another shot at this: why do I get nothing off of my 10.8 atari arII for battlezone

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another shot at this: why do I get nothing off of my 10.8 atari arII for battlezone

any ideas?
 
I know you hate to pull out the brick but 10.3 comes from there..

Either the bridge rectifier is complete blown open which I don't think happen.

Or the fuse that goes to it is not making connection or is blown open F3..

Maybe the connector is not making a good connection. Have you measure the voltages from the connector without it being plugged in? Open in the wire will cause your issue too
 

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Ok thanks for breaking this down for me.

I went and pulled the fuse at F3, tested it, good. Went back to insert it and it seemed like it wasn't sitting flush in there. I tweaked the fuse holder a bit and re-inserted it. Tested for continuity between the 2 points outside the fuse and it was there. Wish I would have tested before I pulled the fuse, just for the information.

Anyway, that did the trick. I now have +12.23 at the 10.8. Is this going to work?
too high?
 
My experience.......the 10VDC line on these Atari games always reads approximately 12-14VDC. Yours looks fine to me. That juice will actually get regulated proper on the Audio/Regulator board.

Edward
 
Well the the 10.3 is unregulated. 12.3 does seem a little high. Did you measure it plugged in or not plugged in ?

My experience.......the 10VDC line on these Atari games always reads approximately 12-14VDC. Yours looks fine to me. That juice will actually get regulated proper on the Audio/Regulator board.

Edward
well the 12.23 is at the test point of the 10.8 on the a/r board.
 
well the 12.23 is at the test point of the 10.8 on the a/r board.

But if that is the test point for the input from the transformer brick, it is in the OK range. It took me a while to understand that unregulated is exactly that: UNREGULATED! So the values are not precise and don't really matter, as long as they are within an acceptable range. ELutz said this falls in the range he is used to seeing.

Measure A/C on that 10.8 test point (to ground) and post that value. If it is an OK value, you can move on to testing the output voltages from the AR2.
 
so I am ok to have my board going and test my monitor out tonight then it sounds like. I may toss that high score brase kit in there as well adn see what happens.
 
ok well I hooked up the monitor to give it a go, and R29 bunrt to a crisp instantly. caught on fire even.

took out the arII put a new resistor in R29 position, fired her back up (without the monitor connectored) and it was fine, didn't burn up.

Hooked up another known working monitor, fired her up, R29 starts smoking instantly, so I shut her off before it completely fried the resistor this time.

what next?
 
Check your edge connector, and pins for burns on the board. You're sense line on the AR board is not seeing 5v and it's trying to compensate. Thus burning up R29.
 
I've got no burnt pins on the edge connector of the board, either board.

Is the harness connector loose possibly? Not making good contact? Is that kind of what you mean?
 
Yes, you probably aren't getting a good 5V to the game board. Either the connector isn't making contact, or it's tarnished. After replacing R29 again, you can try jumping 5V from the AR II to a test point on the PCB. Then you'll have a known-good 5V line for testing.
 
well I wiggled the edge connector and all of a sudden got the rattle I was waiting for.
the game finally boots up to a nice screen, but it's intermittent, and goes away if you breathe on it. (bottom edge connector for the record)

It would coin up and the start button would flash but it wouldn't start.

so I go to get a working replacement button to test if the button is bad, but I can't get the game to boot back up again since then.

back to work after dinner.

obviously I am having edge connector issues.
what would you guys do to fix this?
I have soldered on a replacement edge connector on an asteroids before, is that the trick here?
replace the edge connector (seems like a bitch)
 
Well you could use a small screw driver and gentle bend the pins to make a better connection but in all honesty that is just a temp fix and the metal in the edge connectors is most likely lost it's spring and it just need to be replaced.
 
Well you could use a small screw driver and gentle bend the pins to make a better connection but in all honesty that is just a temp fix and the metal in the edge connectors is most likely lost it's spring and it just need to be replaced.

So guys actually clip the old harness off and go through the pain in the ass of re-pinning a new harness and hooking it up to all of the old wiring?
 
Just did this on my asteroids. You start by just removing the power pins from the connector and replacing them. With luck, the rest will make good enough contact, and you'll be good to go.

Pick up the split-pin extractor tool from Bob R. You can also snip the "ball" off a bobby pin, and use it (that's what I did, but it's a pain).

For my asteroids, all I needed to replace were the 5V pins. Everything else seems to make fine contact.
 
To get by until you get the split pins (assuming you don't have any), I'd do what alpha-tron mentioned, and try bending the pins out to make better contact.
 
Just did this on my asteroids. You start by just removing the power pins from the connector and replacing them. With luck, the rest will make good enough contact, and you'll be good to go.

Pick up the split-pin extractor tool from Bob R. You can also snip the "ball" off a bobby pin, and use it (that's what I did, but it's a pain).

For my asteroids, all I needed to replace were the 5V pins. Everything else seems to make fine contact.

Ok so you are talking about removing and replacing the current pins in the current harness, not chopping it off and replacing the whole plastic piece and all, of the harness.
I can do that.
 
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