On 05/03/2010 14:28, Bill Sudbrink wrote: It looks like you have a good machine :-) The serial and cassette ports are pretty reliable. You might want to tweak the PLL setting for the cassette; it's described in the Tech Manual, but isn't often needed. I found with both of mine, and a variety of cassette recorders, that an attenuator was useful -- that's just a voltage divider made up of two resistors and built in to one of the plugs. Again, there's an example in the Tech Manual. You should be able to remove the keytops easily by pulling them straight up, preferably with a keytop puller. My favoured system is then to drop them in a small bucket with a little floor cleaner (=low foam detergent) in warm water and swish them about a bit; I drain them off and wipe them with a cloth with a very small amount of furniture polish. When I'm feeling lazier, I put them in a pillowcase, give a /short/ spray of polish (while they're still wet), tie up the top, and drop them in the tumble drier on a cool setting (often with other household articles). The keys themselves are of the sprung gold-plated type similar to some DEC VT-series terminals, and they're good quality. A small paintbrush and a vacuum cleaner will remove any debris from around them, and the most you'd want to do with the contacts is blow some canned air in (not too violently) to dislodge any dust. If it wasn't actually hot-melt glue, it was obviously something very similar. -- Pete Peter Turnbull Network Manager University of York

Since the machine is basically working, it shouldn't be too hard to sort out any problems with these interfaces. You have enough oerking to be able to write values ot the interface ports and see what happens... If you remove the keycaps (and IIRC they just pull off), make a diagram before you start. So you don't have to send out the sort of message I sent out once when restoring an HO9185 (the keys on that fall out when you remove the PCB...) -- 'Can somebody please tell be the order of the keys in the first 2 rows of the keybard'. :-) I normally use graph paper for this. I draw the key positions approximsately using either 1cm or 1/2" squares for each normal-size key.. 'Aproximately' means I tesnd offset the rows of the QWERTY section by hald a key width for each row, rather htan the exact ammount. It's clear enough. And then I writei n each 'box' on hthe graph paper the markings on the key. After I've completed the cleaning, I file that sheet in the service manual for the machine for next time I have to do a repair. I can't remember,but the reason I am replying here is that I have an intense distrust of glues. If it were my machine, I would drill small holes and use nuts and bols (M3 over here, I guess 4-40 is about right too) to hold the grilles in place. It may not be originial, but I am not running a museum, I run the machines :-). And I don't want metal objects floating around inside... -tony