Commodore VIC-1541 electronic and mechanical repairs

[@BarnokRetro]

Thanks for the great video! I remember making 10 bucks a pop for aligning drives at user group meetings back in the mid 80s. Two screwdrivers, a floppy and a bottle of fingernail polish with my 64 and monitor was all it took. Making $40 to 50 a month for twiddling drives when you're 15/16 was great.

[@RavenWolfRetroTech]

What a great in depth repair. I was today years old when I learned how to adjust the zero stop!

[@gametimewarp3724]

One of the most informative 1541 repair videos I've seen. The head stop adjustment segment in particular was something I need to do to properly finish aligning a drive sitting on my bench so thank you! If you find the time, I would love to see a video by you using a scope to do the alignment as well. I have seen it detailed in a repair manual or two but seeing you explain it would make things much more clear. I haven't been able to find a single video that details this procedure. Keep up the good work over there man :)

[@kenknight5983]

Didn't know about the 24 pin thing. That's going to save me some time in the future.

[@wimwiddershins]

My old 1541-II was pretty temperamental back in the day. I dug it out of storage a little while ago and had a look inside. One of the ROMs was half out of the socket. Probably could've saved a lot of frustration if I'd known about that, 35 years ago!😂

[@RandomBitzzz]

I've never seen anyone use a feeler gauge on a piece of computer equipment. I figured you'd use something like a playing card or something not as precise. I still have a 1541 that I had drilled a hole in the bottom of to adjust the motor speed... for reasons 🙂 Call me a Maverick, but it was way easier to access the trim pot via the hole rather than taking the drive apart. I had friends that would go on to duplicate this trick.

[@retrotechinsanity]

Great vid! I'm feeling inspired to dig into my pile of 1541s now. All these modern storage solutions we have now have made me lazy.

[@Epictronics1]

dude, are you shaving in between shots? lol. The best 1541 video I have seen so far, well done!

[@TheRetroChannel]

Haha, I might need to, but probably just spread out filming over a couple of days. It's not uncommon to see my shirt change a couple of times in a single video 😅

[@PJBonoVox]

The continuity of facial hair (or lack of) threw me for a loop 🤣

[@ScottyBrockway]

That long board is awesome. Odd I always had better luck with the newtronics drives than the alps ones. The heads are glass coated, you can scrub them pretty hard.

[@RacerX-]

Another great video and excellent repair. This video should be a reference for anyone wanting to align their 1541 without using an expensive analog disk and oscilloscope. Fantastic!. Thank You.

[@steffan-c64]

Thx a lot. Going to check my drives now.

[@Shmbler]

My favorite topic. You managed to get quite a bit if useful repair information into a single video. I noticed you're Alps drives don't seem to make the typical scratchy noise in the hub assembly while the disk is spinning. I can't get mine to stop doing that and I suspect something hasn't been put together correctly in my drive. Perhaps you can teardown/clean this Alps hub assembly some day for us?

[@TheRetroChannel]

Yeah some seem to be noiser than others even after a disassembly and cleanup. There's a lot of individual parts to them so I've added a link to the hub assembly parts in the video description, it may be worth pulling yours apart and checking it's in the right order

[@richardbuckley1761]

Great video, many thanks!

[@spawnterror]

Great video, thank you!

[@Miidolf]

Fascinatingly interesting video, keep'em coming :)

[@RetroKrazy]

Need to look at my drive sometime. Don't even know if it works or if the heads are alive!

[@JustWasted3HoursHere]

Adjusting the alignment seems a bit wonky. I wonder why Commodore didn't include an adjustment screw for that purpose instead of requiring you to loosen the screws and rotating. I guess they figured if it's set at the factory it wouldn't need to be set or adjusted again.

[@JustWasted3HoursHere]

I've always wondered how can ROMs or other chips fail under normal use, considering there are no moving parts, no excessive heat (under normal use) etc.

[@herbmyers805]

I like your probe scope? Did you give a rundown on it?

[@TheRetroChannel]

There's a bit more info on it in the VIC20 repair video from a couple of months back. Otherwise Adrian's Digital Basement has a more through video on the single channel version kzbin.info/www/bejne/i6LVlp9rm7ajgZY

[@fu1r4]

Do you know how many kilos you have on the shelf behind you? Is the shelf screwed to the wall because it looks very heavy at the top with all those monitors ...

[@TheRetroChannel]

There's a lot more weight on the bottom shelves (the ones off camera). They also lean back towards the wall, don't worry they ain't going nowhere

[@elmarschwarz535]

Yeah. Repair hardware. No hardware busting

[@robsantry9772]

What brand and model is your mini oscilloscope?

[@TheRetroChannel]

It's a Zeewei something something. I don't remember the exact model but you can find more details on it in the "tools and kit" link in the video description