12 Jun
2006
12 Jun
'06
9:54 p.m.
-------------------Original Message:
From: Pete Turnbull <pete at dunnington.plus.com>
Subject: Re: atari printers - gears
On Jun 12 2006, 1:30, Philip Pemberton wrote:
<snip>
I'd be tempted to file a flat section on the shaft
and add
a matching flat to
the gear, or use a small screw to fix it. I'm not
sure
what the lifetime of
Loctite is, but I wouldn't want to be pulling a
plotter
apart a few years down
the line just to put some more glue on a gear...
From memory, the gear is too small to make that
practical,
even an M2
would be far too big.
<snip>
--
Pete
----------------Reply:
Indeed; the gears in question are only about 5mm (1/8") dia.
with 12
(13?) teeth. As Tony explained, as the plastic ages they
split due to
the stress of being pressed onto the motor shaft.
Although my CGP-115 was working fine when last used several
years
ago, when I dug it out recently I found that both gears had
split in
the meantime. I reamed out the centre hole a little with a
1/64"
drill to relieve the stress, put a tiny drop of superglue on
the
inside of the split and put it back on the shaft with a
gentle clamp
(to avoid deforming the fairly soft teeth). Let it dry,
carefully
scraped a bit of excess glue from between the teeth at the
split, and
so far it's survived several feet of test printing in text
mode
(which stresses the gears much more than line drawing).
What I was testing was re-inked pens. I suspect that some of
the
people who made suggestions re the pens have not seen one of
those
either; they are small ball-point pens, 24 x 5 mm (1" x
1/8") with
a very fine point (for printing 6pt characters, 80 cols on
4" paper).
There are two types, a plastic tip and a metal tip in a
plastic
sleeve. The tips are easily removed; the absorbent insert
inside the
body can also usually be removed, although that's not
necessary.
After a thorough soaking and drying they can be refilled and
reassembled; briefly put them in hot water to force ink out
the tip
to get it started, and that's it (unless it was too solidly
clogged
or corroded).
Since they have to fit into a small 4-pen carousel, the
shape and
size is pretty critical so they can't be replaced with any
generic
pens. It might be possible to replace the metal tip with a
cut-off
ballpoint refill, although a normal refill might not work
very well
since the pens are mounted horizontally.
YMMV,
mike
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