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Apple /// restoration

bibilit

Well-known member
The bottom part of the drive (head and moving parts) are more or less the same as the Apple II one.
The board is different, but similar.
So in my opinion belt should be identical, never seen one bad by the way.
 

pball52998

Well-known member
Good to know! They're dirty as all get out.. Clean everything with 91% IPA and see if they spin up? Any preventive maintenance that needs to be done? Or is that really only after seeing if they turn on or not?
 

bibilit

Well-known member
Try spinning the drive by hand, the Apple III seems to have seen a lot of wet environnement.
Clean the head and rails, lubricate lighly those.
Setting speed to 299 rpm will help also.
 

pball52998

Well-known member
Keyboard update and dilemma here..

After pulling all the keycaps and finally looking at the keyboard fully it seems rusted to hell.
keyboard topo.jpg

keyboard close.jpg
I was really hoping it was just dirty.. that doesn't seem to hold true and it is rusty
I’d suggest Evaporust. The stuff works incredibly, and is totally non-toxic.
Could I possibly use some of this on it still?

About to try vinegar and some q tip scrubbing and pray.

I really don't want to have to de-solder all these..clean board/derust it..solder back..
 

LaPorta

Well-known member
Now the only thing that is worrisome in this case is that evaporust (or any other agent, for that matter) doesn't discriminate: if you have rusted traces and/or internal components, it will dissolve that as well. That leaves you a dilemma: you can use the stuff to take off the surface rust only by soaking paper towels in it, applying them to the surface, then wrapping it in plastic wrap tightly for the 24 hours (believe it or not, that's an approved method on the bottle). However, that won't inspect the internals of the key switches, which are also likely rusted/gunked up. I would not say that this is a lost cause at all, but it is a big job.

Someone else might have more suggestions.
 

pball52998

Well-known member
However, that won't inspect the internals of the key switches, which are also likely rusted/gunked up. I would not say that this is a lost cause at all, but it is a big job.
Yeah... Man I knew keyboards were my least favorite part and this makes it worse! lol

If I need to desolder it, I'll start kicking it into high gear and see what I can accomplish. I have it soaking in vinegar paper towels at the moment to see if anything interesting will happen there..

I moved onto the floppies while thats soaking a bit. Man there is some rust in that internal floppy!

floppy 3 internal.jpg

On a positive note, I finished the bottom of the case that holds the logic board.

Before photo is in the second post, kind of a bad comparison.

Corner of it before:
before.jpg
But new shot:
cleaned bottom.jpg

There was rust on several spots on the inside too. But I got those out and sanded down
 

pball52998

Well-known member
Well, keyboard on it's way!

Everything has been desoldered (switch wise, didn't desolder anything else. It was enough to desolder a whole keyset with 2 points per key)

Just a few switches left that are being not so nice. Soaking in wd-40/have the devils sideways leg that I haven't straightened out yet/need to de-solder them because I somehow forgot 5 of them

stuck switches.jpg

The others on the side are about to go into a soak overnight beside the key caps.

Whoever decided to have random switches that decide to have a slant for the leg instead of straight. Not a fan of them.

1668231792329.png

Seriously? One straight one curved? Can someone give me a reason for this besides just to make someone 42 years down the road mad? lol

I am super glad that the single bit of convincing @LaPorta gave me to take all the caps off is working well so far.

Moving slowly (still newerish to soldering) but trying to keep work consistent.

The board below is absolutely disgusting, all the caps got stuck coming out, they're covered in grime, dirt, rust everything in between.

I cannot imagine what troubles I'd either run into on initial power up or even serveral years down the road if I don't go ahead and clean it now.

Can't wait to get the top metal off and get the rust off and clean the bottom board/pcb well

Man this project is moving quick!

More updates and photos to come as I work through keyboard/floppies tomorrow!
 

pball52998

Well-known member
Update on keyboard:

Desoldered everything, check continuity to make sure I didn't screw up and of the pad removing those devil crooked legs.

