Fixing The Twin Famicom(Twin Fami...Oh F*ck)

[JohnnyBlaze]

I promised that I would tell my story on fixing a Twin Famicom from a few years back, since I found my old blog entry. It was LOOOONG, so here's the cliff notes straight from the blog itself:

(UPS) showed up and we got our item.

With Bunny, Jackie, and Scarlett present, I ripped it open like a kid on Christmas morning. The box was perfect! Not a flaw on it except for some shelf wear. I was lucky! This was hardly ever used!

We unpack it and set it up. Bunny was so scared about putting the plug in, I thought she was going to piss herself. She didn't want to be the one to blow the system(the AC is different: 100v to our 120v). After reminding her that it would work, she put in in.

Everything was set up. We popped in Galaxian and....white screen. FUCK! Scarlett decided to clean the cart(we use a Q-tip and a little..LITTLE rubbing alcohol). You should've seen the black shit on the cart. Anyways, we pop it back in and it works! You see, kids. Even in Japan they have to blow on or clean the carts. Everyone seems to think that just because the Japanese never had a toaster NES, their shit is somehow immune to the blowing trick. WRONG, FUCKER!

Here's where it all started:

We cut the bullshit and get down to business. Why did me and Bunny(mostly me) want a Twin Famicom? Why, to play Famicom disks of course!

She takes Zelda out and pops it in the drive(which still came with the cardboard protection thingy. NICE!). We get the "Now Loading" screen and....it hangs. We remember seeing a YouTube video where it took a couple of minutes to load a game, so we let it sit. But, we ate our lunch, came back, and lo and behold, the fucking thing was stuck. You could hear the motor moving, but nothing was loading. For the hell of it, we try Mario 2. Same thing.

Now, we know something is really wrong. So, we contact the seller and let him know of our predicament. He says that he has a spare belt and if we need it, he will ship it for nothing. It's nice to know that there are still HONEST sellers on eBay.

But, anyways, we find out that it is indeed, a problem with the drive belt. This problem is common, so we didn't sweat it as much.

After getting some info on this(all we saw was for the standalone FDS), we decide to send the unit to the surgery ward(the lab).

But, we opened the thing up, which was a little pain in the ass, but not as much as Luis' Xbox. We had all the proper tools, it's just that you didn't need the exact screwdriver, you needed a little BIGGER to open it initially. Looks like NO replacement went down as the screws were tight, like a machine did them.

What's weirder is that the screws were LONG. So, we didn't know that they were completely unscrewed until Margot flipped the unit over and the screws came out(she became more than a bystander at this point).

We take the top off the unit and it appears FLAWLESS! Hardly, if any, dust at all! This is a sure sign it's hardly been used, as most of these on eBay without the box are dusty and it's caked in when you open it(as I saw from a few pictures when looking for info on repair).

We look to find that all this thing is are the boards from the Famicom and FDS together in a custom shell. What this means is that if one breaks, you can buy another and replace it no problem. Say if the FDS side is cooked, you can buy a new FDS, open it up, and put the board in your Twin Fami.

We take a look at the drive. It's held in place by four screws, three of which in prime placement for loss. I could unscrew it and the screws would probably fall into the unit as I go to retrieve them.
Margot told me to hold on, went into her purse, and grabbed a pair of tweezers. It looked stupid. I asked her what the hell that was for and she told me to watch.

She unscrewed the first once just enough to get it out and then took the tweezers and grabbed the screw. It came out without incident and didn't fall into the unit. I was surprised at how well this worked out, especially with the one by the reset button(it's packed pretty tight in there).

I mumbled an apology and realized that just because someone says "Watch this", doesn't mean it's always a bad thing. Also, that sometimes the weirdest idea and the one you would never think of, would turn out to be the solution.

We remove the drive and undo the bottom. That's right. You have to work on the bottom of the unit. This unit is no bigger than a CD case, but a tad narrower. This one screw was a bitch, until we realized that we didn't have to worry about that screw. That was one of the screws for the drive controller. We remove the cover and we were stunned, as the video clearly showed you.

It was a belt issue after all. But, the belt was MELTED. What's even more funny, is that this is a common problem. Either the belt gets snapped or melts. We took the residue off the smaller head(the gold one). But, when we looked at the bigger head, we were in deep shit. It wouldn't come off as easily. The bigger head was plastic(of course), so melted rubber would stick.

On the video, you'll hear Bunny say something that sums it up: "We can see why this was hardly used. It looks like the belt melted and has been like this for some time. The person who had it probably didn't know how to replace it."

I couldn't agree more, honey.But, to get to the head properly(which was the hardest part of the procedure), we had the unscrew the drive controller, removing a couple of small power plugs in the process(the wires felt weak and I was scared that they would come out. Margot wound up using my small flat-head to gently pry it off)

Now, these steps aren't really necessary to simply replace the belt. But, you have to remember, we had to clean the head. So, we finally got the head isolated. Since the rubber was really stuck on, we had to use a woodworking technique: Position the flat-head and move the wheel. This helped us scrape off the rubber.

This presented a new dilemma. We cleaned the majority of it. But, we needed it COMPLETELY CLEAN to put the new belt in. Otherwise, the new belt is going to stick the the residue from the old one and that one will break too.

Anyways, we remove the gunk, and after an hour, the unit is ready for the new belt. We place everything back. The hardest part was putting the drive back in. Since we couldn't use the tweezer trick here(not to my knowledge), we had to put the screws first and then match them up. I almost got it when Margot screamed at me like a bomb squad member: "WAIT! STOP!". She happened to notice a ground wire attached to a metal ring. It was meant to be attached to the screw closest to the reset button. I took out the drive, put the wire on, and screwed it in place.

We closed it up and then tested it. The carts worked perfectly. Then, the real test: The disks. We knew they wouldn't load. But, what we wanted to hear was the motor running and the BIOS detecting that a disk was loaded. We popped in Mario 2 and it went to the "Now Loading" screen and hung. I put my ear to the unit and could hear the motor running and the disk spinning. Perfect! We knew that we did it right.

It ends there, but I did get the belt a few days later and pop it in which was an even more pain in the ass. I did something to the head in replacing the belt, but come to find out, I calibrated it on accident. It wound up working and I had it a year before I was hospitalized for medical problems and had huge bills from insurance not covering everything(we later got them to retroactively pay the bill), but it was too late. The Twin Fami was sold. I never DID get to do that review. Hopefully, when the stuff I ordered from 80sFreak arrives here, I finally will be able to.

THAT was my first and best memory of the Famicom

[ulera]

I dread the day my fds stops working. Although it was refurbished before shipping so hopefully it wont be for awhile.

[80sFREAK]

Nice story

About belts - keep in mind, that these units 25+ years old and electronics aren't a wine or cogniac .  I've seen same problem (melted belt) in some tape recorders from late 70's up to mid 80's, BUT some manufactures does not affected. I have no statistics, but i can say some taperecorders/walkmans still working fine, some units has melted belts and some other rubber parts and some units has "dried" cracky belts and other rubber parts.
Make long story short - i expect 5-10years of belts life.

Another "problem" waving around is about recapping "everything because it's too old". If some people interested in this i can start new thread and explain, why and when you do need recapping your electronics and when you don't.

[YoshiFan501]

if my belt is melted i just order a whole new drive part.

[egg_sanwich]

Nicely done! Changing the belt for the first time is definitely a hair-raising experience - but, like riding bike, can be replicated quite easily. Best of luck recreating the nostalgia!

[JohnnyBlaze]

That's mainly because I wrote it the night that I did it. It was fresh in my mind.