Eject mechanism on 128k

[Strimkind]

I have a 128k and it boots fine to a sad mac however the floppy is stuck in it (its the original startup disk). I have tried a pin however it is not coming out. I was thinking of taking a good floppy drive from a 512k and placing it into the 128k. Is that possible? Or would it take just a little grease to fix the eject mechanism?

Also, the external drive I have for it is set to down (like a disk is in). Is that normal when it is off?

 

[LCGuy]

The standard 512k (not 512ke) uses the exact same 400k floppy drive as the 128k, and therefore drives are interchangable between both units. Personally, I'd probably take the drive out and have a bit of a better look at it...it might be a good idea to check that all the springs are in good condition. (I have had the springs go a bit limp on a couple of my drives)

 

[Strimkind]

I was thinking of doing that however I have never opened a compact mac before.

I hope to get it fully functional and either ebay it or sell it here as a set or part it out. Its unfortunate but I have some bills to pay =/

 

[Mac128]

I was thinking of doing that however I have never opened a compact mac before.

None of the symptoms you describe are normal. Search the forum for cracking your Mac as it has been discussed ad infinitum, every method possible. The external drive is much easier to open and as such is self-explanatory. As for cleaning your drives, there is likewise a lot of advice floating around this forum though not necessarily all in one place. Here is a good resource online: http://chrislawson.net/writing/macdaniel/2k0314.shtml

 

[Strimkind]

Great! I shall do that when I have a few minutes this weekend.

I hope I can get it up and running and the original floppy disk out of the drive. So much to do so little time.

 

[shred]

The old 400k drives are notorious for having the grease gum up the eject mechanism. Usually if/when this happens, you'll find that applying constant pressure with the paper clip will result in the eject mechanism slowly releasing the disk.

Whether the disk can be removed this way or not, the drives are not particularly difficult to remove from the computer. If it is gummed up with grease, get the disk out, take the drive outside and liberally spray the eject mechanism with contact cleaner until you've washed the grease out. The drive should then be "all good". It's probably not a bad idea to use some light grease on the various sliders and things, although in the day, the recommended fix was to leave the drive "un-greased".