They were pretty stuck to the pads and lifted a little on 2 of them. But once removed pads fell back down and are not moving anymore. Checked to make sure though and we're good!

This one last switch was the bane of my existence. Soaked in wd-40 all night, cleaned board, de-soldered the rest of the items I forgot (whoops).

Then had to let it soak again in wd-40. But it's off!

last one gone.jpg

This is the pcb:
1668270060990.png
About to get a bath at the moment.

After bath:
clean!.jpg

Drying with keycaps and switches while other switches get their bath after being pulled off this morning

I picked up some rust remover from home depot this morning and about to soak some of the parts from the floppy along with the metal frame of the keyboard.

Will post back later with before / after photos!
 
Last edited:

waynestewart

Well-known member
I had some broken key switches on a couple of Apple IIIs but was able to use key switches from a damaged Mac 128 keyboard
 

pball52998

Well-known member
Before I solder everything back to the keyboard.. Does anyone know what specifically the red part on the bottom of the switches near the connectors is?

Is it important? Needed for anyhting electrical wise? Or just for looks?

Unfortunately I didn't get very far with the floppies today.

I'm considering not taking them entirely down to bare metal (taking out motors and everything..) and just cleaning them as much as possible while keeping all the wires in there. Then testing them to see if they really need further breakdown or not.

Pic of switches in question:
red vs broken.jpg

Thanks!

PSU to be here Tuesday! 🍾

It'll be the moment of truth. and show how much work I still have to do to get the damn thing back together. My house looks like it exploded of apple /// parts!
 

LaPorta

Well-known member
Looks to me like plastic, urethane, or some sort of non-conductive filler put in there after the leads were placed...but that is just a guess on my part.
 

AwkwardPotato

Well-known member
Red part could be an indicator of switch weighting (i.e. heavier force required to activate the spacebar) but ISTR that the arrow keys on these systems have two actions, in other words pressing the key harder makes the cursor move faster? If so, the red stuff may signify that.
 

pball52998

Well-known member
Looks to me like plastic, urethane, or some sort of non-conductive filler
I thought the same thing, it crumbled off when pulling some of the caps. Others just disintegrated in water

Others stayed perfectly intact.

I have the keyboard top soaking in a rust removal I found (couldn't find the one you recommended at any of my local hardware stores @LaPorta )

Using Blaster metal rescue. Have some screws, floppy drive cover and keyboard soaking in it since midday and will leave it till tomorrow morning.

What stopped me more from moving forward with floppies is I can't get one entirely back together because parts are in the rust removal trying it out..

Thank you two for the quick response!
 

Byrd

Well-known member
Enjoying the thread. How many keys have the red marks? If a handful you'd presume they are for the high traffic keys?
 

pball52998

Well-known member
Enjoying the thread. How many keys have the red marks? If a handful you'd presume they are for the high traffic keys?
10 and a half are non red/blank. Half being one that's still half on there from where it disintegrated when pulling it off.

I'll be putting all non red (missing red or never came with it..?) on the number pad since that would be the least used thing for me on the board.

We'll find out if they're important this upcoming week I guess!
 

bibilit

Well-known member
Before soldering back the keys, test each and everyone for a continuity test with a multimeter, better safe than sorry once done.
 

pball52998

Well-known member
test each and everyone for a continuity test with a multimeter
Great idea on that. Didn't cross my mind for some reason.

Update on rust removal:

keyboard front.jpg
keyboard back.jpg

Keyboard front and back turned out rust free! In the solution for about ~22 hours. One of the parts in the floppy came out clean as a whistle. The other still looks like when I put it in there...(Post #26 photo one is that part) I'll let that one soak for another day and focus on keyboard more than likely today.

Opinions on leaving it as is with paint splotched? Or re-painting it?

I'm a terrible painter with terrible luck with paint so take that as you will..
 

joshc

Well-known member
I think you should repaint it, you’ve gone this far… spray a primer and matt black paint on there and it should look good.
 
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