge connectors with fine-grit sandpaper and
re-tin them. Desoldered board to board connectors and re-soldered them.
Replace boards. Fire up, runs fine! ...for about a minute, then dies.
Spot killer on. (Ok, it's only 10PM, be fixed in a couple minutes!)

3) Check voltages. +3.6V on the +5V rail. Power down. Test a few minutes
later. +5V present, runs a few minutes, then drops to +3.6V. Shotgun debug
power supply with a spare. (Take *that*, game gremlins!) Game fires up and
works. ...until the monitor image "blooms" to about 2x size. (Hmmmmm.
10:30PM. The dog is giving me the "aren't you done *yet*" look.)

4) Remove monitor HV supply. Suspect D904 failure. Open D904 "holders".
Totally rusted out. One end of D904 lead falls off from corrosion.
Craaaaaaaap. Take Dremmel to D904 and cut back package to reveal clean
metal. Cut off old "holders" and directly solder D904 in place. Pot in
silicone. Resolder all other connections on board. Reassemble and replace
in monitor. Fire it up. Works exactly as before. (11:45PM. The Dog's
giving me that "you suck" look...)

5) Replace monitor HV supply with a spare while waiting for new D904
replacment. Almost get killed taking spare monitor off shelf. (Note to
self: you can't hold a G05-802 at arms-length with one arm.) Fire up game.
Bottom half of display missing. !@#$!@#$!! Drag scope over and check X and
Y outputs-- whole image present at PCB, must be the deflection section of
the monitor. *sigh* (Sometime after midnight-- The dog left to go to her
kennel an hour ago. Bag it... try again tomorrow!)

About the only thing that's gone right has been installing Tom's repro
centering bellows which seem to be working quite nicely. Of course it's a
little dull without the damn game running! ;-)

Anyway, just had to rant a little there. Another day in the life of
collecting 20 year old electronics...

-Clay
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Received on Tue Oct 3 20:09:32 2000