Mac Portable back up and running!

[smp]

WHOOO HOOOO !!!

 
My Mac Portable is back and it’s working!  Thank you *very* much to Chuck Phillips at MacCaps.com for the re-cap and fix-it service!
 
After a couple of power-on attempts with sad Macs, I was able to power up with just the main board (not enough memory for System 7.1), then with my 1 Meg RAM board (perfect), and finally with my new 8 Meg RAM board (shows 9,216K).  Those LEDs are a bit bright, aren’t they?
 
I have my new non-Macintosh battery attached in by jumper wires and a fresh 9V backup battery, and all is good.
 
My 40 MB Conner hard disk is still working, and my floppy drive is still working, as well.  My trackball is not working left-to-right, but I dug out a ABD mouse and that works just fine.
 
Thanks again to Chuck at MacCaps.com for all the attention and effort!
 
smp
 


 

 

[just.in.time]

Congrats

 

[khannonnd]

I wonder re: the trackball.  Since it seems the rubber rollers start to go after a bit (causing it to be unable to move the cursor in a given direction very well/at all) -- couldn't someone get a 3d printer to create little plastic rollers to replace them?

 

[just.in.time]

I feel like I have heard people mention that shapeways will do custom parts like that. However, I don't have any experience with them.

 

[smp]

Now that I have my Mac Portable back up and running, and I've satiated myself with playing all the old System 6 and early System 7 games that I have on it, I am thinking about the battery situation again.

I purchased a WP4.5-6 Sealed AGM 6v 4.5ah Battery and I currently have it attached with a couple of alligator clip jumpers.

I am thinking about opening up my old dead Mac Portable battery and wiring the new battery into it.  Does anyone have any tips or tricks to offer before I start hacking?  What's the best way to get the old battery case open?  Should I simply use a band saw and cut along the seams?  Does it matter how I get the old battery case apart?  I figure that I need to salvage the battery contacts that are welded onto the old batteries, and remix them somehow to the inside of the battery case.  Any tips on how to go about doing this?

Thanks very much, in advance, for your advice.

smp

 

[NJRoadfan]

If I recall, I used a blade screw driver to pry the top cover off. Save the metal battery terminals and the plastic insulation sheet. You'll solder on the terminals to your jumper wires, and the plastic sheet holds everything in place on re-assembly. The top cover was reattached with tape.

 

[bibilit]

The battery cover is really easy to lift.

Once removed, the old cells should been discarded but of course keep the battery terminals, solder wires as NJRoadfan said.

I put all together with some drops of epoxy glue.

 

[smp]

OK!  Thanks very much, guys.

A flat blade screwdriver is what I used, based on your advice, and the box came apart pretty easily, with little damage.

Now to salvage the battery terminals and get some spade lugs to tie up to my new battery.

I'll post back with my progress.

smp