RL02 Question

[Aaron Jackson]

> On 03/26/2018 04:08 PM, Aaron Jackson via cctalk wrote:
>>>> So, from what I can see, the drive should spin up correctly, but for
>>>> some reason it goes into fault mode. I am right in thinking that upon
>>>> load, the heads should continue moving forward until the first track is
>>>> found, right? I should not have to perform a seek manually from the PDP?
>>>> If this is not the case, perhaps there is something else wrong.
>>> I’m not an RL02 hardware expert at all, just a daily user back in the
>>> day. I’m reading this assuming that at all times the drive is
>>> correctly hooked up to an RLV12 in a running PDP with the correct
>>> cable and termination present on the drive? If it isn’t you’ll get a
>>> fault condition instead of ready after spin up.
>>>
>>> A
>> No worries, your input has been valuable, so thank you.
>>
>> For anyone else who might have an idea:
> ON fault the heads are retracted and will not load till cleared.
> Least mine behaves that way.
>
> Most common problems are wrong drive address, cable issues, no terminator.
> Others include head lock not removed or the auto unlock style of
> headlock has
> the tab broken.
>
>> It seems to be hooked up correctly. When it is in the weird flashing
>> ready state, the boot loader says "Read error" or "Device error"
>> randomly. The heads oscillate back and forth very slightly as if it is
>> trying to align itself better on the first track, which doesn't exist
>> because it hasn't moved far enough into the pack.
> IF in fault its resetting to retracted on every try.
> If not something else is wrong.
>
>> I'm beginning to think the heads are bad which will be far too expensive
>> so I may end up giving up.
>
> Heads are not that expensive... However you could have a wrong pack
> or one that has been erased and has no servo tracks. You must start with
> a known good pack and cleaned heads.
>
>
> Allison

Thanks for the suggestions, Allison.

Given that the pack was tested before it was shipped, I am beginning to
come to the conclusion that the heads are bad. I can see the servo burst
data if I push the heads on a few mm further into pack, but perhaps the
heads produce noise which confuse the logic upon load.

Heads are more expensive than what I'd like, from what I have seen on
eBay.

I believe I have a "working" (i.e. non-crashing) down head (as in the
one on top). If this is head 0 (anyone know?) then I might have a chance
of getting it working without spending anymore money. Let's see.

Thanks again,
Aaron.