earth ground question concerning trackballs

tron guy

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So I have a wacko that almost immediately upon purchase quit moving up and down.

Long story short, I finally get an extra set of trackball pcbs and decided to go ahead and put in a spare tonite.

To my delightful surprise, it worked. So I play a quick game, go back and do something else for a few. Then decide to play one more game.

I reach my hand inside the coin door and strap down the control panel locks, and coin up.

The mother fucker won't go up again.
check a lot of connectors, etc to no avail.

I did notice that most of the control panel is metal on the underside as well as the trackball casing and joystick casing all being metal.

I did not see an earthground strap connected to the panel anywhere. (though it may be connected in the molex I don't know, someone with a wacko would have to confirm or deny that)

My question:

Is the lack of earth ground either:
causing my trackball pcb not to work or
frying the mother fucker

or neither and someone has a better answer
 
It's possible it could be failing due to ESD without a ground strap. I don't have enough experience with trackballs to say for sure.
 
yeah I would like some solid information before I throw in another board and toast it.
 
I connected earth ground to the control panel strap (in the cabinet) I figured when I lock it, it will run through the cp as well.


can I get someone who knows... to tell me the likelihood that I fried the optics/pcbs.
 
if it's hooked up correctly I wouldn't think you would damage the optic unless it was just bad luck and ready to die or you have a voltage issue. I would look into the possibility that you have the wrong voltage going to the track ball. Either too high or low for that matter. Might also want to open up the track ball and be sure that everything that is supposed to be moving is and all components are in their correct places. Personally I wouldn't consider plugging in another optic board until I checked all other possible issues. Don't want to fry another one.
 
yeah I don't want to fry anything else.

I gotta say this trackball is pissing me off.

I did get some new optics, I need to see if they are interchangeable and maybe try to
rebuild the other ones.

guess I need to email bob roberts for this one.
 
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ok well bob's opinion is that there is almost no way it's an earth ground issue.
He didn't say 100%, but that was his opinion.

guess I need to start toying around. what a project this has been.
I just want to play some wacko.
 
in reality I could be talked out of it, but I want it to work first, before I go that route.
 
well I have it grounded to (earth) and now it's working. so that may or may not have been the issue. seems like it is.
 
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